Native Wisdom

From Jat Regiment Journal 1995, Bicentenary Issue.

Continuing my rant on alternative system of medicines from  here. 

 

 

 

 

I am not against allopathy but as our society gets more and more dependent on specialists , I feel we are losing sight of common sense approach to any issue, particularly health issues. 

This write up of mine was first published in Jat Veer 1995, Bicentenary issue of the Regimental Magazine . At that time I was only looking at the way our troops , the Jats, approached certain healthcare problems. Today, I feel we have rich knowledge base  of traditional systems of health care in every part of our country . Our life style today, has led to over-dependence on specialists . Traditional sources of  knowledge are being dismissed as  superstitions and quackery. I think we need to take a re-look at common sense approach to health care.


 It happened in Pithoragarh circa 1993. My constitution, particularly my extra-sensitive digestive system, has never been my strong point. But what happened to me recently (written in circa 1994) was something really abnormal. It all started around midnight and the rest of the night was punctuated by regular trips to the loo and back. Not unused to such a state I took it in my stride . Next morning, on consulting my better half, and after going through a number of possible reasons for the catastrophe, we decided on a plan of action. We believed that any organism heals itself if allowed to. If output is bad , the input should be examined, we reasoned. So it was decided that I would live on only salt and water (ORF) till I got okay. It suited my wife as well, as it was a day of fasting for her. 

Now, came the deviation from the familiar pattern of a self limiting problem. Every glass of water found its way out in record time. It was as if the entire alimentary canal was one straight tube. So, the doctor enters the scene. 

All he could do was to prescribe a heavy dose of some anti-diarrhoeal medicines and give me a ‘Sick in Quarters’ sentence that exempted me from going to office. 

Then we started on our home remedies. A pitcher full of buttermilk with a liberal dose of Asafoetida , ( hing) was made and I was to take a glassful every half an hour or so. 

In India everyone is a doctor and he or she knows exactly what is to be done . The maid servant arrived and gave her own  recipe for cure. I don’t remember what it was but fortunately for me, it was promptly ruled out by my wife.

My fauji helper then confided to me that , despite a well equipped military hospital in the cantonment, all our men depended on a particular sepoy to cure any stomach ailment. This gentlemen , I was told was ustad (expert) in settling the ‘nerves’. Here I must say , the troops were jats and their stomachs  were particularly sensitive to the quality of drinking water. The problem as spelt out by jats  is sort of untranslatable. It was  colloquially described as ‘dharn dig gaya’ . It could be loosely described as a nerve centre shifting a bit from its precise location .

Mind you ,we were educated and hence very skeptical . But then we were always open to new ideas like resetting a nerve to cure diarrhoea ! 

Enter Lance Naik Ranbir……

A rug was spread on the floor and I had to lie down for examination. So, with a bellyful of medicines and buttermilk with asaphotida , I surrendered myself to the ministrations of Lance naik. He tentatively put a hand on my naval and started probing; with a sudden pressure , he evinced a sharp cry from me at one spot. Now fully convinced of the cause of the problem, he proceeded with the treatment. I was placed belly down with a tightly folded cloth under my naval. Then , deliberately he went on to  pluck the flesh on the back of the thighs on each leg , and  then  he declared I was okay. No, not yet, I was to consume some ‘mithi cheez’ (something sweet) preferably halwa to ensure that the nerve center stayed in place. This was a little too much even for our wide open minds. Anyway, after a little hesitation he agreed that lassi without the hing would do. 

Presto! I became okay. No More discomfort in the stomach and no more trips to the loo. Only thing ; my skeptic mind was quite shaken up by the entire episode. What had caused the problem and how was it cured ? 

The question prompted me to find out about other native remedies. One interesting fact was that sciatica ,called rangar among our troops, was often treated  with a great degree of success, by ‘clearing certain veins in the legs of bad blood’ .

Why don’t the scientifically trained doctors recognize other methods for cure , particularly when they themselves were clueless and were only experimenting, trying out various approaches?

With this incident , I was reminded of what our one year old son had gone  through. It was also so similar . We had gone to a pediatrician and had tried out various medicines and when nothing worked , the doctor  had prescribed a change of diet  to horrible smelling soya bean milk powder from the regular milk powder. Finally it was an old woman, a maid servant, who offered to provide a cure in her desi way. As we had been through so much of ‘scientific’ treatments with no results, we readily agreed. She said the intestines had got  entangled and with gentle patting on the stomach , brought it to normal position. All was okay. This possibility never occurred to the pediatrician ! 

Whatever, I do not say that home remedy is the best solution, but would love to hear our doctors, when they don’t know something , simply  say “We are clueless of the cause or remedies “ instead of using words like ‘idiopathic ‘ or ‘prophylactic treatment ‘ to carry on with  their ‘scientific’ experiments. 

I also wish they look at some of the home remedies with an open mind. We are losing our common sense approach to ailments. At this rate , some day, to stop hiccups , we would be running to doctors and specialists instead of looking for a glass of water.

6 thoughts on “Native Wisdom”

  1. Local remedies do work but can turned out to be life threatening if attempted by unskilled person not having proper knowledge and practical orientation of problems. I don’t know whether they are effective in long term.

    1. I agree. My experience has been that most of the desi solutions, coupled with yama and niyama are for long term .

  2. Yes! Local, native remedies do help – and as you rightly said… long term discipline. I’m sure all of us must have sometime or the other in our life time have tried these local treatments and with results. We need to respect that and not brand it as quackery.

  3. Yes traditional medicine, that has followed the shruti lore has always played an important and successful role in the well-being of humans. According to me, one of the most important factor in this has been the strong belief and faith in the system. Couple it with Love sans money and you have the right vibrations to effect cure.

  4. I can vouch for the dharn part, for I saw it being treated by ustads a hundred times or more. It’s indicated not just in diarrhoea, but also in headaches, vomitting, vertigo and such. Doctors would keep treating for symptoms and fail, since such an ailment is not there in their books.
    Native treatments, even nazar-utaarna and jhad-phoonk deserve more respect than the dismissive ridicule they derive presently under the misplaced modicum of “challenge existing thought”. Chronicle them, look for experts, carry out trials, why not? Afterall they wouldn’t have survived a century of dismissal had they not been effective.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *