CSIR, Ayush to start drive for herbal drugs discovery

New Delhi: In a move aimed at promoting traditional medicines, the Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR) is all set to start a major campaign to discover new drugs from ayurvedic formulations with the help of its three dozen laboratories.

An agreement has also been signed between CSIR and AYUSH Ministry to expedite the research work and both the departments have expressed their hope that their joint efforts would help in the discovery of new ayurvedic drugs for curing lifestyle-based new diseases.

"As the CSIR has a record of developing herbal medicines, so the expertise of CSIR would help Ayush Ministry in findings out new ayurvedic formulations. The CSIR developed anti-diabetic ayurvedic drug BGR 34 has proved a milestone in curing diabetic disease," a CSIR official said, adding that it's a scientifically developed drug that has been produced by completing various medical tests and is proving very beneficial in controlling diabetes.

According to the CSIR official, the joint programme would focus on developing new medicines through extensive research work.

The agreement to explore new herbal drugs was signed by CSIR DG Shekhar C Mande and Ayush Secretary Rajesh Kotecha. As per the pact, both the departments would initiate two programmes – one would be on traditional knowledge inspired drug discovery while the other would be on food age medicine.

Notably, both the departments --- CSIR and Ayush -- have already developed Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) in which all the formulae of Ayurveda has been written in many foreign languages.