NE LEGAL BUREAU
CHENNAI, JULY 10
The Madras High Court came down on the Central and the Tamil Nadu governments for not considering or verifying claims of cure available for COVID-19 in Siddha medicines and said it seemed vested interests were acting against development of the indigenous drugs here on Thursday.
The court directed the state government to file a report by July 23 as to the number of such cures forwarded to the government and action taken on them.
The interim order was passed by a division bench of Justice N Kirubakaran and Justice V M Velumani during the hearing of a plea challenging detention of Siddha doctor V Thanikasalam under Goondas Act for claiming he had found a cure for the pandemic.
The apathetic attitude of the governments was not going to help anyone when the entire world is desperately looking for a solution to cure COVID-19, the bench said. “If the medicines developed by qualified Siddha doctors are not recognised and sent for analysis by the state government to the AYUSH department, the very purpose of having Siddha institutes and Siddha medical colleges would be lost,” the judges said. It seemed vested interests are acting against development of Siddha, which is why the indigenous medicines are not properly promoted and published in the media, the bench said.
Noting how a Siddha doctor was forced to approach the Madurai Bench of the court to get a medicine that he found to cure COVID-19 tested by the state government, the judges said he has come out with a drug about three months ago during the initial stages of the pandemic. If the state had been prompt enough to analyse the medicine properly and recommend the same to the AYUSH, by this time, the new Siddha medicine would have been recognised and the doctor, who developed it and its efficacy, would have been popular throughout the country.
It is said that in all the hospitals, including private hospitals, ”kabasura kudineer” (a herbal dicoction) is given to COVID-19 patients apart from immunity-boosting medicines like vitamin C and zinc tablets and paracetamol and antibiotics, in case of fever. Therefore, the government has to come out with a statement as to what are the medicines given for patients in Tamil Nadu and as to whether Siddha medicines play a vital role in curing the infection, the court said.
The Madurai Bench on July 7 had directed the Centre and the central councils of Ayurveda and Siddha to take immediate steps for verifying the efficacy of the drug “IMPRO”, a mix of 66 herbs, developed by Siddha doctor S Subramanian.
