Nirendra Dev in Kohima 1990
In the business of pharmaceuticals, it is probably recording the highest growth sale. Suddenly a variety of over-the-counter aggressively advertised ‘energy rechargers’ are flooding the market, all aimed at the urban Indian male over 30.
Aphrodisiac health tonic or whatever it is marketed as, most of the pills contain the stimulae Ginseng, the wonder herb of the ancient Chinese, believed to cure all ailments.
The Indian drug manufacturers are obtaining the herb primarily from South Korea now and demand, K Gopalakrishnan of Glenmark Pharmaceuticals told ‘India Today’ recently – “is growing at the rate of 80 per cent annually”. For Glenmark and its rivals, however, there is good news from the northeast.
Botanists in Nagaland say they have discovered the magic herb in the mountainous wilds of the state.
“We have it here in India as we had always believed,” Sapu Changkija, regional director of Sophisticated Instrumentation Centre, Shillong.
Changkija first made the claim in October 1989 but this has since touched off a minor battle for credit, with a local practitioner Dr Somba Chang saying it was he who first discovered Ginseng in Nagaland.
Somba has in fact even named the Naga plant after himself, calling it Panax Somba.
True Ginseng that the Chinese prize has the scientific name Panax Schinseng while a North American variety,used as a substitute but now almost extinct is called Panax Quinquefolius.
Panax comes from the Greek words ‘pan’ meaning all and ‘akos’ for cure. The English word Panacea incidentally is similarly derived.
Somba says he first chanced upon the herbs in August 1985 in the northeastern Changsang forest on the Saramati mountain range not far from the Burmese (Myanmar) border.
Two years later, he also earned a certificate from the Department of Botany in the North Eastern Hill University(NEHU) in Shillong (headquartered) to practice as a herbalist and he now (that is 1990) treats several patientseveryday at his clinic in Nagaland’s Tuensang district.
The state government granted him financial assistance of Rs 20,000 to run the clinic.
“He can treat people with any disease,” said one of his patients and an admirer.
“I could never imagine I would be a herbalist,” said Somba and recounted how a film he had seen 30 years ago led him on this search for the wonder herb.
“The film was ‘Ramayana’ in Hindi and I saw it in 1996. I saw how Hanuman brought the herb Sanjeevani from the Himalayas to save Lakshman. Later I learnt from the Ramayan text that the medicinal herb was of yellow colour. Then in a Chinese magazine, I saw a colour picture of Ginseng and immediately I knew it was the same Sanjeevani of the Ramayan.
That inspired me to undertake my search more earnestly and at last I was rewarded by the discovery of the wonder drug in Nagaland”.
Sapu Changkija made his ‘discovery’ of Ginseng in the Japfu range and describes the plants as 30 to 50 cm tall having five to six compound leaflets.
It grows in highly shaded, deep loamy soil at high altitudes, preferably in thick forest rich in humus or disintegrating organic matter.
That description does not tally with Somba’s Ginseng plants which, he says, are 60-70 cm tall having green fruits which turn red when ripe.
Changkija’s discovery, in fact, is (was in 1990) seen with a degree of skepticism by the Nagaland government.
“The Economic Plants Cell of the state’s Department of Industry has not yet recognised his claim,” said Y Jamir, a senior official of the department.
“The claim may be true or false, we can’t say yet (that is 1990). We have not heard anything. But the Saramati and Japfu mountain ranges have similar topographical conditions so this second discovery should not be surprising”.
Changkija says he began his search in 1985. “My wife was of great help,” he said.
“No, I received no financial assistance from the government. But I did not ask for it either”.
He believes there are three varieties of the herb growing in the wilds of Nagaland and perhaps one in Arunachal Pradesh too. “Perhaps, the Naga people, who came from southeast Asia, once knew the curative properties of the plant. But later forgot”.
Because of its rarity and its supposed magical properties, Ginseng has always been surrounded by an aura of mystery.
But for the people of Nagaland, the discovery could well usher a boom of sorts with not only the Indian drug manufacturers but also firms from the west flocking the state.
Says Changkija: “The fleshy root of Ginseng is as precious as gold”.
In the US, some firms are already trying to grow the plant artificially, he said, and Nagaland could greatly benefit from the herb’s discovery.
(This was the story of Ginseng discovery in Naga hills cradled in the wilds of northeast India in 1990; but sadly nothing much happened on that front as politicians and the administration in general focused on ‘politics, insurgency, law and order and so called peace talks.)