118
Ayurveda
: Ancient Heritage in the Age of Globalisation
special effect (prabhaava) and the effect on physiological
systems (Karma). As examples we have listed here sesame
oil, ghee and honey which are the best medicines for Vata,
Pitta and Kapha respectively. You can find how sesame
oil is understood based on rasa is pungent, its quality is
unctuous, its virya or potency is hot and its post digestive
taste ispungentanditsKarma isVatabalancing. Prabhaava
or the special effect is an unpredictable effect of a product
which defy the logical details of the other properties. Ghee
it is sweet in taste, unctuous in property, cold in potency
and the post-digestive taste is sweet. Cold things are
supposed to diminish the digestive process but here it
aggravates it. So it is a special effect of ghee. It is Pitta
balancing. Honey is sweet to taste, it is dry in quality,
hot in potency, pungent in post digestive taste and it is
Kapha balancing. So though, it is sweet in taste, after
the digestion, it becomes pungent. It also has scraping
property and that is why sweet honey is used in diabetes.
There are few plants which are very commonly
used in Ayurveda. In south India, we take it as
Brahmi
and this is having an effect on the brain, improving the
memory and very widely used in conditions affecting
memory and all like.
Then, it is
guggulu
.
The purified form of
guggulu
is available in
the exhibition hall. You can have a look. It is Withania
