Ethnomedicine and Tribal Healing Practices in India: Challenges and Possibilities of Recognition and Integration

371 Pages·2023·7.281 MB·English

by  Sunita Reddy, Nemthianngai Guite, Bamdev Subedi

People, Cultures and Societies:
Exploring and Documenting Diversities
Sunita Reddy
Nemthianngai Guite
Bamdev Subedi Editors
Ethnomedicine
and Tribal Healing
Practices in India
Challenges and Possibilities of
Recognition and Integration
People, Cultures and Societies: Exploring
and Documenting Diversities
Series Editors
Sunita Reddy, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, Delhi, India
Sanghmitra S. Acharya, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University,
New Delhi, Delhi, India
Editorial Board
Tulsi Patel, Department of Sociology, University of Delhi, New Delhi, Delhi, India
Ash Narain Roy, New Delhi, India
Ramesh C. Gaur, Central Library, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, Delhi,
India
Robert Tian, School of Business, Huaihua University, Hunan, China
Maisam Najafizada, Faculty of Medicine, Memorial University, St. John’s, NL,
Canada
Shalina Mehta, Panjab University, Chandigarh, Punjab, India
K. K. Mishra, Motilal Nehru National Institute of Technology, Allahabad,
Uttar Pradesh, India
Alison L. Kahn, Stanford University Overseas Program, Oxford, UK
The series proposes to capture the diversities in people and their communities in
India. It provides a unique and innovative resource for anthropological knowledge,
philosophy, methods, and tools to understand, analyse and formulate sustainable,
innovative solutions to address socio-cultural issues in India.
India is a repository of varied cultures and diversities. With the globalisation and
development process, the cultural fabric is changing. Customs, traditions, beliefs,
on one hand, food habits, art and craft, weaving, dyeing, and handloom artefacts,
on the other, are undergoing a metamorphosis. It is imperative to explore, under-
stand and document the process of changing diversity and relational inequalities.
The series encompasses richness in art, craft, language, dance, music, folklore, food
culture and beliefs, traditions and practices. It addresses the issues of development
disparities, inequality, and segregation on the axes of caste, class, religion, region,
ethnicity, and gender. The series publishes methodologically rigorous and theoret-
ically sound, critical and comparative, empirical research peer-reviewed volumes
related to non-codified healing practices, gender-based violence, migration induced
vulnerabilities, child abuse, social identity-based work on a national, regional and
local level, welcoming case studies, as well as comparative and applied research.
The series is of interest to the academicians and students in the discipline of
sociology, anthropology, psychology, social work, history, philosophy, and public
health, and to all of those interested in a wide-ranging overview of art, culture, and
politics. It accepts monographs, edited volumes, and textbooks.
· ·
Sunita Reddy Nemthianngai Guite
Bamdev Subedi
Editors
Ethnomedicine and Tribal
Healing Practices in India
Challenges and Possibilities of Recognition
and Integration
Editors
Sunita Reddy Nemthianngai Guite
School of Social Science, Center of Social School of Social Science, Center of Social
Medicine and Community Health Medicine and Community Health
Jawaharlal Nehru University Jawaharlal Nehru University
New Delhi, Delhi, India New Delhi, Delhi, India
Bamdev Subedi
Kathmandu, Nepal
ISSN 2662-6616 ISSN 2662-6624 (electronic)
People, Cultures and Societies: Exploring and Documenting Diversities
ISBN 978-981-19-4285-3 ISBN 978-981-19-4286-0 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-4286-0
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature
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Anthropos India Foundation (AIF)
Anthropos India Foundation (AIF) is a trust founded in October 2011 and registered
in Delhi. AIF’s aim is to promote the discipline of Anthropology, its philosophy
and methods, because the subject has huge potential to engage with all spheres of
life. Therefore, the trust actively peruse and encourage Applied and Action Research.
Through action research the foundation particularly reach out to women, children and
other marginalized sections of the society with a focus on health, education and child
rights. AIF, through its work, seeks to address issues in the local/ regional context
based on the ‘emic’ perspectives and practices bottom up approach to solve the prob-
lems faced by the communities. AIF carries out community-based research, provide
advocacy and policy recommendations and while doing so it takes into account,
local knowledge systems, the perspective of common people and work with sincere
appreciation and respect towards local culture and ecology. Besides conducting
community-based action research, the foundation regularly organizes guest lectures
by eminent anthropologists, social scientists and maintain an e-resources to be shared
through the official website. AIF also promotes Visual Anthropology through vibrant,
authentic, meaningful ethnographic films and photo documentation. More details can
be accessed on www.anthroposindiafoundation.com
v
Preface
I am delighted to bring out this volume and hope that this will stimulate further interest
among students, academicians, researchers, indigenous rights activists, planners and
policy makers on the issues of recognition and integration of indigenous healing prac-
tices. The idea of this volume was conceived at the national seminar on “Indigenous
Healing Practices among the Tribes: Challenges in Recognizing and Mainstream-
ing” held in 2016 in Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. The seminar could
not have taken place without the financial support from Indian Council of Social
Science Research (ICSSR). Further support came to Anthropos India Foundation
(AIF) from Indira Gandhi National Centre for Arts (IGNCA) to conduct research in
selected states of North East. Further support came in from ICSSR funded project
to Dr. Nemthinngai Guite and myself to conduct research in North East States. The
study ‘Traditional Healing Practices and Health Care Utilization among Women and
Children: A Study in four North Eastern States’ was carried out during 2018–2020.
This volume comprises chapters contributed by young and eminent scholars
providing a robust background on many issues of indigenous healing practices among
the different tribes in India based on empirical research not just by anthropolo-
gists but also from Ayurvedic doctors, public health specialists and practitioners and
promoters who are conserving local health traditions. The contributors of this volume
draw attention to many important aspects of ethnomedicine and indigenous healing
and at the same time, share the possibilities of recognition, conservation, promotion,
revitalization, integration and mainstreaming of local health traditions.
Further this volume opens up avenues for further research on this theme, which
has so far received scant attention. In a way this is an effort to advance the theme of
recognition and integration of indigenous traditional medicine that existed across the
tribal populations. We are grateful to our distinguished scholars for the deliberations
and discussion on many issues of ethnomedicine and to have contributed to this
volume.
vii
viii Preface
Anthropos India Foundation will take forward advocacy with the Ministry of
Tribal Affairs and Ministry of Ayush to ensure the recognition and rights of the tribal
healers along with other stakeholders.
New Delhi, India Sunita Reddy
Founder Chair, Anthropos India
Foundation
Acknowledgements
It gives us immense pleasure to express our gratitude to many people and institutions
who helped us put this volume together. This book got conceived while organizing
a seminar titled “Indigenous Healing Practices among the Tribes: Challenges in
Recognizing and Mainstreaming”, held on 10–11 February 2017, at Jawaharlal Nehru
University (JNU). We want to thank Indian Council for Social Science Research
(ICSSR) and Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR) for financially supporting
the seminar. It was great teamwork with our students who helped organize this
seminar; some have also contributed to this volume. Thanks to Bamdev Subedi,
Tshering Lepcha, Asem Tomba, Farzana, Alok Patra, Ashwini, and Minakshi. Special
thanks to our friends, Dr Harimohan and our colleague Prof. Sanghmitra Acharya for
their constant support and guidance. We are also thankful to the staff and the faculty
for their support from the Center of Social Medicine and Community Health, JNU.
We also like to thank the staff of the Research and Development cell of JNU.
We are grateful to all the authors who reposed faith in us and patiently updated the
papers for submission in this edited volume. Special thanks to Prof. R. K. Mutatkar for
reviewing chapters and Ms. Rosemary Sebastian for language editing. Our sincere
appreciation for the three unknown reviewers for their valuable comments on the
manuscript helped reorganize and revise the book. Our gratitude goes to all the
healers who shared their issues, challenges during our respective fieldwork. We all
hope that this book will help make policies for recognizing, mainstreaming, and
integrating local health traditions, which is long and overdue on this subject.
Sunita Reddy
Nemthianngai Guite
Bamdev Subedi
ix
Contents
1 Introduction: Ethnomedicine and Tribal Healing Practices
in India: Challenges and Possibilities of Recognition
and Integration ............................................... 1
Sunita Reddy, Bamdev Subedi, and Nemthianngai Guite
Part I Historical and Critical Perspectives to Understand
Ethnomedicine and Healing Practices Among the Tribes
2 Practice and Praxis: A Critical Look at Medical Anthropology
in India ...................................................... 35
P. C. Joshi
3 Ethnomedicine as Public Health ................................ 45
R. K. Mutatkar
4 Biological Diversity Act 2002, an Implementation Challenges
in India: An Experience Sharing from Sikkim ................... 61
Bharat Kumar Pradhan
5 Chronicles of Exploitation: Practice and Practitioners
of Ethnomedicine in Quagmire of Market Dynamics
of Pharmacopoeia ............................................. 77
Shalina Mehta and Dinesh Kumar
6 Indigenous Healing Practices in the Himalayas: Use
of Medicinal Plants and Health Development in Nepal ............ 95
Madhusudan Subedi
Part II Healing Practices Among Various Tribes
7 Folk Healing Practices of the North-East States .................. 111
Shailaja Chandra
xi