Indian Medicinal Plants (Volume-1)

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This book consists of six hundred and thirty nine pages (639). The literature gives identification, availability and the code names by which these plants are known in various cities and areas and also the medicinal uses for which these plants are known. The author has made her best attempt to put the picture of each plant against the description so that the plants are readily identified. She has consulted and taken help from a number of books, chiefly being Wealth of India, (all the volumes in Hindi and English), Flora of British India by Hooker and Benthem, Flora of Madras, Bombay, Delhi, Upper Gangetic plan, Pachmari, and so on. She has also taken help from the Index Book of Chopra's Medicinal Plants, Johri's Index book on Economic Plants, Cactus and Flowering plants, Himalayan Flowers, A.C. Datta's Botany and other reference books given in the Index at the back of the last volume.

The present book is the first in the series of two volumes. However, if the need arises, a third volume shall be added.

The Author is B.Sc. Zoo. (Hons.), M.Sc. Zoology with specialization in Entomology from Delhi University. She has also worked as a research student in Pusa Institute I.A.R.I (Entomology Division) under the guidance of Dr. N.C. Pant who is a Senior and respected Professor in Entomology. She has 12 publications to her credit in I.A.R.I. Due to unavoidable circumstance, she could not complete her Ph. D. and therefore, to maintain herself worked for 20 years as a Museum Curator in Sri Venkateswara College, which was considered as Non-Teaching Job. Since it was her dream to write such a book, she started collecting material. For atleast 15 years she collected the material and there was nobody who would help her in publishing it. Yet her love and desire for the subject continued and one day she came in contact with Ayurved-Vikas Magazine and met the Editor Dr. Ashawni Shastri for subscribing for the Magazine in Harsha Bhawan, New Delhi. Dr. Shastri not only encouraged her but promised her to make her dream a reality. He has been a great help and a guide in this venture. She continues to feel indebted and grateful to him for the rest of her life.

The history of Medicine proves that the 'Indian Medicinal Plants' used to exercise some magical influence upon people all over the world. And this knowledge was supposed to be more popular with hermits than educated people At that time medicine prescribed by a hermit earned more favour and reputation than the one based on some test and experience But as time elapsed and education spread everywhere, people started believing in allopathic medicine and surgery.

Until about fifty years ago, a sudden shift towards Indian medicinal herbs has been realized and since then the demand is increasing by leaps The probable reason might be failure of English drugs in curing diseases completely. The cost of purchasing and the side effects of these medicines are few of the main causes due to which people have again shifted to Indian medicinal herbs which are much cheaper, more effective and do not have any side effects and these herbs do not suppress the disease but completely cure them. Easy availability of the herbs is another advantage Due to the increasing popularity of Indian herbal medicine, foreigners are also attracted to the extent that they have started doing research and getting our plants patented. For example 'neem' (Margosa) is one of the examples.

To overcome this situation and give our people a more thorough understanding of our medicinal plants and to make teaching more effective, this subject was introduced in schools, colleges and universities where the students were systematically taught characters of the plants to identify them with medicinal uses to make them aware and save their natural wealth In making this project successful the main hurdle was the recognition of the plant because howsoever perfect a student is in theory, he fails if he or she is unable to identify the plants.