Medicinal plants: Way to wellness !

Plants have been used in Ayurveda for their curative and preventive properties since Vedic period.

A rich knowledge on plants is available in Rigveda, Atharvaveda, Ayurveda and in other texts.
The Rigveda has documented about 67 medicinal plants, 81 species and Atharvaveda 290 species.

The Ayurvedic texts also described the clinical uses of thousands of medicinal plants with their characteristics and innate properties like, Karma ( action of the drug) and mode through which the a they exert their effects i.e. Guna ( properties like whether the drug is hot or cold) ,Rasa ( taste of the drug like sweet, sour, salty, pungent,  bitter and astringent  ), Veerya (the potency of the drug like hot or cold   ), Vipaka (attributes of drug assimilation   )  and Prabhava ( specific action of particular plant)

With the increasing esteem of herbal medicine and Ayurveda, use of medicinal plants is expected to rise globally.The popularity of herbs have increased because of side effects of synthetic drugs, development of resistance to many drugs like antibiotics, public awareness, population explosion, insufficient supply of drugs, high cost of synthetic drugs.

These Plants contain potent phytochemicals. Plant-based natural constituents can be derived from any part of the plant like bark, leaves, flowers, roots, fruits, seeds etc as any part of the plant contain active components. Many active compounds have been isolated from various plants so far.

In present era also Modern  research activities are focused on these plants for the development of new drugs as in the past.

Let's review some of the devine,  auspicious and important medicinal plants and their usage in Ayurveda one by one