State-patronised and funded Fraud in India

While returning from a visit to the train station in lucknow, i could not help noticing huge billboards announcing tall claims by ayurvedic practitioners for treatment of every malaise ,ranging from impotence to cancer. One cannot help note that the country whose Constitution declares a fundamental duty of citizens to promote scientific temper, actually abounds with all sorts of State-sponsored fraud.

Let us be very clear about the fact that none of the claims of Ayurved are backed by any systematic evidence. None of the ayurvedic medicines have ever undergone stringent tests to establish effectiveness and safety. I am not a doctor, and realizing this simple truth doesn't require a medical qualification: If any of the claims of ayurveda or other traditional therapies were proved to be effective and safe , these therapies would have been adopted into mainstream medical science. Any new drug or other therapy has to pass a stringent set of tests (" clinical trials " ) to establish both the effectiveness and safety ; such tests are very elaborate and stringent; and only on passing these does the drug regulatory authority approves the use of the particular therapy for the particular disease or symptoms. ( if a herbal preparation proves to be effective and safe for treating a set of symptoms , it would be included in the mainstream medicine )

Ayurvedic and other herbal preparations may or may not be effective, there is no way of telling this until the proper tests are carried out. What it means is that the large number of patients flocking to ayurvedic clinics are actually being duped by the unproven and unsubstantiated claims of herbal practitioners.

And what's truly amazing is that despite knowing very well that all the claims of ayurved and herbal medicine are hollow, unproven and unsubstantiated in the absence of any well-documented evidence, the Indian Government has decided to patronise these practices by recognizing and funding these, ostensibly in the name of promoting "indian cultural heritage ". One can easily see how the indian government has compromised with the health of so many gullible indians by exposing them to unproven treatments which might even be unsafe.

( From herbal medicines to spiritual ways of healing depression and anxiety , such alternative therapies are legal everywhere in the world. But only in India do they receive State patronage and funding in the absence of any credible systematic evidence .)