Chapter V

Contest for Space: Reconfiguration of Indigenous Medical ‘Systems’

5.1 Meaning of Āyuḷvedam /Ayurveda in the Late Nineteenth Century

5.2 Causes for the Construction of the Separate Medical Boundaries

5.2.1 Reconfiguration of Ayurveda

5.2.2 Trajectory of the Government Attitude and Intensification of

Contest

5.3 Constructing Siddha as a Separate Medical Realm

5.3.1 Revitalisation and Institutionalisation of Siddha Medicine

5.3.2 Constructing Alternative Medical Identity

5.3.3 Immortal Siddhas and Superiority of Siddha Medicine

5.4 Contest between Siddha and Ayurveda

5.5 Voices against Systemic Boundary Constructions

 Contest for Space: Reconfiguration of Indigenous Medical ‘Systems’

“The quest to revitalize indigenous medicine reflected a multi-pronged struggle for

cultural hegemony not only between the colonizer and the colonized, but also between
different classes within the colonized society.”
K.N. Panikkar1

At the dawn of the third decade of the twentieth century, there was a sudden upsurge in
the formation of Tamil Siddha medical associations, establishment of Siddha book publishing
societies and publication of Tamil Siddha medical journals in Colonial Tamil region. Criticism
against those who were using the term Āyuḷvedam/Ayurveda in their titles and voices against
the terming of Tamil medical texts as a part of Ayurveda emerged in the public sphere. A group
of Tamil physicians consistently propagated to avoid the application of nomenclatures like
Ayurveda, South Indian Ayurveda and Dravida Ayurveda to the medical practices based on
Tamil medical texts. For example, Virudai Sivagnana yogi, a Tamil physician held the title
Āyuḷveda Bāskara up to the second decade of the twentieth century but he avoided using this
title after the severe criticism of Tamil physicians in the 1920s.2 Emergence of new Siddha
medical associations like Tamil Vaidya Saṅgam (Tamil Medical Association) and Chennai
Māhāṇa Siddha Vaidya Saṅgam (Madras Presidency Siddha Medical Association), during the
third decade of the twentieth century, provided new titles like Vaidya Bōpathi, Vaidyāpathi and
Maruthuva Sirōṇmaṇi to physicians who followed the Tamil medical texts instead of titles
having the prefix Āyuḷvedam.3 Moreover, the title of the first conference of Tamil Medical
Association (1921), “Āyuḷveda Mahānāḍum Marunthu Kaṇkāṭchiyum (Āyuḷveda Conference
and Medical Exhibition)”, was rechristened “Tamil Vaidya Mahānāḍum Marunthu
Kaṇkāṭchiyum (Tamil Medical Conference and Medical Exhibition)” after the objections of
Tamil physicians. These changes reflected the tensions of the medical sphere in Colonial Tamil
region. Until the second decade of the twentieth century, Tamil physicians used the titles
having prefix Ayurveda/Āyuḷveda without any hesitation like Āyuḷveda Bāskara Kandasamy
Mudaliyar, Āyuḷveda Bāskara Subiramaniya Pandithar and also the Tamil medial texts were
considered as part and parcel of Ayurveda. But after that, there was a clarion call against this
claim. Why such drastic changes occurred in the minds of physicians? And what were the
circumstances of these changes? To know the answers, the medical history of Colonial Tamil

1
Panikkar, Colonialism, Culture and Resistance, 188.
2
Virudai Sivagnana Yogi, Oushada Prayōga Chandrigai (Tirunelveli: Norul Islam Press, 1911); idem, Siddha
Marundugaḷ, 1928.
3
Sivagnana Yogi, “Tamil Vaidya Saṅga Naḍavaḍikai,” 85-87; idem, Siddha Marundugal, 3-5.

222
region during the late nineteenth and the early part of the twentieth century should be
unravelled.

Until the late nineteenth century, heterogeneous medical practices with the overlapping
of textual and oral traditions in diverse languages were practiced by different physicians. These
medical practices did not have clearly defined boundaries. The medical sphere did not function
on the basis of systemic identities like the present times. In the case of the present Siddha
‘system’, its practices developed through a long period of time by borrowing from a number
of sources irrespective of territorial unit, language, racial group etc. These practices were
generally called as Āyuḷvedam/Ayurveda by the Siddhas and physicians, in the meaning that
they help for the longevity of people’s life. Ayurveda or Āyuḷvedam did not have any link with
language and racial identities before the twentieth century but from the early twentieth century,
it attained new meanings aligned with race, religion and language. Many historians and
researchers analysed in diverse ways about the relationship between Ayurveda and Siddha, and
concluded that Siddha came from Ayurveda or vice versa. At this juncture, the duty of the
historian is not only to analyse events and to infer the ‘systems’ from the way in which it is
understood today but rather to understand the circumstances and process in which the
heterogeneous medical practices were constructed in new systemic frameworks by probing the
forces at play.

The complexity of the systemic identities of Ayurveda and Siddha medicines was
inattentive realm of medical history of India. Historians of Indian medicine usually take a
‘system’ as a concrete body of knowledge without concerning its variations and
transformations. For instance, they looked upon the indigenous medical ‘systems’ of India such
as Ayurveda and Siddha as separate, compact, systemic entities rather than viewing their fragile
boundaries. According to Charles Leslie, Ayurveda was a medical system coming from remote
past along with social evolution of the tradition and intellectual coherence. He defined
Ayurveda based on textual boundaries without variations.4 The studies of Kenneth Zysk,
Dominik Wujastyk and Jan. G. Meulenbeld traced the evolution and growth of Ayurveda
during the pre-colonial times. These studies mostly focused on the history of Ayurveda,
especially, the problems of chronology, dating, concepts and its continuity.5 Likewise, studies
on the Siddha ‘system’ as a distinctive medical ‘system’ were presented by historians and

4
Leslie, “The Ambiguities of Medical Revivalism in Modern India,” 356-367.
5
Kenneth Zysk, Asceticism and Healing in Ancient India: Medicine in the Buddhist Monastery (Delhi: Motilal
Banarsidass, 1999); Jan. G. Meulenbeld and Dominik Wujastyk, Studies on Indian Medical History ((Delhi:
Motilal Banarsidass, 2001).

223
physicians narrating its development from the remote past of the glorious Sangam age along
with the genealogy of Siddhas, Siddha medical principles and drugs.6 Recent studies on Siddha
medicine by Roman Sieler and Brigitte Sebastia, highlight present day medical practices and
their complex links, on the basis of anthropological aspects.7 Apart from separate studies, the
relationship between Ayurveda and Siddha was studied and conclusions were reached that
Siddha came from Ayurveda or vice versa. Hartmut Scharfe compared the basic philosophies
for the concept of humoral theory in Ayurveda and Siddha and concluded that Siddha borrowed
the concept of humoral theory from Ayurveda, because the latter had the foundational
philosophy for its theory when Siddha medicine does not have it.8 K.H. Krishnamurthy and G.
Chandra Mouli’s study on Siddha ‘System’ of medicine compared the theory, pharmacopeia
and Siddhas of Ayurveda and Siddha medicines. The work concluded that the botanical wealth
of Siddha ‘system’ was not very different either in their varieties or in preparations in
comparison with what we had in Ayurveda.9 All these studies considered that Ayurveda and
Siddha were two distinctive medical ‘systems’ coming from the remote past during the Vedic
and Sangam periods respectively. These concrete systemic approaches made them to conclude
that copying or borrowing of knowledge had happened from one ‘system’ to another.

Recent studies by Jean Langford, Robert Pool, Wenzel Geissler, Guy Attewell and
Projit Bihari Mukharji have made the ‘systemic’ approach more complex.10 According to Guy
Attewell, the systems are not static, and instead, keep on changing their boundaries and nature
based on the circumstances. He pointed out that using the term ‘system’ to a particular
medicine, implies completeness and homogeneity, connoting internal coherence and
impression of consolidate continuity. But an analysis of the trajectory of medical systems

6
T.V. Sambasivam Pillai, Portions selected from the Introduction of Thiru. T.V. Sambasivam Pillai’s Tamil –
English (Cyclopaedic Dictionary) (Madras: Directorate of Indian medicine & Homeopathy, 1968); Kandaswamy
Pillai, History of Siddha Medicine (Chennai: Department of Indian Medicine & Homeopathy, 2012); Ramamurthi
Iyer, The Hand Book of Indian Medicine: The Germs of Siddha System (Delhi: Sri Satguru Publications, 1981);
R. Niranjana Devi, Teṉṉindiya Maruthuva Varalāru (Chennai: International institute of Tamil studies, 2004);
Chidambarathanu Pillai, Citta Maruttuva Amuthu (Chennai: Siddha Medical Literature Research Centre, 1991);
A. Shunmugavelan, Siddhar’s Science of Longevity and Kalpa Medicine of India (Madras: Directorate of Indian
medicine and Homeopathy, 1992).
7
Roman Sieler, “From Lineage Transmission to Transnational Distance Education: The Case of Siddha Varma
Medicine,” European Journal of Transnational Studies 5 (Spring 2013): 112-143; Sebastia, “Competing for
Medical Space,” 165-185.
8
Hartmut Scharfe, “The Doctrines of the Three Humors in Traditional Indian Medicine and Alleged Antiquity of
Tamil Siddha Medicine,” Journal of American Oriental Society 119 (Oct-Dec., 1999): 609- 629.
9
K.H. Krishnamurthy & G. Chandra Mouli, “Siddha System of Medicine: A Historical Appraisal,” Indian Journal
of History Of science 19, no. 1 (1984): 43-53.
10
Langford, Fluent Bodies, 2002; Robert Pool, “The Creation and Dissolution of Ethno Medical Systems in the
Medical Ethnography of Africa,” Africa 64, no.1 (1994): 1-20; Attewell, Refiguring Unani Tibb, 2007; Mukharji,
Nationalizing the Body, 2012; Robert Pool and Wenzel Geissler, Medical Anthropology (Maidenhead: Open
University Press, 2005).

224
reflects the opposite. In his study on Unani, he brought out that modern day Unani-tibb was the
outcome of its dialogues with medical modernity, introduced by the colonial government, and
the re-imagination of indigenous Unani physicians. Projit’s study on Daktari broke the concrete
boundary of the medical ‘system’. His work reflected the fluid nature of Western medicine and
its amalgamation with indigenous medical practices freely which resulted in a rise of a new
category of physicians in Bengal, called, Daktars.11 Jean Langford’s fascinating study on
Ayurveda confronted the application of the term ‘system’ to Ayurveda in the sense of
continuing from the remote past. She showed the varied layers of Ayurveda and the disjuncture
of practices among ayurvedic practitioners. Ultimately, she concluded that the present day
meanings and boundaries of Ayurveda and its unbroken historical past were constructed during
the period of the revitalisation movement. Anthropologists like Rebert Pool and Geissler,
rejected the availability of pure and original form of knowledge or body of knowledge as a
system, and, instead, they emphasised the syncretic nature of medical practices. The present
work follows their footstep and instead taking ‘system’ as a coherent single unchanging body
of knowledge, seeks to find out as to when and how boundaries of medical ‘systems’ were
constructed and what were the forces at play. The researcher adopts this technique to trace the
circumstances and processes during the late nineteenth and the early twentieth century in which
the heterogeneous medical practices of Colonial South India were (re)constructed in new
systemic framework. The present study also examines the opposition to these ‘systemic
constructions’ by some indigenous physicians as well.

The late nineteenth and the early decades of the twentieth century were very important
in the medical history of India as these centuries witnessed a transformative process. The
present day understandings, meanings and systemic boundaries of the medical ‘systems’ were
constructed, during this period, irrespective of Ayurveda and Siddha traditions. An exploration
of this transformation reflects the complications, tensions and contests within indigenous
medicines. Marginalisation and revitalisation of indigenous medicines and their contest with
Western medicine, changes of government attitude towards indigenous medical ‘systems’ and
opening of new opportunities to practitioners of indigenous medicines, political mobilisation
at national and regional level, cultural upheavals like superiority of Aryan and Dravidian
heritages and language struggles all over India impacted on plural medical practices. The
competing identities and constructions were contested against each other in the public sphere
and carried on a debate in the print journals and popular literature of the period. Print offered

11
Mukharji, Nationalizing the Body, 2012.

225
them the means for establishing their legitimacy as they used the print technology in full to
create an authentic space for their constructions. In this process, practitioners of indigenous
medicines (re)constructed their discourses through claims to glory of the vernacular languages
and particularistic identities embodied in the public sphere.

Until the dawn of the 20th century, language was used just for the purpose of
communication. Thereafter, as works of Sumathi Ramaswamy, Lisa Mitchell and Francesca
Orsini had identified, language became an indicator to define culture, to identify people and
was linked to community identity.12 This community consciousness based on language was
distinct from pre-colonial practices.13 Language had been mobilized to act not only as a new
object of emotion, but also as the imagined foundation for the reorganization of knowledge,
historical narratives, every day practices and literary production.14 During the early part of the
twentieth century, medical texts and practices were aligned with language, race and territorial
identity which were central to the reconstruction of medical ‘systems’ and their boundaries in
the claims to superiority of a particular race or language group and its culture. When Indian
intellectuals contested for the legitimisation of indigenous science vis a vis Western science,
they constructed discourses on indigenous science with some qualifiers like Hindu and Aryan
through which they tried to create a monolithic culture as the backbone of an imagined nation,
thereby creating tension in the structure of plural practices. Likewise, during the revitalisation
movement, Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians defined Ayurveda within the boundary of
Sanskrit language by which they connected ayurvedic medicine with the Aryan race. The
emergence of Tamil medical construction was the consequential process against this monolithic
construction. Moreover, during the second decade of the twentieth century, pressurising the
government through passing resolutions in Governor in Councils and in indigenous medical
conferences and, continuously writing about the step-motherly attitude of the colonial
government in journals increased along with the national movement. As result, the government
slightly changed its attitude and opened new packages for the development of indigenous
medicines and physicians like setting up of Koman Committee and Usman Committee.
Simultaneously, some corporations and municipalities extended their hands towards

12
Ramaswamy, Passions of the Tongue, 1997; Lisa Mitchell, Language, Emotion and Politics in South India: The
Making of a Mother Tongue (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2009); Francesca Orsini, The Hindi Public
Sphere 1920 – 1940: The Language and Literature in the Age of Nationalism (Delhi: Oxford University Press,
2002); Veena Naregal, Language Politics, Elites and the Public Sphere (New Delhi: Permanent Black, 2001).
13
Orsini, Hindi Public Sphere, 18.
14
Mitchell, Language, Emotion and Politics, 15.

226
indigenous medicines for their healthcare needs. These administrative changes brought new
opportunities to the practitioners of indigenous medicines which led to intensify the contest
among them for grabbing the newly obtained social and economic benefits.

The modern scholarship and common notions of Ayurveda and Siddha medical
traditions are being explained incessantly as two different medical ‘systems’ originating from
the remote past. Generally Ayurveda is characterised as a Sanskrit tradition, having an Aryan
heritage and using herbal medicine, while Siddha tradition is concomitant with the Tamil
language, Dravidian race and alchemy, and in using metals in the preparation of medicine.
These binary oppositions of Sanskrit-Tamil, Aryan-Dravidian and herbal-metal, mystify their
origins and obscure the real aspects of the medical ‘systems’ as these boundaries are quite
ambiguous. For example, the term “Tamil medicine” or “Tamil vaidyam” is used to denote
Siddha medicine, in which the prefix “Tamil” reflects that Siddha medical techniques and
practices which are to be located within Tamil language alone excluding the contribution of
other languages to medical knowledge. Moreover the construction provided above implies that
the Siddha belongs to a different realm, quite distinct from Ayurveda which is located in the
Sanskrit sphere and that Sanskrit texts were connected exclusively with Ayurveda. The
question was whether these binary aspects were coming from remote past or it was a
construction during the colonial period. To find out the reality, the present research focusses
on the meaning and boundary of Ayurveda during the late nineteenth century in Colonial Tamil
region.

5.1 Meaning of Āyuḷvedam /Ayurveda in the Late Nineteenth Century

Āyuḷvedam (presently Siddha) as mentioned in Tamil medical texts was a plural

medical practices that extend from practice of herbals to metals, tridoṣa theory to religious
rituals, tantra, yantra and charms. These texts were written in diverse languages such as Tamil,
Sanskrit and possibly in other Dravidian languages and encompassed medical knowledge from
the Arabs, Chinese and even Europeans. The flow of medical knowledge was not hindered by
territorial limits and developed by adopting and adapting plural practices in the pre-colonial
period. For example, the pulse examination (nāḍi pariṭchai) was not mentioned in the ancient
ayurvedic classics of Caraka Samhita, Sushruta Samhita and it was referred for the first time
in Cikitsa Kalika, a Sanskrit work on Ayurveda by Tistacarya (c.12th century) and later the
Sāraṅgadāra Samhita (c.14th century) explained it in a detailed manner. It is suggested that the

227
pulse examination was a gift of medical practices of the Tamil region to other regions.15
Similarly, alchemical aspects also might have been taken from China (Bhogar), Arabia (Yacob)
and North India (Natha and Rasa Siddhas) to Tamil region.16 Medical practices in the Tamil
region were not just written in Tamil language, as physicians selected Sanskrit language too.17
Apart from writing in Sanskrit, vernacularizing the text from Sanskrit to Tamil was continuous
process till the late nineteenth century. Vernacularizing Sanskrit medical texts into Tamil was
a customary process before the emergence of language based identity during the twentieth
century. The books of such importance are Agastya Māmuṉivar Aruḷiya Āyuḷvedam 1200,
Agastiyar Paripōraṇam, Agastiyar Nayaṉa Vithi 500, Nāgamuṉi Nayaṉa Vithi 500,
Jēvarakshāmirtham18, Vāda Sowmiyam 1200, etc. These books were later framed within the
boundaries of Siddha medicine. Modern scholarship sometimes unconsciously or wilfully
keeps the cultural and intellectual sphere of Sanskrit and Tamil sealed off from each other. A
number of scholars are seeking to find relations and exchanges between these two.19 According
to David Shulman and Yigal Bronner, during the second millennium, Sanskrit became
regionalised and served following primary sense: serving as an available and localised medium
in each and every region distinctly, it participated along with the vernaculars in the project of
inventing and elaborating distinctive regional cultures and identities. Sanskrit adapted some
aspects of vernaculars and vice versa.20

Āyuḷvedam in Tamil, can be derived from the words "āyuḷ (ayus)" and "vedam (veda)."
"Āyuḷ" means life and "Vedam" means knowledge or science that comprised heterogeneous
practices with rather flexible boundaries. Tamil texts reflected that Āyuḷvedam encompasses
both Sanskrit and Tamil texts and treatises, medicines herbals and metals and, founders both
North Indian and South Indian physicians in the late nineteenth century. Tamil medical texts

15
Krishnankutty, History of Ayurveda, 300-301; Kumar, “Probing History of Medicine,” 259-273; Sampath,
“Evolution and development of Siddha medicine,” 1-20; D. Suresh Kumar and P.R. Krishna Prasad, “The Chinese
Connection of Tamil Medicine,” Ancient Science of Life XI, no.3 & 4 (1992): 114-117.
16
Suresh and Krishna, “The Chinese Connection of Tamil Medicine,” 114-117; Kanchana “Divine Semen and
the Alchemical Conversion of Iramatevar,” 255-278; T.N. Ganapathy, The Philosophy of the Tamil Siddhas (New
Delhi: Indian Council of Philosophical Research, 2004).
17
During medieval times, medical treatises and others like bhakti songs etc. were written in Sanskrit and Tamil
languages without any hesitation in the Tamil region. Scholars suggest that more interactions had happened
between the Tamil and Sanskrit languages during the medieval times.
18
It is a Sanskrit book that was vernacularized by Subiramaniya Pandithar along compiled with other Tamil and
Sanskrit medical texts.
19
Kannan M. and Jennifer Clare, eds., Passages: Relationships between Tamil and Sanskrit (Pondicherry: Institut
Français de Pondichéry, 2009); Whitney Cox and Vincenzo Vergiani, eds., Bilingual Discourse and Cross-
cultural Fertilisation: Sanskrit and Tamil in Medieval India (Pondicherry: Institut Français de Pondichéry, 2013);
Yigal Bronner, David Shulman, “‘A Cloud Turned Goose’: Sanskrit in the vernacular millennium,” The Indian
Economic and Social History Review 43:1 (2006): 1-30.
20
Yigal Bronner, David Shulman, “‘A Cloud Turned Goose,’” 6.

228
never claimed medical practices as a Siddha ‘system’. Instead Siddhas and physicians
themselves called their medical practices as Āyuḷvedam which did not have at that time the
connotations of the word as it was constructed in the 20th century. Number of examples can be
provided for this claim. The books Bishajakalpam written by M. Jaganathum Naidoo,
Yūgimuṉiver Āyuḷvedam by Āyuḷveda Bāskara Kandasamy Mudaliyar, Swadēsha Vaithia
Rathṉam by S. Chandrasakher and even other texts reflected the earlier trend. For example,
Bishajakalpam and Yūgimuṉiver Āyuḷvedam provided a detailed description about Āyuḷvedam
and its medical texts and physicians. These books articulate Āyuḷvedam as a medical ‘system’
and the founders of the ‘system’ are specified as follows: Dhanwanthri, Asvinidevar, Indiran,
Agastiyar, Pulasthiyar, Sanagar, Sowmiyar, Susruthar, Bharathvasar, Viyasar and others are
honoured as North Indian physicians and Agastiyar, Pulasthiyar, Yugi, Tirumoolar,
Bhoganathar, Kalanginathar, Theraiyar, Sattai Muni, Konganar, Matcha Muni, Uromar,
Karuvurar, Korakker and others as South Indian physicians. Sanskrit medical texts include
Vaidyasāram, Vaidyasāra Saṅgiragam, Vaidya Sayaṉam, Vaidya Muththāram,
Yōgarathiṉavāḷi, Thiraviyavāḷi, Thirilōga Cintāmaṇi, Ārōkkiya Cintāmaṇi, Sura Cintāmaṇi,
Sāṅgiya Nidanam, Kumāra Thandiram, Rasaratṉa Samuchchaya Nigaṇḍu, Rasa Ratṉa
Saṇgiṉi, Rasaratṉākāram, Rasasāra Saṅgiragam, Rasa Pradēpigai, Salliya Thandiram,
Gnaṉa Bāskaram, Vārithamuṉi Nigaṇḍu, Dhanwanthri Nigaṇḍu, Caraka Thandiram, Sushruta
Thandiram, Aṣṭāṅga Hrdayam, etc., and Tamil medical texts comprise Ayurveda Bāsyam,
Agastiyar Perunthiraṭṭu (3 canto), Vaidya Cintāmaṇi, Vaidya Ratṉākāram, Karisal Sendūram
300, Kaṛpam 200, Thēraiyar Kāppiyam, Vaidya Paḷḷu, Guṇa Pāḍam, Kālaṅgināthar
Kuṛunthiraṭṭu – Perunthiraṭṭu, Bōgar 7000, Kaḻpam 700, Koṅgaṉar (3canto), Saṭṭai Muṉi (3
canto), Rāmadēvar Peru Nōl etc.21 It should be noted that these books and founders were not
divided on the basis of herbal and metal (alchemical) medicines. Moreover, Vaidya Rāja
Cintāmaṇi – a medical book of Dhanvantari Mahal of Saraboji was published in 1895 by
Gopala Pillai (print author) in which physicians of Mahal were divided into body physicians
(thēga vaidiyar), eye physicians (kaṇ vaidiyar), surgery physicians (raṇa vaidiyar) and poison
physicians (visha vaidiyar). Also different language books like Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu,
Kannada etc., were utilised for medical preparations.22 After the advent of Western medicine,
practitioners of indigenous medicines started pharmacies and published catalogues which

21
Kandasamy Mudaliyar, Ākkiyōṉ to Yūgimuṉiver Āyuḷvedam, by Yugimuni, comp. Kandasamy Mudaliyar
(Madras: Elakkaṇa Kaḷañsium Press, 1886), 16-22; M. Jaganathum Naidoo, Bishajakalpam, V-XV;
Chandrasakher, Swadēsha Vaithia Rathṉam, 1909.
22
Gopala Pillai, Vaidya Rāja Cintāmaṇi (Chennai: Ve. Na. Jubilee Press, 1895), 7.

229
reflected their consciousness about their medical ‘systems’. In 1893, a catalogue of Sri
Ambiganander Āyuḷveda hospital was published by its physician Srinivasa Iyer. He claimed
that the medicines of the pharmacy were prepared on the basis of Siddha Pulasthiya texts. His
meaning of Āyuḷveda intrinsically explained what his understanding of the ‘system’ was. Thus
the consciousness of physicians about the medical ‘system’ was the concept of Āyuḷvedam that
was not bound by language and was not premised upon a racial bias.

By the late nineteenth and the first decade of the twentieth century, Āyuḷvedam, as a
common name, used to denote plural medical practices comprising herbals, metals, charms,
rituals, yantra, tantra and even astrology which was based on Tamil, Sanskrit and even possibly
other Dravidian language medical texts. Āyuḷvedam was not conceived or understood in the
present rigid structure at that time even though it had same fundamental theory and methods.
There were no differences among physicians on the basis of language and race. Brahmin (later
considered as Aryan in Colonial Tamil region) and physicians like Veerama Munivar,
Muhammad Abdullah Sahib who belonged to other religions also used Tamil medical texts to
dispense medicine without any racial differences. Medical divisions on the basis of herbal and
metal (alchemical) had not emerged until the early decades of the twentieth century. The
historic moment of medical practices based on Tamil medical texts as Siddha medicine arrived
during the third decade of the twentieth century when Tamil physicians contested against their
marginalisation by Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians as well as practitioners of Western
medicine. The circumstances for the emergence of two separate medical systemic identities
during the early part of the twentieth century in the Tamil region need to be examined.

5.2 Causes for the Construction of the Separate Medical Boundaries

The medical sphere in Colonial Tamil region was severely transformed at the dawn of
the twentieth century which witnessed the revitalisation movement of indigenous medicines to
counter the hegemony of Western medicine. The process of revitalisation of indigenous
medicines was greatly influenced by the socio, political and cultural developments such as
emergence of nationalism and regionalism, Hindu nationalism and Tamil revivalism etc.
Further, the changes in the attitude of the government towards indigenous medicines and
enactment of the Government Act of 1919 played a prominent role in structuralising the
medical sphere of the Colonial Tamil region. In particular, three aspects were mainly
responsible for the changes in the medical sphere in Colonial Tamil region: (i) the
reconfiguration of Ayurveda, (ii) opening of new socio-economic opportunities by the colonial

230
state and (iii) Dravidian politics and socio-cultural movements in the Tamil region during the
first quarter of the twentieth century.

5.2.1 Reconfiguration of Ayurveda

Revitalisation of indigenous medicines not only included the process of the opening up
of new hospitals, schools and publishing books and journals but also reconfiguring systemic
meanings and boundaries. When contesting the scientific authority of Western medicine,
practitioners of indigenous medicines renegotiated that authority through translation and
reinterpretation of indigenous medical texts. In this process, practitioners of indigenous
medicines constructed a legitimate history and monolithic structure for Ayurveda. But the
process of revitalization of indigenous medicines was influenced profoundly by Hindu
nationalist ideologies which led ultimately to the construction of a new meaning to Ayurveda
that not merely countered the hegemony of Western medicine but also marginalised indigenous
medical practices not based on Sanskrit texts. While contesting with Western medicine for the
scientific authority, Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians constructed a boundary for authentic
Ayurveda which was propagated as rational and scientific. Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic
physicians tried to secularise their medicine through marginalising other indigenous practices
as superstitious and irrational and termed them as folk medicine though they were considered
as part of classical ayurvedic texts earlier.23 Apart from medical practices, Sanskrit-centric
ayurvedic physicians claimed the authenticity based on the language of the medical texts. They
constructed authentic Ayurveda on the basis of Sanskrit medical texts which ultimately
marginalised other regional medical texts. During the revitalisation movement, the medical
texts became the marker of legitimation and authenticity which also empowered the
practitioners. Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians, strictly fixing the origin of modern
Ayurveda in the ancient Sanskrit ayurvedic texts such as Caraka and Sushruta, ultimately
marginalised ayurvedic practices which evolved during the intervening centuries, with all of
its regional variations, innovations and developments. While claiming the authenticity of
Ayurveda based on Sanskrit classical medical texts, the medical texts written in regional
languages and physicians who practiced based on that texts were considered as illegitimate
medical practices and practitioners respectively.
During the late nineteenth and the early part of the twentieth century, ayurvedic
physicians started to propagate the superiority of Ayurveda and its importance by maintaining

23
Mukharji, “In-Disciplining Jwarasur,” 261-288; Idem, “Lokman, Chholeman and Manik Pir,” 720-738;
Abraham, “From the Vaidyam to Kerala Ayurveda,” 32-33.

231
good health in the public sphere. As has been discussed in the previous chapter, speeches and
journal writings of such physicians articulated the discourse of an indigenous scientific
tradition constructed by Aryan reformists, Orientalists and Indian scientists and thereby
provided a platform to equate the scientific credentials of Western medicine in the public
sphere. 24 It has been already brought out how the history of Ayurveda was taking the trajectory
of an unbroken lineage originating from the Vedic period and thus constituting a legitimate
textual practice that was complete in itself as a ‘system’ of indigenous scientific medicine.25
The contestation against the scientific authority of Western medicine became a part of the
Hindu nation - making project which was reflected in the writings of Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic
physicians.26 In this process, meanings and boundaries of Ayurveda were constructed within
Sanskrit language and Sanskrit Ayurveda was adopted as a scale to define itself as an
indigenous and authentic practice of the emerging Indian nation.

Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians constructed Ayurveda around the Hindu-Aryan-

Sanskrit axis in the early twentieth century. Ayurveda Sammelan leaders claimed that
canonised Sanskrit texts, Sanskrit treatises and Sanskrit educated practitioners were solely
representative of the legitimate and authentic Indian tradition. They promulgated that Sanskrit
knowledge became the prerequisite for studying Ayurveda and texts which were in vernacular
languages were not considered as authentic medical knowledge. Ayurvedic physicians of
Colonial South India like Pandit Gopalacharlu, Pandit Duraiswami Aiyangar, A. Lakshmipathi
and P.S. Varier defined Ayurveda based on Sanskrit language and Sanskrit texts. For examples,
P.S. Varier defined the medicine of Ayurveda as “System of medicine which has been dealt
with in such Sanskrit works as Caraka, Sushruta, Vagabhata, Vridha Vagabhata,
Bhavaprakāsha, Sāraṅgadāra, Rasaratṉa Samuchchaya and others.”27 Pandit D Gopalacharlu
wrote in his text about Ayurveda that the text of Ayurveda originally formed a part of Atharva
Veda – one of the four Vedas, admittedly the most ancient books in the world. It was followed
by the ancient rishis. Some of the eminent among them supplemented the original works with
the results of their experience. A very large mass of medical literature was the inevitable
consequence. The whole literature being in Sanskrit, which, in course of time, has become a
dead language, also tended much to make the ayurvedic system a sealed science to many.28

24
See. Chapter 4.
25
See. Part 4.8 in Chapter 4.
26
Sivaramakrishnan, “The Use of the Past in a Public Campaign,” 178-191.
27
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2 Vols. (Madras: Government
Publications, 1924), 2: 215.
28
Gopalacharlu, Ayurvedic Medicine, 14; idem, Ayurveda – The Arshaic System of Hindu Medicine, 1.

232
Likewise, when responding to the criticism of practitioners of Western medicine regarding the
authenticity of Ayurveda, Kaviraj Gananath Sen replied that before criticising Ayurveda,
practitioners of Western medicine had to find out authentic ayurvedic medical science. For
which, they should have the commendable knowledge of Sanskrit language. Otherwise,
understanding authentic ayurvedic medicine was not possible.29 These writings indicates that
Sanskrit language was made foundational for an unbroken tradition of Ayurveda and
vernacular languages and vernacular texts were excluded from the ayurvedic tradition.

Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians constantly contended that the main cause of the
waning popularity of the science of Ayurveda was the lack of knowledge of the Sanskrit texts
and treatises. The medical texts written in Sanskrit were projected as the sole authority on the
subject. For example, A. Lakshmipathi pointed out that the criticism of practitioners of Western
medicine on Ayurveda was mainly based on lack of knowledge of Sanskrit texts on the part of
people who professed to be ayurvedic physicians. So he requested the government and
ayurvedic professional bodies to take the necessary action to identify and eliminate quacks.30
Likewise, Pandit Duraiswami Aiyangar also indicated the cause for the fall of Ayurveda as
follows:

Presently, some are calling themselves as ayurvedic physicians after reading one
or two medical texts or after knowing to prepare one or two medicines. Most of
them have not studied courses such as anatomy, diagnostic techniques, Materia
Medica, symptoms of diseases etc., through the institutions which teach Ayurveda
with the help of authentic Sanskrit Texts. This is the main reason for the fall of
Ayurveda.31

During the third decade of the twentieth century, the responses of Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic
physicians to the Usman Committee reflected their perspective. Most of the physicians said
that the ayurvedic medical texts had been written only in Sanskrit language and vernacular
texts should not be a part of the ayurvedic corpus.

During the early decades of the twentieth century, All India Ayurveda Mahamandal and
All India Ayurveda Vidyapeeth emerged as very powerful bodies to define which knowledge
was legitimate and authentic. Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians propagated the importance

29
Gananath Sen, “Charges Against Ayurveda Answered,” VK 3, no 5 (1916): 99; idem, “A Word to Western
Medical Men,” VK 3, no 6 (1916): 121-122.
30
A. Lakshmipathi, “Why Should Local Boards Encouraged Ayurveda,” VK 4, no 5 (1917): 81-85.
31
Duraiswami Aiyangar, “How Can Our Medicine be Improved?,” VK 5, no 10 (1918):149.

233
of All India Ayurvedic Vidyapeeth and its courses. Even some physicians promulgated that
only those physicians who were certified by All India Ayurveda Vidyapeeth, were considered
as legitimate practitioners of Ayurveda. According to A. Lakshmipathi:
Of more than 30,000 Vaids in Madras Presidency, it is very difficult to distinguish
between the authentic and the fake practitioners. The All India Ayurveda
Mahamandal would have to work to identify the quacks by introducing tests for the
physicians. Only those who have passed the examination set by the All India
Ayurveda Mahamandal could become legitimate practitioners of Ayurveda.32

Kaviraj Gananath Sen gave the criteria for differentiating the authentic ayurvedic physicians
from quacks in his presidential address of All India Ayurvedic Conference. He stated that only
those practitioners who had completed the courses in the curriculum of the All India Ayurveda
Mahamandal would be qualified as ayurvedic physicians. Those who had studied at other
institutions not recognised by the Mahamandal or self-taught would be considered as quacks.33
Such rhetoric reflected the emerging popularity and power of All India Ayurveda Mahamandal
and All India Ayurveda Vidyapeeth. Ayurveda Mahamandal decided the courses, texts and
qualification of the students. It canonised Sanskrit ayurvedic texts only as a legitimate corpus
of Ayurveda such as Caraka, Sushruta, Mādhava Nidana, Aṣṭāṅga Hrdayam, Bhavaprakāsha,
Sāraṅgadāra Samhita, Rasaratṉa Samuchchaya and others.34 Vernacular language medical
texts were pushed outside the corpus of ayurvedic knowledge. Moreover, ayurvedic colleges
required prerequisite knowledge of Sanskrit language. All India Ayurveda Vidyapeeth
provided three courses such as Ayurveda Āchārya, Ayurveda Vishārath and Vidya. All these
examinations required qualifications similar or equal to the Vishārath or Āchārya level in
Sanskrit.35 Venkataramana Ayurveda College and Madras Ayurveda College in Madras
accepted only the students who had sufficient knowledge of Sanskrit language at least up to
Nāṭaka standard.36

In Colonial Tamil region too, writings of Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians

reflected the same sensitivity. Tamil medical texts and practitioners were marginalised by
Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians as happened in all other parts of the country. Sanskrit-

32
A. Lakshmipathi, “Principles of Ayurvedic Treatment,” VK 7, no 2 (1920): 29.
33
Gananath Sen, “The All India Ayurvedic Conference Presidential Address,” VK 7, no 5-6 (1920): 98-100.
34
Duraiswami Aiyangar, “Suggestions for the Improvement of the Ayurveda System,” VK 8, no 9, 10, 11 (1921):
91-99.
35
Duraiswami Aiyangar, “The All India Ayurveda Vidya Pita,” VK 6, no 8&9 (1919): 107.
36
D. Gopalacharlu, Ayurvedic Medicines, 20; Nāṭaka standard in Sanskrit language was criteria for the admission
in the Sanskrit Ayurveda course in Madras Ayurveda College. Apart from this, medical courses were taught in
Tamil and Telugu languages in the College.

234
centric ayurvedic physicians of Colonial Tamil region pushed Tamil medical texts and
practitioners outside the boundary of Ayurveda and called their practices as illegitimate.
Besides, they propagated that whatever worthy practices existed in Tamil medical texts were
all taken from Sanskrit texts. This type of rhetoric projected that whatever worthy features
found in Tamil medical texts were plagiarised versions of Sanskrit Ayurveda and those who
were practicing medicine based on Tamil texts were not authentic practitioners.

Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians criticised that Tamil physicians were responsible

for earning a negative reputation for Ayurveda among the public due to their inability to
diagnose and treat diseases while claiming themselves as ayurvedic physicians. Pandit
Duraiswami Aiyangar wrote in his work Sarngadhara Samhita (Sāraṅgadāra Samhita) that
Tamil medical texts of Siddhas such as Agastiyar, Theraiyar and Pulippani were considered
generally as ayurvedic texts. Undoubtedly, ayurvedic texts written in Sanskrit were the
foundation of all medical texts whether they were Greek, Unani, Chinese and even Tamil. But
all Tamil medical texts could not be taken as a part of Ayurveda. Tamil physicians who were
claiming themselves as a part of Ayurveda were doing so to get legitimacy in society even
though that claim about those texts could not be sustained.37 Further, Duraiswami Aiyangar
compared Sanskrit texts with Tamil medical texts and concluded that Tamil medical texts such
as Agastiyar Vaidya Kāviyam, Agastiyar Vaidyam, Agastiyar Paripōraṇam, Bōgar 700,
Yūgimuṉi 1000, Urōmarishi 500, Pulippāṇi 500 and so on did not have any details about
anatomy, surgery, embryology etc., which were very prominent in Sanskrit texts.38 He stated
in his Rasaratṉa Samuchchayam that Tamil medical texts originally written by Siddhas were
not available, and that the available texts were spurious documents. No texts available in Tamil
had detailed descriptions of alchemy equal to Sanskrit texts.39

While some Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians criticised Tamil medical texts, some
others targeted the practices of Tamil physicians. For instance, K. Siva Subramaniam wrote
about the past and present condition of indigenous medicines in which he attacked Tamil
physicians as illegitimate practitioners and threats to society. He criticised that the people who
were roaming about here and there, jobless and without knowledge, read one or two books to
become Vaids overnight and then project themselves as native doctors or ayurvedic physicians.

37
Duraiswami Aiyangar, Introduction to Sarngadhara Samhita, by Sarangadaran, trans. Duraiswami Aiyangar
(Madras: Vaidya Kalanidhi Office, 1915), XXII-XXIII.
38
Ibid.
39
Duraiswami Aiyangar, Introduction to Rasaratṉa Samuchchayam, by Vagabhata, trans. Duraiswami Aiyangar
(Madras: Vaidya Kalanidhi Office, 1931), 10.

235
These people started their practice to earn money without possessing the necessary medical
knowledge and thus have gotten a bad name to all ayurvedic physicians in society.
Undoubtedly, these Tamil physicians were threats to society.40 Likewise, Ayurveda Bhūsaṉ
P.G. Ganapathi Sastri, chief physician of Sri Lakshmi Prasanna Venkatesha Ayurvedic Free
Dispensary in Srirangam, had written about the ability of Tamil physician to diagnose diseases
that even though the diagnostic method of pulse (nāḍi pariṭchai) had been taken from Sanskrit
medical treatises into Tamil, physician should not depend on it solely. But Tamil physicians
were diagnosing diseases solely based on pulse examination which could not help to find
problems in the body accurately and they cheat the people by dispensing medicine without
knowing diseases correctly. At the same time, ayurvedic physicians were using Aṣṭa Sthāṉa
Pariksha emphasised in Sanskrit texts, to deduct diseases accurately and cure perfectly.41

When a group of Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians tried to project Tamil medical

texts and practices as inauthentic, some Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians accepted Tamil
medical treatises as authentic as much as Sanskrit treatises. In addition to it, they called medical
practices based on Tamil texts as ‘Agastya Vaidyam’ a distinct medical ‘system’ of South India.
For example, Pandit D Gopalacharlu wrote two books about Tamil medical practices entitled
Agastya Vaidyamu and Dhaksiṇa Bhārathamu. He stated that preparatory methods of alchemy
prescribed in Tamil texts were superior to and simpler than those methods recommended in the
Sanskrit treatises. He named the distinct practices of South India as ‘Agastya Vaidyam’. He,
further, added that the founders of this ‘system’ were eighteen Siddhas such as Tirumoolar,
Sattai Muni, Pulastiyar, and Yugi who did not have knowledge of Sanskrit and were exclusive
yogis of Tamil region. After analysing Tamil and Sanskrit medical texts, he concluded that
‘Agastya Vaidyam’ based on Tamil medical texts was found to be divergent from the medical
practices based on Sanskrit texts. However, systemic boundaries were fragile and the efforts of
physicians to identify the origin of the hybrid practices turned out to be futile.42 Thus such sort
of rhetoric regarding medical treatises was constantly debated in the public sphere leading to
the formation of a new axis, that is, Ayurveda-Aryan-Sanskrit, which helped to create a special
space for Ayurveda in the competing scenario. The new alignment of Ayurveda with Sanskrit
also led to the implication that whatever written in Sanskrit belongs to Aryans. Even though
there was a diverse estimation among ayurvedic physicians about the efficacy of medical

40
K. Siva Subramaniam, “The Indigenous Medicines: The Past and Present Conditions,” VK 8, no 12 (1921): 113-
114.
41
P.G. Ganapathi Sastri, “How to Diagnose the Diseases?,” VK 3, no.3 (1915): 57-58.
42
Gopalacharlu, Agastya Vaidyamu, 1914; idem, Dhakshiṇa Bhārathamu, 1917; S.S. Anandam, “Siddha Vaidya
Muṛaiyaipaṛṛi Panditha D. Gopalachariyāriṉ Virivuraiyiṉ Surukkam,” Maruthuvaṉ 1, no.7 (1929): 189-192.

236
practices based on Tamil texts, they pushed Tamil medical texts and practitioners outside the
boundary of Ayurveda. But before these constructions, the medical practices based on Tamil
texts were located within the boundary of Ayurveda. During the first quarter of the twentieth
century, Ayurveda was structuralised within the boundary of the Sanskrit language and Aryan
race and, whatever lay outside this boundary was not considered as Ayurveda and therefore not
genuine. This newly structured Ayurveda was accepted as the national medicine by Indian
National Congress in 1920.43

Almost simultaneously, the attitude of the colonial government towards indigenous

medicines changed gradually which led to the opening up new social and economic
opportunities to the practitioners of indigenous medicines. The appointment of Usman
Committee for recognition and encouragement of indigenous medicines after the formation of
the Justice party government created a stir in the medical sphere of Tamil region. Why there
was a sudden activity after the formation of Usman Committee? To find the answer, an analysis
of the circumstances which brought about a change in the attitude of government in favour of
indigenous medicines and how that change impacted on the medical sphere of Colonial Tamil
region is inevitable.

5.2.2 Trajectory of the Government Attitude and Intensification of Contest

Until the second decade of the twentieth century, indigenous medicines were
considered as a local tradition and treated in step-motherly attitude. Though the colonial state
utilised practitioners of indigenous medicines for a particular cause, indigenous medicines were
not accepted as universal. The colonial government allocated financial help to develop Western
medicine and left indigenous medicines on their own. But sometimes, the Corporation of
Madras contributed financial support to certain ayurvedic hospitals located in Madras city with
some degree of regulations.44 The scenario changed gradually along with the emergence of the
national movement which pressurised the government to consider the development of
indigenous medicines. Moreover, Government of India Act of 1919 provided some autonomy
to the Indians in matters of health of the Indians and the fate of indigenous medicines.
Gradually, number of local bodies and corporations were willing to open indigenous
dispensaries and hospitals and, recruit practitioners of indigenous medicines for them which
opened new possibilities and opportunities to the marginalised practitioners of indigenous

43
Jaggi, Western Medicine in India, 18.
44
G.O. No. 1171, Municipal, dated 27.7.1911.

237
medicines. Besides, the formation of Usman Committee headed by Muhamad Usman for the
recognition and encouragement of indigenous medicines such as Ayurveda and Unani
intensified the contest among practitioners of indigenous medicines regarding the legitimacy
and authenticity of their respective medicines.

Before 1919, the support for the advancement of indigenous medicines was hardly
forthcoming, even though indigenous medicines and practitioners were used by practitioners
of Western medicine and the colonial government. But, the emergence of national movement
pressurised the colonial government to support indigenous medicines. The members of Central
and Provincial Legislative Councils, native newspapers and practitioners of indigenous
medicines continuously raised their voices for the development of indigenous medicines for
the betterment of health of the indigenous population. From 1911 onwards, resolutions in
favour of indigenous medicines were introduced in the Governor in Council and, Central and
Provincial Legislative Councils by the members of the respective Councils. Some important
ones are Seshagiri Aiyar’s resolution (1911) to make enquiries concerning the schools and
colleges of indigenous medicines; Krishna Rao’s resolution to direct a research and
investigation of the ayurvedic system of medicine with a view to encourage that system (1914
& 1915); and another resolution of Krishna Rao to appoint a special officer to investigate the
Ayurveda and Unani systems of medicine with a view to encourage and improve the systems
(1917). The first two resolutions failed in the council but the third one was accepted in the
modified form meant to investigate indigenous drugs rather than indigenous medical systems.45
Even though attitude of the colonial government was negative on financial aids to indigenous
medicines, the continuous approach of the Madras Corporation pushed the government to
sanction some financial contributions to ayurvedic dispensaries located in Madras city with
much reluctance.46

Practitioners of indigenous medicines and native newspapers continuously attacked the

attitude of the government and demanded the government to come forward to the support of
indigenous medicines. For instance, A. Lakshmipathi demanded the local boards and
corporations to support indigenous medicines due to the inadequacy of practitioners of Western
medicine and still ninety percentage of Indian population depended on indigenous medicines.47

45
G.O. No. 90, Public, dated 23.1.1912; G.O. No. 98, Public, dated 20.1.1916; G.O. No. 285, Medical, dated
27.6.1917; Duraiswami Aiyangar, “Our Legislative Council and the Indigenous Systems of Medicine,” VK 2, no.3
(1914): 63-65.
46
G.O. No. 1171, Municipal, dated 27.7.1911.
47
Lakshmipathi, “Why Should Local Boards Encouraged Ayurveda,” 81-85.

238
T.R. Ethirajulu Naidu’s book, entitled, The Ayurvedic System, was written with the objective
to draw the attention of the government. He requested the colonial government as follows:

We propose to draw the attention of the Government to view the question with
somewhat more foresight and at least with some amount of sympathy as they are
the inheritors of the great Roman and Tuetonic civilization whose motto it was to
follow truth wherever found. The time has now approached for the Government to
take a definite attitude and we impress on them that, as the race of lovers of arts
and sciences, they should extend their hand of support to the resuscitation, growth
and usefulness of the ancient system of medicine to the suffering humanity.48

Pandit Duraiswami Aiyangar attacked the attitude of the colonial government and practitioners
of Western medicine that though Indians continuously requested the government for the
development of indigenous medicines, attitude of the government was always undesirable.
Instead of betterment of indigenous medicines, high officials defamed and demotivated
indigenous medicines as unscientific and irrational without understanding their basic principles
and theories. The attitude of the government should be changed favourably towards indigenous
medicines for the advancement of health of Indians.49 The native newspapers also criticised the
attitude of the government and tried to bring the attention of the government towards
indigenous medicines. The Hindu Nesan wrote, “there were only four medical schools in this
South India which was quite inadequate to meet the demands of the people,” and urged the
“desirability of starting schools for imparting instruction, in the vernaculars, on the Eastern
system of medicine, as the majority of the people had recourse only to this system.”50 The
Lokopakari pointed out that the government’s attitude of not encouraging the Unani and
Ayurveda in the situation of inadequacy of Western hospitals and doctors should be understood
as the malfunctioning of the administration.51 The Dravidan projected the above concern of
inadequacy of practitioners of Western medicine and suggested the government to adopt
indigenous systems at a time of increasing the prices of foreign articles.52 Thus, the second
decade of the twentieth century was the period of nation building in which indigenous
medicines became a part of it.

48
Ethirajulu Naidu, The Ayurvedic System, 2.
49
Duraiswami Aiyangar, “The Progress of Ayurveda in Travancore,” VK 6, no.6 (1918): 95.
50
Hindu Nesan, 9.1.1918, NNPR, Madras.
51
Lokopakari, 25.2.1918, NNPR, Madras.
52
Dravidan, 13.2.1918, NNPR, Madras.

239
 The policy of government towards indigenous medicines was slightly shifted in 1918
by appointing a Committee to investigate indigenous drugs under the chairmanship of
Dr. M.C. Koman.53 His report suggested not to support indigenous medicines. However, he
suggested the inclusion of some of the important Indian drugs in the Materia Medica. 54 His
report was severely criticised by practitioners of indigenous medicines and Native newspapers
like Andhrapatrika, Vaidya Kalanidhi and Vaidya Chandrika. Likewise, a repartee was
prepared by the joint board of Dravida Vaidya Mandal and Madras Ayurveda Sabha.55 The
policy of the government towards indigenous medicines regarding the financial contribution
was negative until 1919. For instance, Surgeon-General Bannerman warned the Dharapuram
Municipal Corporation for requesting the financial sanctions regarding the purchased
ayurvedic drugs for combating plague. While Municipal Corporation approached him, he
replied that “the government cannot be expected to support use of quack medicines”. Further,
he warned that “no expenditure should be incurred in the future from municipal funds on the
purchase of ayurvedic drugs.”56 But, the vigorous criticism of practitioners of indigenous
medicines, their continuous demands and the rising trend of nationalism altered the nature of
government’s attitude away from their earlier policy of neglect towards indigenous medicines.

The public health policy of the colonial state did not officially involve indigenous
medicines until the early part of the twentieth century. At the same time, Western medicine
was introduced to combat epidemics under the organisation of Indian Medical Service (IMS)
the cadres of which were occupied by the British to the exclusion the Indians. This situation
changed with the colonial states’ intention to expand public health measure beyond the
prevention and restriction of epidemics. In so doing, it became evident that the Government of
India was dependent on practitioners of indigenous medicines and started to engage directly
with Ayurveda through the individual physicians. Having rejected indigenous medicines
previously on the basis of their unscientific logic and mystical aspects, the colonial government
shifted its focus to the potential of practitioners of indigenous medicines in the improvement
of public health. By 1920, indigenous medicines were understood in both popular discourse
and officially as a set of practices mediated by Vaids and Hakims. This change was more
pronounced in the Montagu-Chelmsford reforms of 1919.57 After the enactment of Government
Act of India 1919, the policy making in the medical sphere changed slightly towards positive.

53
G.O. No. 833, Municipal, dated 22.6.1920.
54
Ibid.
55
See. Part 4.3 in Chapter 4.
56
G.O. No. 1867, Municipal, dated 1.11.1917.
57
Berger, Ayurveda Made Modern, 3.

240
The act of Montagu-Chelmsford reform was envisioned to provide a small measure of
self-government to Indians. The principle of dyarchy extended open hands to provincial
self-government in providing autonomy over localised issues, including health, education,
roads and agriculture. The coming of the Justice party to power in the Madras Presidency in
1920, led to the appointment of the Usman Committee in October, 1921 to report on the
question of the recognition and encouragement of the indigenous systems of medicine in vogue
in the Presidency.58 The objective of the Committee was to afford the exponents of Ayurveda
and Unani an opportunity to state their case fully in writing for scientific criticism and to justify
state encouragement of these systems.59 The formation of the Usman Committee was
considered as an opening of new possibilities and opportunities by practitioners of indigenous
medicines. Moreover, the local bodies and corporations gradually started indigenous
dispensaries and hospitals along with purchasing indigenous medicines at the time of
epidemics.60 This changing scenario intensified the contest among practitioners of indigenous
medicines regarding the legitimacy and authenticity of their respective medicines to grab the
newly gained material and social benefits.

Already the revitalisation of Ayurveda was marginalising Tamil medical texts and
physicians as illegitimate and unauthentic texts and practitioners respectively along with
constructing the meaning of Ayurveda within the boundary of Sanskrit texts and language in
Colonial Tamil region. Now, there was a possibility of new opportunities and financial benefits
to indigenous medicines to be gained by the formation of the Usman Committee. Sanskrit-
centric ayurvedic physicians propagated Sanskrit-based medicine as authentic and legitimate
in an attempt to get social and economic benefits. Tamil physicians thought that if they fail to
prove Tamil medical system as authentic and legitimate, the system and practitioners would be
eclipsed by Sanskrit ayurvedic physicians. This fear of marginalisation pushed the Tamil
physicians for revitalisation and reconfiguration of their medicine in the public sphere. From
1921 onwards, Tamil physicians started to construct a separate medical systemic sphere
differing from Sanskrit Ayurveda along with forming new associations, conducting
conferences, establishing Tamil Siddha medical journals and contesting against the hegemony
of Sanskrit Ayurveda and Western medicine. In this context, the negation of the Tamil Siddha

58
The Committee submitted its report on 17th February 1923 with the details of indigenous medicines comprised
150 pages.
59
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 1: 1; G.O. No 1351, P.H, dated
17.10.1921.
60
G.O. No. 1114, P.H, dated 1.6.1925.

241
‘system’ in the Madras Provincial council triggered an explosive reaction among Tamil
physicians.61

The formation of Usman Committee was taken as a great opportunity to establish their
medical practice as a separate ‘system’ by Tamil physicians. Prominent Tamil physicians like
Virudai Sivagnana Yogi, S.S. Anandam and U.C.P. Moiyadeen Rawuthar continuously
propagated the importance of Usman Committee and circulated prepared answers to the
questions of the Usman Committee to the large community of Tamil physicians.62 Usman
Committee was considered by Tamil physicians as a final battlefield for their medicine and
existence. The writings of Tamil physicians reflected this perspective. For instance,
U.C.P. Moiyadeen Rawuthar wrote an article, entitled, “State of Tamil Siddha Medicine” in
the journal of Tamil Vaidya Kaḷañsium. It seemed to him that the Usman Committee was going
to investigate solely Sanskrit Ayurveda and Unani. If it happened, these systems would get
financial benefits, employment opportunities and social legitimacy. At the same time, the
condition of Tamil medicine and the respectability of its practitioners would deteriorate.
Furthermore, the government would not accept Tamil medicine as an authentic practice which
would lead to the loss of financial aid and employment opportunities. Thus, he called upon
Tamil people and physicians to struggle for making the government accept Tamil medicine as
a separate and authentic medicine of the Tamil land. If fails, Siddha medicine would die
assuredly.63 Likewise, Tamil physicians: Virudai Sivagnana Yogi and Kadhar Muhayadeen
Rawuthar continuously warned Tamil physicians on the questions of the Usman Committee.
They advocated that as Tamil Siddha medicine was not being taught by framed syllabus like
Ayurveda and Unani, it had number of variations among Vaids regarding theory, diagnostic
methods, medical preparations and ingredients etc. If physicians did not respond identically to
the questions of Usman Committee, it would spoil the reputation of Tamil medicine. They,
finally, requested that all Tamil physicians tell congruent answers which were circulated to
them by Tamil Vaidya Saṅgam and Theṉ Indiya Āyuḷveda Saṅgam.64 Apart from such
propagations, leading Tamil physicians toured the different parts of the Tamil region and met
Tamil physicians regarding these aspects and circulated answers. Thereafter, Tamil physicians

61
Proceedings of Madras Legislative Council 1921, Vol III, Part II, dated 14.2.1921.
62
Ka.Pu.Ma. Kadhar Muhayadeen Rawuthar, “Virudai Sivagnana Yōgigaḷ,” TVK 1, no.9 (1922): 202-203.
63
U.C.P. Moiyadeen Rawuthar, “Tamil Siddha Vaidyathiṉ Nilamai,” TVK 1, no.4 (1921): 72-76.
64
U.C.P. Moiyadeen Rawuthar, “Siddha Vaidyargaḷukku Oru Eachcharikkai,” TVK 1, no.6 (1922): 117-119;
Ka.Pu.Ma. Kadhar Muhayadeen Rawuthar, “Swadēsha Vaidya Parisilaṉai Committee,” TVK 1, no.8 (1922): 157-
160.

242
started to avoid using Āyuḷvedam in their titles and projected Tamil medicine as a separate
medicine different from Sanskrit Ayurveda.65

The juxtaposition of historical circumstances, namely, reconfiguration of Ayurveda

along with Sanskrit-Aryan axis, opening up of new opportunity due to changes in the attitude
of the colonial state and the formation of Usman Committee and the ongoing political, social
and cultural movements such as Dravidian movement, Tamil revivalism and Saiva Siddhanta
movement in Colonial Tamil region resulted in the emergence of separate medical identities,
Sanskrit Ayurveda and Tamil Siddha. When the reconfiguration of Ayurveda and the struggle
for opportunity pushed Tamil physicians outside the boundary of Ayurveda, the emergence of
Tamil revivalism and Dravidian movement acted as pulling factors in the ‘systemic’
constructions of Tamil Siddha medicine. When Tamil physicians tried to construct Tamil
medicine as a separate legitimate medicine, the ideologies of Tamil revivalism and Dravidian
movement became the bedrock for their rhetoric.

5.3 Constructing Siddha as a Separate Medical Realm

When the plural medical practices were set aside in new structuralised monolithic
tradition of Ayurveda, based on race and language, it created tensions in the medical sphere.
This newly constructed meaning of Ayurveda aligned with Aryan-Sanskrit axis was severely
contested in Colonial Tamil region as in other parts of the country. Tamil revivalism, Non-
Brahmin movement and pure Tamil movement had a tremendous impact on the constructions
in the medical sphere. Due to the exclusion of Tamil medical texts and practitioners as
illegitimate, they faced a double blow, that of marginalisation earlier from Western medicine
and now from Ayurveda which was projected as a national medicine. The development of a
congenial atmosphere during the second decade of the twentieth century, for the process of
indigenous medicines created a competition among practitioners of indigenous medicines to
grab the economic and social benefits. During the revitalisation of Ayurveda, marginalised
Tamil physicians strived to form a new identity to secure the authority of the tradition in the
public sphere. Tamil revivalism and Dravidian movement already prepared the ground for the
Tamil physicians and it was very easy to join hands with those movements because most of the
physicians generally belonged to Non-Brahmin communities and were connected with
Dravidian party. In the following decade, Tamil physicians tried to construct a separate medical
tradition, called, Siddha medicine that exclusively belonged to the Tamil region and comprised

65
Sivagnana Yogi, Oushada Prayōga Chandrigai, 1911; idem, Siddha Marundugaḷ, 1928.

243
of only Tamil medical texts. To establish it, they formed new organisations, conducted
conferences and instituted journals to contest for the legitimacy and authority of their medical
practice. Tamil physicians like Virudai Sivagnana Yogi, Shunmugananda Swamigal, Pandit
S.S. Anandam, Ka. Pu. Ma. Kadhar Muhayadeen Rawuthar, U.C.P. Moiyadeen Rawuthar,
R.S. Pathy, Sigamani Pandithar, C.S. Murugesha Mudaliyar and others worked hard to bring
Tamil medicine into the forefront in Colonial Tamil region among whom Virudai Sivagnana
Yogi and S.S. Anandam were very active in the public sphere.

5.3.1 Revitalisation and Institutionalisation of Siddha Medicine

Until the second decade of the twentieth century, Tamil physicians were not very
vigorous in the revitalisation process whereas ayurvedic physicians had already entered into
the process from the last decade of the nineteenth century. But after that, they followed the
footsteps of ayurvedic physicians to strengthen Siddha medicine by professionalizing,
institutionalising, standardising Siddha medicine along with the publishing medical texts and
journals. The institutionalisation of the hospitals and standardisation of medicine were the
prominent aspects in this process in which the contribution of Virudai Sivagnana Yogi was
immense. He was an important stalwart of revitalisation and reconfiguration of Tamil Siddha
medicine. He touched all the spheres of medical developments by establishing hospitals,
medical manufacturing units and associations. He was not born in a physician family but he
learnt it by his own interest and became familiar by curing diseases. Basically, he was a police
officer and was employed in the city of Coimbatore during the visit of Edward VII. In the later
part of his life, he shifted to Koilpatti, Tirunelveli, in the Southern part of Tamil region from
where he worked to develop the Tamil Siddha medicine.66 He loved Tamil language and culture
along with being well-versed in Sanskrit language too. He participated eagerly in Dravidian
movements and wrote a number of articles about it. He was a champion of Tamil revivalism
and cultural struggle. He started “Tiruviḍar Kaḻagam” at Kutralam in 1908 and was one of the
important personalities in the forefront of the Saiva Siddhanta movement. He presented his
views in the Saiva Siddhanta conference held in Ramnad in 1910. He was also a part of the
Theosophical Society. He was an active writer in various subjects like religion and music but
medicine in particular. He wrote a number of books on spirituality and medicine both in Tamil
and Sanskrit apart from translations of Sanskrit texts into Tamil. His religious books are
Vibūthiruthiratshataraṉa Nirubaṇam, Devōbāsaṇam, Gita Amirthamañjari, Sivagnaṉa

66
Kandaswamy Pillai, History of Siddha Medicine, 739.

244
Viḷakkam, Vedagama Uṇmai which dealt with various subtitles from the Bhagavad Gita and
the Vedas to music and keerthanas on gods.67 His medical books are Oushada Prayōga
Chandrigai, Oushada Nirṇaya Chandrigai and Siddha Marundugaḷ. Oushada Prayōga
Chandrigai explains 4000 diseases, its symptoms and medicines to cure the diseases. Oushada
Nirṇaya Chandrigai contains information about diseases, diagnostic techniques, inferences and
preparation of drugs etc. Siddha Medical Marundugaḷ carried details about drugs and their
prices which were produced in his manufacturing unit at Koilpatti. He toiled his whole life for
the development of Siddha medicine and Siddha physicians.68

Starting of institutions like hospitals, dispensaries and pharmaceutical industries were

the key aspects for the revitalisation of Siddha medicine. Virudai Sivagnana Yogi opened a
new Siddha hospital named as Sivagnana Siddha Vaidya Sālai (Sivagnana Siddha Hospital) in
Koilpatti where he provided free medical treatments and medicines to poor people. He kept a
time schedule for free treatment - morning 6 to 8 am and evening 5 to 6 pm. Besides, he
rendered free postal consultation to those who sent their details of diseases through letters. To
make Siddha medical ‘system’ equivalent with Western medicine, he started a pharmaceutical
industry adjacent to his hospital in Koilpatti which prepared efficacious Siddha drugs and made
them available in market. He sent medicines by post to Siddha hospitals, dispensaries and even
to individuals on request. He prepared effective medicines to deal with epidemic diseases like
plague and cholera and sold his drugs to hospitals and dispensaries of the government
municipalities and taluk boards. He published a medical catalogue to popularise his medicine.
This catalogued named, Siddha Marundugaḷ, explained various medicines that were being
manufactured in his pharmacy. He explained the ingredients, medical preparations and dosages
of the Siddha medicine in the text which helped to standardise Siddha medicines.69 By that
time, Siddha medicines were propagated as spurious drugs by practitioners of Western
medicine and Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians and was considered as dangerous by
Western educated intellectuals. Further, there was no mechanism to differentiate efficacious
drugs from bogus drugs. In those circumstances, proving the efficacy and authenticity of
Siddha medicines was an inevitable objective. To establish the authenticity of Siddha medicine,
he instituted a Siddha Medical Board as an organ of Tamil Vaidya Saṅgam which comprised

67
Sivagnana Yogi, Dēvōbāsaṉādēbam (Tanjore: Sri Vidyavinodhini Press, 1907); D.V. Kanagarathinam,
“Revitalisation of Siddha Medicine and Contribution of Virudai Sivagnana Yogi in Colonial Tamil Region,”
Golden Research Thoughts 5, no. 2 (2015): 1-4.
68
Kanagarathinam, “Revitalisation of Siddha Medicine,” 1-4; Sivagnana Yogi, Oushada Prayōga Chandrigai,
1911.
69
Sivagnana Yogi, Siddha Marundugaḷ, 3-5.

245
of renowned Siddha physicians as members who tested the drugs and issued certificates in the
conferences. By this process, the certified drugs and physicians got good reputation and
marketing. Along with these aspects, the standardisation of Siddha medical knowledge was a
vital one because he knew that there were a number of variations in the ingredients and
preparations of Siddha medicine, medical texts and medical practices. He tried to systematise
Siddha medicine for which he found Tamil Vaidya Kalvi Kaḻagam (Tamil Medical Board of
Studies) to write Siddha medical texts. The Board of Studies requested physicians to write a
book on various subjects of Siddha medicine.70 It tried to cull out unscientific and superstitious
aspects from Siddha manuscripts and brought out its scientific nature in the new texts. Apart
from these endeavours, he formed medical associations and instituted a journal, entitled, Tamil
Vaidyam, for Siddha medical development.71 He was conscious about the importance of
associations and the necessity for strengthening the community of Siddha practitioners and
therefore founded Dravida Vaidya Mandal along with Pandit D. Gopalacharlu. He acted as vice
president of Dravida Vaidya Mandal. After the demise of Pandit D. Gopalacharlu, he left
Dravida Vaidya Mandal and started Tamil Vaidya Saṅgam which was established at Koilpatti
in 1921 for the advancement of Siddha medicine and became its first secretary.72 After the
formation of Usman Committee, he worked to make the Committee accept Siddha as a separate
medicine coming from the remote past into Tamil lands. He toured the Tamil regions to meet
Siddha physicians, and prepared and circulated a set of common answers to the questions of
the Usman Committee.73 Due to his intense work along with other Siddha physicians, the
Usman Committee accepted Siddha medicine as a unique medicine of the Tamil region and it
was placed as one of the ‘systems’ in the Indian Medical School in Madras.

Apart from Sivagnana Yogi, a number of Siddha physicians established hospitals and
medical manufacturing units at large and small scale levels in Colonial Tamil region. They also
contributed to the revitalisation of Siddha medicine. Some important Siddha hospitals and
medical manufacturing units were Velmurugan Medical Hall and Pharmaceutical Industry in
Madras; R. Rajagopala Iyyangar’s The Siddha Vaidya Agasthya Āshramam in Tanjore;
Ka.Pu.Ma. Kadhar Muhayadeen Rawuthar & U.C.P. Moiyadeen Rawuthar’s Tamil Siddha
Medical Hall and Pharmaceutical Industry at Tirunelveli; T. Sami’s Oushadālayā at Sowkarpet

70
Sivagnana Yogi, “Tamil Vaidya Saṅga Naḍavaḍikai,” 85-87; Sivagnana Yogi, Siddha Marundugaḷ, 3-5.
71
It was not published after two issues.
72
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 444.
73
Kadhar Muhayadeen Rawuthar, “Virudai Sivagnana Yōgigaḷ,” 202-203.

246
in Madras; M. Kandasamy Pillai’s Bogar Meignaṉa Vaidya Sālai and Marundukkaḍai in Palani
and so on.74

When Virudai Sivagnana Yogi worked in the Southern part of the Tamil region, another
important progenitor of the movement, Pandit S.S. Anandam struggled in Madras city. He
comes from a hereditary family of royal physicians of the Tanjore palace. He was born at
Kumbakonam on 16th March, 1876 as a son of Rajayogi Saminathan and Kamalambal. At a
very early age, he had mastered the minor classics of Tamil literature as a devoted student of
Dr. U. V. Swaminatha Iyer. Besides, he had acquired proficiency in Carnatic music and
Bharathanāṭṭiyam. He was a leading member of the Justice Party and the Madras Corporation.
He has done valuable service to the city of Madras, and is mainly responsible for naming, what
was about to be named as “New Mambalam” as “Thiagaraya Nagar” and the splendid park
therein as “Panagal Park”.75 His liberty and selfless service to Siddha medicine and Maruthuvar
(barber) community earned the gratitude of Siddha practitioners and Maruthuvar community.
Though he touched all fields of Siddha medicine, he mainly contributed to develop fraternity
among physicians by forming associations, institutionalisation of Siddha medicine and
popularising Siddha medicine through his journal Maruthuvaṉ.

S.S. Anandam started Theṉ Indiya Āyuḷveda Saṅgam (South India Āyuḷveda
Association) on 23rd December 1915 in Madras with the support of Sir. P. Theagaraya Chetty,
Diwan Bhagadur P. Rajarathinam Mudaliyar and other important justice party members.
S.S. Anandam was the first president of the Theṉ Indiya Āyuḷveda Saṅgam.76 Though it was
started in the second decade of the twentieth century, it acted vibrantly only during the third
decade. Theṉ Indiya Āyuḷveda Saṅgam conducted two medical Conferences (Theṉ Indiya
Maruthuva Mahānāḍu). The first was held in Madras on 21/10/1922 under the headship of
P. Theagaraya Chetty and the second was held in Madurai on March 28th & 29th, 1925.77 In the
first conference, S.S. Anandam projected the special aspects of Tamil medicine and how it
differed from Sanskrit Ayurveda and passed the resolution to pressurise the government to
accept Siddha medicine as a unique medicine of the Tamil region. Further, the papers about
history of Siddha medicine, unique features of Siddha medicine and various diseases and
Siddha methods of treatments were presented. The Siddha medical drugs were exhibited and

74
Sivagnana Yogi, Oushada Prayōga Chandrigai, 1911. Ka.Pu.Ma. Kadhar Muhayadeen Rawuthar, “Tamil
Siddha Vaidya Marundu Sālai,” TVK 1, no.1 (1921).
75
Kandaswamy Pillai, History of Siddha Medicine, 752-753.
76
S.S. Anandam, “Namathu Pathirikaiṉ Nōkkam,” Maruthuvaṉ 1, no 1 (1928): 3-4.
77
“Pandit Anandam Avargaḷukku Theṉ Indiya Maruthuva Saṅgaththār Aḷiththa Makiḻchi Paththiram,”
Maruthuvaṉ 1, no.8-9 (1929): 246-248;

247
certified by S.S. Anandam in the conferences. The association continuously tried to turn the
attention of the government to the development of Siddha Medicine. For instance, Theṉ Indiya
Āyuḷveda Saṅgam continuously petitioned to the government for the formation of Siddha book
publishing committee, stipend for Siddha students in Indian Medical School, establishing
Siddha medical gardens, Siddha manuscript library and so on.78

Pandit S.S. Anandam realised the importance of proper training grounds for the
physicians of barber community and he found that due to lack of financial facility most of the
barber community children were moving to other jobs. To mitigate these two conditions, he
started medical classes in his Tamil Medical Hall with stipend, free food and accommodation
to the barber community students on behalf of the Theṉ Iṇdiya Āyuḷveda Saṅgam.79 The
students were getting practical training in S.S. Anandam’s hospital and drug manufacturing
unit functioning in the same building. Besides, he opened two medical dispensaries, named
Free Tamil Medical Dispensary at Washermanpet and Mint Street.80 The member physicians
of Theṉ Iṇdiya Āyuḷveda Saṅgam rendered their service to these institutions. Along with these
institutions, he established his own hospital and a small scale pharmaceutical industry, named
Tamil Medical Hall at Mint Street in Madras. The medicine prepared by his pharmaceutical
industry were circulated to the association’s free dispensaries and other places. He knew the
importance of print media and the power of publishing materials. Due to that he instituted
Tamil Siddha medical journal, Maruthuvaṉ through which he endeavoured to popularise
Siddha medicine and its superior qualities. He published Tamil medical texts through his
publishing society, Maruthuvaṉ Kāriyālayam, to improve the medical knowledge of Tamil
physicians and printed Tamil medical texts in a series in his journal. He toiled hard to bring
rare medical manuscripts and his family’s secret potions into the public sphere. He started a
book store called Tamil Kalā Nilayam in his medical hall where he sold his medical books and
other Tamil medical texts as well.81 He not only worked in the public sphere for the
advancement of Siddha medicine and physicians, but advocated his ideals in Madras
Corporation as well. After becoming a member of the Madras Corporation, he brought the
attention of the government about various aspects of health policies and suggested the necessity
for improvement of Siddha medicine. Particularly, the admission of village midwife into
government hospitals for modern training with stipend which became possible due to his effort

78
S.S. Anandam, “Theṉ Indiya Maruthuvar Saṅgam Niṛaiveṛṛiya Tērmāṉaṅgaḷ,” Maruthuvaṉ 1, no. 12 (1929):
340.
79
“Pandit Anandam Avargaḷukku Theṉ Indiya Maruthuva Saṅgaththār Aḷiththa Makiḻchi Paththiram,” 246-248.
80
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 244.
81
S.S. Anandam, “Advertisement of Tamil Medical Hall,” Maruthuvaṉ, Last Page of all issues.

248
in Madras Corporation.82 After the formation of Usman Committee, Pandit S.S. Anandam
visited various places of the Tamil regions, interacted with Tamil physicians and explained the
importance of Usman Committee. Besides, like Virudai Sivagnana Yogi, he also prepared
answers to the questions of the Usman Committee and circulated them to the members of Theṉ
Indiya Āyuḷveda Saṅgam. S.S. Anandam’s association, institutions and journals played a very
prominent role in the revitalisation process of Siddha medicine.

Along with the contributions of Pandit S.S. Anandam and Virudai Sivagnana Yogi, a
numerable physicians slogged for the development of Siddha medicine in Colonial Tamil
region. They formed associations, instituted book publishing societies and instituted journals
during the revitalisation period of Siddha medicine. For example, Ka. Pu. Ma. Kadhar
Muhayadeen Rawuthar and U.C.P. Moiyadeen Rawuthar founded Pēṭṭai Siddha Vaidya
Saṅgam (Pēṭṭai Siddha Medical Association) in 1921 in Tirunelveli and published a Tamil
medical Journal, Tamil Vaidya Kaḷañsium, as an association journal to advance Tamil Siddha
medicine in 1921.83 Kadhar Muhayadeen Rawuthar published a number of pamphlets and
medical texts to promote Siddha medicine. Such important pamphlets and texts were
Tamilnāṭṭu Vaidyargaḷē kaṇviḻiyuṅgaḷ (Tamil Vaids Please Open Your Eyes), Tirukkuṛaḷ
Marundu (Medicine of Tirukkuṛaḷ), Science of South India, Tamil Siddha Medicine and
Ayurvedic Physicians etc., and Tiruvaḷḷuvar Gnanaveṭṭi 1500, Navaratṉa Cintāmaṇi, Pañcha
Rattiṉam 500 respectively. He was one of the important protagonists of Siddha revitalisation,
and pressurised the government and Usman Committee to accept Siddha medicine as a separate
and unique medicine of the Tamil region through his writings. He moved a resolution to
consider Siddha medicine as a separate and authentic medical system of the Tamil region on
March 25, 1921 in Pēṭṭai Siddha Vaidya Saṅgam. This resolution was considered by the
government and ordered Usman Committee to engage the Tamil medicine and practitioners as
a separate ‘system’ for its enquiry.84 Shunmugananda Swamigal, another renowned physician
of Tamil medicine in Madras city, started “Siddha Book Publishing Society” in his Yōgāṉanda
Āshramam at Washermenpet in Madras on 21st April 1923 to publish Tamil medical texts.85
He owned a printing press “Siddhar Achchukkūḍam” (Siddhar Printing Press) where the books
of the society were printed. The society invited membership from physicians and public at the
cost of one rupee and those who became member could get discount when they purchased

82
S.S. Anandam, “Pandit Anandam Avargaḷ Chennai Corporatioṉil Niṛaiveṛṛiya Tērmānam,” Maruthuvaṉ 1,
no.12 (1929): 338-339.
83
Ka.Pu.Ma. Kadhar Muhayadeen Rawuthar, “Eṉadu Nōkkam,” TVK 1, no.1 (1921): 2-3.
84
Ibid.
85
Shunmugananda Swamigal, Tirumoolar Vaidyam Karukkiḍai 900 (Chennai: Siddhar Press, 1924).

249
books. The aim of the society was to collect, edit, compose and publish Siddha books which
were not easily available. Shunmugananda Swamigal printed Tiruvaḷḷuva Nāyaṉār
Vaguththaruḷiya Pañcha Rattiṉam 500, Tirumoolar Vaidyam - Karukkiḍai 900 etc. These texts
comprised the life history of Tiruvalluvar and Tirumoolar, history and development of Siddha
medicine, description about Siddhas along with medical knowledge.86

After the marginalisation of medical practitioners based on Tamil texts, they started to
revitalise their medicine by forming associations, institutionalising the practices and publishing
texts and journals. The third decade of the twentieth century onwards, the formation of
associations of Tamil medicine and conducting conferences happened all over the Tamil region
in a vibrant manner. Tamil medical associations and their leaders were always connected with
the political movement of Justice Party and its ideologies. Presidents of Tamil medical
associations and Tamil medical conferences mostly were Justice Party leaders which
symbolised the impact of Dravidian ideology and Dravidian politics in the medical realm.
Tamil physicians not only concentrated on physical aspects like institutions, associations and
conferences during the revitalisation period but dedicated much to the ideological grounds
through which they structured the boundary of Siddha medicine. How that process was
achieved and what aspects became the criteria to construct Tamil medical boundary will be
discussed in forthcoming pages.

5.3.2 Constructing Alternative Medical Identity

Tamil physicians constructed their systemic boundary along with revitalisation process.
In this process, they claimed the authority through the ideas and symbols already projected by
Tamil revivalists and the Non-Brahmin movement. Though different interpretations were given
for the emergence of Non-Brahmin movement by scholars like Irschick, Washbrook and Nambi
Arooran, the basic outcome of the movement was a fierce contest between the Brahmin
community and the (upper caste) Non-Brahmin community in political, social, economic and
cultural spheres.87 Tamil revivalism, Saiva Siddhanta movement and Dravidian movement
developed a Dravidian cultural identity which was articulated against the alignment of the
Sanskritic, Brahmanical, and Aryan Hinduism. Moreover, Tamil revivalists projected the

86
Shunmugananda Swamigal, Tiruvaḷḷuva Nāyaṉār Vaguththaruḷiya Pañcha Rattiṉam 500 (Chennai: Siddhar
Press, 1927), 8; idem, Tirumoolar Vaidyam Karukkiḍai 900, 14.
87
Eugene F Irschick, Tamil Revivalism in the 1930s (Madras: Orr Jay Process, 1986); D.A. Washbrook, The
Emergence of Provincial Politics: The Madras Presidency 1870-1920 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2008); K. Nambi Arooran, Tamil Renaissance and Dravidian Nationalism 1905-1944 (Madurai: Koodal
Publishers, 1980).

250
glorious past of Tamils with the help of Sangam literature. Sangam age was propagated as a
golden age of Tamils. Theory of Lemuria was promulgated by Tamil scholars in which the
mythical continent of Lemuria was projected as the ancient home of Tamils and the birth place
of human civilisation.88 For instance, Navalar Somasundara Bharathiar wrote:

The ancient Tamil classics now proved to be over two thousand years old, expressly
identify the home of Tamils to be a region bordered by the Venkata Hills in the
north, and extending southward very much further into the Indian Ocean than Cape
Comorin and the island of Ceylon, forming one contiguous country where the
Tamil people were the Indigene. In fact one of the poems in Kalithogai expressly
speaks of a deluge causing the subsidence of a large slice of land in the south of
Tamilaham, and driving the survivors from their submerged lands to colonise in
the northern territories of their great Tamil continent. The consciousness of the
Tamil people as evidenced by their literature from the earliest times has always
been that they were the aboriginal natives of this southern continent. 89

He also wrote in Tamil Classics and Tamilagam that Dravidian civilisation owed nothing to
the Aryan culture, but rather gave the Aryans a readymade civilisation. These types of rhetoric
were adopted by Tamil physicians to construct a separate medical identity. In the medical
sphere, the idea of unending history of Siddha medicine from Sangam age, separate legitimate
medicine and “Aryan pollution” were articulated in the writings of Tamil physicians. Thus they
tried to prove that Siddha (Tamil) medicine as a pure and pre-Aryan medicine of the Tamils
and formed a new axis, that is, Dravidian-Tamil-Siddha as against Aryan-Sanskrit-Ayurveda
and Western-English-Allopathy.

The advocates of Tamil medical ‘system’ like Virudai Sivagnana Yogi, R.S. Pathy,
Shunmugananda Swamigal, Ka. Pu. Ma. Kadhar Muhayadeen Rawuthar and D. Sangaradanu
Pillai constructed an uninterrupted history of Siddha medicine from the Sangam age. They
historicised their medical practices, tracing its origin twelve thousand years ago and attributed
its beginning and evolution to the first, second and third Tamil literary conferences. Besides,
they compared Siddha ‘system’ with other ‘systems’ through which they tried to prove the
antiquity of Siddha medicine as well as it was a base and foundation for all other ‘systems’.

88
Sambasivam Pillai, Portions selected from the Introduction of Thiru. T.V. Sambasivam Pillai’s Tamil –
English, 3.
89
S. Sambasivan ed., The Papers of Dr. Navalar Somasundara Bharathiar (Tamil Nadu: Navalar Puthaka
Nilayam, 1967), 27.

251
For instance, Virudai Sivagnana yogi addressed in the third Siddha medical conference held at
Madurai in 1927 that the original home of human race was Kumari continent, located south to
present Kumari (Cape Comorin) where Tamils lived until the deluge. During the period, first
and second Tamil conferences held in Tenmadurai (South Madurai) and Kabadapuram
respectively in which Tamil medical texts were written by Sivanar, Ammai, Nandi, Tirumoolar
and Agastiyar. A Nandi lived 16,000 years ago which showed the ancientness of the Tamil
medical system. From that period onwards, Tamil medical knowledge was handed over from
Sivanar through Ammai, Nandi, Tirumoolar, Agastiyar, Sattai Muni, Kalangi, Bogar,
Konganar, Karuvurar, Theraiyar, Matcha Muni to Punnakisar and the like. More than one lakh
texts were written by these Siddhas.90 Further, he compared the age of other ‘systems’ with
Siddha ‘system’ and tried to prove the antiquity of Siddha medicine. He calculated and said
that the period of Dhanwanthri was 1500 years before, Caraka belonged to first century A.D,
Aṣṭāṅga Hrdayam belonged to Ninth century A.D, and Sāraṅgadāra Samhita and
Bhavaprakāsha were written in thirteen century A.D and sixteenth century A.D respectively.
He stated that Greek Medicine, Allopathy, Roman medicine, Homeopathy and Unani emerged
about 900 B.C, 1775 A.D, 200 A.D, 1753 A.D and 600 A.D respectively. But Siddha system
originated twelve thousand years before that was more ancient and basis to other systems.91
R.S. Pathy, Tamil physician from Madurai, wrote in his journal Selvakkaḷañsium that twelve
thousand years ago, there was a land called Tamilagam to the South of Kumari (Cape Comorin)
which was divided into forty nine countries such as Madurai Nādu, Kumari Nādu and so on.
These forty nine countries were ruled by Chera, Chola and Pandya kings. People of the land
lived in harmony and prosperity. Three Tamil literacy conferences (Saṅgams) were held in Old
Madurai, Kabadapuram, and present Madurai respectively where Tamil medical texts were
written by gods like Sivanar and Murugan, and physicians like Maruthuva Damodaranar.92

When some Tamil physicians situated their medicine before twelve thousand years,
some Tamil physicians pushed beyond that period also. For instance, Shunmugananda
Swamigal wrote that Siddha medicine was created by Siddhas before the emergence of the
classical Tamil language. When analysing the special features of Siddha medicine such as vāḻai
(goddess), muppu (universal salt), kāram (alkalis), kaṛpam (drug of longevity) and maṇi (solid
beads of mercury), it reflected ancientness of medicine than language.93 Likewise,

90
Gurusamy Konar, Siddha Vaidya Agarāti, 1-4; Sivagnana Yogi, Siddha Marundugaḷ, 3-5.
91
Ibid
92
R.S. Pathy, “Tamiḻnāḍum Saṅgaṅgaḷum,” SK 1, no.3 (1926): 65-67.
93
Shunmugananda Swamigal, Tiruvaḷḷuva Nāyaṉār Vaguththaruḷiya Pañcha Rattiṉam 500, 5.

252
D. Sangaradanu Pillai pointed out that Siddha medicine was developed from time immemorial
by number of Siddhas and physicians through a continuous analysis of nature, disease factors
etc. Outsiders, like Europeans, Jews, Egyptians, Venetians, Greek and others learned Siddha
medicine and developed it in their respective languages. Even King Solomon and Jesus Christ
also learned Siddha medicine.94 The eighteen Siddhas and the Pothigai hill became inseparable
part of these sort of rhetoric constructed by Tamil physicians. For example, U.C.P. Moiyadeen
Rawuthar, sub-editor of Tamil Vaidya Kaḷañsium propagated that during the period of Pandya
king Kaichina Vazhuti, eighteen Siddhas under the leadership of Agastya gathered in Pothigai
hill and started writing the Siddha medical texts that comprised medicine, mantras, varmam,
yoga, gnana and siddhi for the betterment of the human race. Further, he added that even during
the period of post-Sangam age, Siddha physicians attained high esteem in the society.95 Apart
from these rhetoric, Tamil physicians not only linked their medical texts with the texts of
Sangam and subsequent periods as the ancient Tamil Siddha texts such as Tirukkuṛaḷ, Ēlādi,
Siṛupañchamōlam, Nāṉmaṇikkaḍigai and Thirikaḍugam but they attributed later Tamil
medical texts also as the Sangam texts.96 For instance, physician Tudisaikizhar
A. Chidambaranar attributed following Siddha texts into Sangam age such as Agastiyar
Peruntiraṭṭu, Agastiyar Kuṛuntiraṭṭu, Vidhi Nōl, Uḍal Nōl, Nāḍi Nōl, Uḷa Nōl, Maruthuva
kaṇṇāḍi, Maṇi Nālāyiram, Sendūram 300 etc.97 When analysing these articulations, it shows
that Tamil Siddha physicians tried to bring the origin of their medicine earlier than the period
of Ayurveda and in their attempt to construct a pre-Aryan medicine of Tamils.

When ayurvedic physicians based on Sanskrit texts criticised Tamil medicine and
medical texts as spurious documents and illegitimate practices, Tamil physicians showed the
special features of Siddha medicine and drew a line between Sanskrit texts and Tamil medical
texts. They propagated that Tamil medicine was created based on metals, minerals, alkalis,
arsenics, vāḻai, muppu, kaṛpa medicine and so on which were absent in the canonised Sanskrit
texts of Caraka and Sushruta and Sanskrit physicians of later period incorporated these into
their systems.98 Tamil medicine was divided into three parts such as Maṉitha Vaidyam (human
medicine), Deiva Vaidyam (divine medicine) and Rākshasa vaidyam (giant medicine)and these
divisions were absent in Sanskrit Ayurveda. Moreover, one of the important diagnostic

94
D. Sangaradanu Pillai, “Tamil Siddha Vaidyam,” TVK 1, no.1 (1921): 17-18.
95
U.C.P. Moiyadeen Rawuthar, “Tamil Vaidyatiṉ Taṛkāla Nilamai,” TVK 1, no.1 (1921): 12-16.
96
Ka.Pu.Ma. Kadhar Muhayadeen Rawuthar, “Namathu Vaidyam,” TVK 1, no.9 (1922): 181-182.
97
Tudisaikizhar A. Chidambaranar, Tamil Maruthuva Nōl Allatu Siddha Vaidyam (Coimbatore: Krishna Vilāsa
Press, n.d), 1-13.
98
Anandam, “Tamil Vaidyamum Samaskrita Vaidyamum,” 142.

253
techniques such as pulse was claimed solely by Tamil physicians as part of Siddha ‘system’.
Except these differences, lot of differences and special aspects were disseminated by Tamil
physicians in the public sphere to create a separate legitimate medical identity. For example,
Virudai Sivagnana yogi maintained that Ayurveda of Caraka and Sushruta did not use minerals,
metals, alkalis, arsenic, muppu and Sendūram. In contrast, Siddha medicine has the above
aspects as primary medicines. So, there is no connection between Ayurveda and Siddha system
of medicine. Moreover, he claimed that pulse, a diagnostic technique, was also not present in
the canonised ayurvedic texts. Later period, Nagarjuna and other ayurvedic physicians like
Sarangadaran, Bavamisra studied Tamil medical texts and incorporated metallic and mineral
medicines and pulse technique into their system.99 Pandit C.S. Murugesha Mudaliyar and
Pandit Shunmuga Sundara Mudaliyar explained in Usman Committee about the special feature
of Siddha medicine as follows: principle treatment of Siddha is Maṇi (Solid beads of Mercury),
Mandiram (Chanting sacred words) and Oushadam. Oushadam is divided into three kinds such
as Oppuṛai (a cure employed by those drugs which excite the symptoms similar to those of
diseases), Etheruṛai (a cure employed by those which act against and suppress the symptoms
of diseases) and Kalappuṛai (mixed medicines of Oppuṛai and Etheruṛai).100

Siddha physicians projected the Siddha medicine as not only a solution to cure diseases
in the body but also as a solution to immortalise the body by which people could escape from
the karmic cycle of human birth and rebirth. They broadened their system into yoga, gnana and
kaṛpam. Tamil physician Somasundaram divided Tamil medicine into three parts such as
Piṇiyoḷi Marundu (medicine to immortalise body), Piṇikku Marundu (medicines for diseases)
and Piṛavi Piṇikku Marundu (medicines like yoga and gnana for mōksha).101
Pandit S.S. Anadam pointed out that Siddha medical texts were about medicine and medical
preparations like Ayurveda. They were written based on the aṛam (dharma), poruḷ (artha),
iṉbam (kāmā) and vēḍu (mōksha). Siddha medical literature comprised maṇi, mantra, oushada,
yoga and gnana in which mantra helped not only to attain good health but also to become a
superhuman.102 Shunmugananda Swamigal had written that the prime aspect of Siddha
medicine was not the curing of diseases but immortalising the body from decaying to attain
gnana. He talked about preventive, curative and immortalising aspects of Siddha medicine that

99
Sivagnana Yogi, “Tamil Vaidya Saṅga Naḍavaḍikai,” 87; The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous
Systems of Medicine, 2: 330-340, 443-444.
100
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 240.
101
R. Somasundaram, “Tamil Siddhargaḷum, Tamil Maruthuva Nōṛgaḷum,” TVK 1, no.8 (1922): 161-167.
102
Anandam, “Namathu Pathirikaiṉ Nōkkam,” 1.

254
were special features of Siddha medicine only.103 Thus, these rhetoric characterised Ayurveda
and Tamil Siddha as a separate medical ‘systems’.

When Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians structuralised Ayurveda within the

boundary of Sanskrit language and Aryans, Tamil physicians followed ideologies and rhetoric
created by Non-Brahmin leaders and constructed their medicine within Tamil language and
Dravidians by marginalising the contribution of other languages particularly Sanskrit. When
the Justice party was heading the Provincial Government in Madras Presidency, knowledge
based on Sanskrit texts was marginalised by the Non-Brahmin leaders. The advocates of Tamil
movements attempted to reconstruct the pure Dravidian culture (pre-Aryan) in all its
components such as language, religion, music and medicine. Leaders of movements like pure
Tamil movement, Tamil isai (music) movement tried to construct Dravidian culture based on
Tamil language and Tamil scriptures alone which led to the erasure of the traces of ‘others’.104
For instance, on the occasion of the appointment of a Reader in the Department of Indian
Philosophy in Madras University, when T.A. Ramalingam Chetti (member of Justice Party)
insisted that the Saiva Siddhanta philosophy alone should be the part of the curriculum, senate
member S. Satyamurthi countered his views by pointing out how the enormity of Indian
philosophy was ignored because of the simple fact that it was written in Sanskrit language.105
Thus during the second and third decade of the twentieth century, the atmosphere of the Tamil
region in Madras Presidency presented a picture of vehement marginalisation of the
contribution of Sanskrit language and constructions of pure Tamil culture. Srinivasa
Aiyangar’s writings reflected such speculation thus:

Within the last fifteen years a new school of Tamil scholars has come into being,
consisting mainly of admirers and caste men of the late lamented professor and
antiquary, Mr. Sundaram Pillai of Trivandram. Their object has been to disown and
to disprove any trace of indebtedness to the Aryans, to exalt the civilisation of the
ancient Tamils, to distort in the name of historic research the current traditions and
literature, and to pooh-pooh the views of former scholars, which support the
Brahmanization of the Tamil race.106

103
Shunmugananda Swamigal, Tirumoolar Vaidyam Karukkiḍai 900, 12.
104
Ramaswamy, Passions of the Tongue, 30.
105
Eugene F Irschick, Politics and Social Conflict in South India: The Non-Brahmin Movement and Tamil
Separatism 1916-1929 (Bombay: Oxford University Press, 1969), 293.
106
M. Srinivasa Aiyangar, Tamil Studies: Essays on the History of the Tamil People, Language, Religion, and
Literature (Madras: Guardian Press, 1914), 46.

255
 Sigamani Pandithar, Palvannam Mudaliyar, and other Tamil physicians affirmed in the
Usman Committee that the treatise of Siddha medicine existed only in the Tamil language.107
D. Sangaradanu Pillai structuralised Siddha medicine within the boundary of Tamil region. He
wrote that Siddha medicine originated and developed in the Tamil country - a region bounded
by Venkata hills in North, Kumari (Cape Comorin) in South, Kudagu hills in West and Guṇa
kaḍal (Bay of Bengal) in East.108 Virudai Sivagnana Yogi has pointed out that Siddha system
of medicine has greatly to do with Siddhas like Nandi, Tirumoolar, Agastiyar, Theraiyar,
Ramadevar, Dhanwanthri and so on who were eighteen in number. None of them were born in
the northern countries.109 Taking a step further, Shunmugananda Swamigal insisted that
thereafter medical practice of Tamil medical texts should be called as Siddha ‘system’ instead
of tagging it as Āyuḷvedam, Tamil Āyuḷvedam, Ayurveda Siddha Vaidyam and South Indian
Āyuḷvedam.110 Besides, he ordered that the word Veda or Vedam in Tamil medical texts should
be understood as Tamil Vedas such as Tiruvāsagam and Dēvāram instead of Sanskrit Vedas.111
When marginalising Sanskrit language and texts from Siddha medicine, Tamil physicians
included even non-textualised medical traditions of Tamil region such as grandma medicine,
bone settings into Siddha systemic boundary. For example, Pandit S.S. Anandam included
illiterate midwives whose knowledge comes through oral tradition as a part of Siddha
medicine.112 He insisted that grandmothers of Tamil region knew Siddha medicine and how to
cure the diseases even before the emergence of written medical texts.113 U.C.P. Moiyadeen
Rawuthar pointed out that Siddha medicine was practiced in every nook and corner of Tamil
villages as an oral tradition.114 T.V. Sambasivam Pillai said that every woman of Tamil region
knew best how to treat herself and her children.115 During the first quarter of the twentieth
century, Tamil physicians constructed a separate medical identity in the public sphere on the
basis of Tamil language, Dravidian race and Tamil region against Sanskrit language and Aryan
race. They claimed that Siddha medical history originated from Sangam age and was aligned
with metallic and mineral medicine while pushing Ayurveda to the realm of herbal medicine.
While disowning the contribution of Sanskrit medical texts, they clubbed non-textualised

107
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 236, 325, 387.
108
Sangaradanu Pillai, “Tamil Siddha Vaidyam,” 17-18.
109
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 444.
110
Shunmugananda Swamigal, Tiruvaḷḷuva Nāyaṉār Vaguththaruḷiya Pañcha Rattiṉam 500, 8.
111
Ibid, 84.
112
S.S. Anandam, “Simon Commission Varaveṛpu,” Maruthuvaṉ 1, no.5 (1929): 130.
113
S.S. Anadam, “Tamil Vaidyamum Samaskrita Vaidyamum,” Maruthuvaṉ 1, no.4 (1929): 95.
114
Moiyadeen Rawuthar, “Tamil Siddha Vaidyathiṉ Nilamai,” 73.
115
Sambasivam Pillai, Portions selected from the Introduction of Thiru. T.V. Sambasivam Pillai’s Tamil – English,
12.

256
medicines into their boundary based on the Tamil region. The continuous rhetoric of Tamil
Vaids became standard history in course of time and not only helped to establish Tamil medical
texts and practices as a separate legitimate medicine but also imprinted uniqueness of Siddha
medicine in the minds of people.

5.3.3 Immortal Siddhas and Superiority of Siddha Medicine

Along with the construction of alternate systemic boundary, Siddha physicians claimed
the superiority of their medicine in the competitive space. They articulated the supernatural
powers of Siddhas and Siddha medicine against other medicines which were propagated as
products of ordinary humans. Feelings of Tamil language and region were spread along with
the writings about Siddha medicine to promote their medicine as exclusively suitable to Tamil
people.116 For instance, R. Somasundaram wrote continuously about powers of Siddhas and
superiority of Siddha medicine by portraying Siddhas as a class of mythical divine beings who
had achieved a state of spiritual enlightenment. They understood microcosm and macrocosm
as a one and the same. Siddhas had spiritual power which controls whole cosmos. They
enquired all aspects of five bhūtas, human body beyond physical, even small ants to big
animals, grass to big trees, minerals, alkalis, metals and so on. Nothing was left in this cosmos
without their enquiry. Ordinary human beings could not understand supernatural powers of
Siddhas. They could move in ether, appeared in stars and lived in universe. Siddhas attained
immortal body by maṇi, mantra and medicine. Eighteen Tamil Siddhas were head of all
Siddhas in the world. Tamil Siddhas proved that body could be immortalised by yoga and
medicine.117 He further added that kaṛpa medicines could not be discovered by human beings
who had petty knowledge and life whereas it could be achieved by superhuman Siddhas. For
example, Pandya king Mā keerthi lived for 25,000 years by taking kaṛpa medicines which
showed the power of Siddha medicine. If other medicines were powerful which was found by
ordinary human beings, one could imagine the power of Siddha medicine that it was found and
given in this Tamil country after thorough analysis on diseases and its causational factors, body
capability of Tamils and climate and nature of Tamil country by the superhuman Siddhas.
Siddha medicine was found after the penance of more than 10,000 Siddha years. One year of
Siddhas was equal to 3000 years of humans. Thus, Tamil people should understand the

116
Sangaradanu Pillai, “Tamil Siddha Vaidyam,” 17-18.
117
R. Somasundaram, “Tamil Siddhargaḷum, Tamil Maruthuva Nōṛgaḷum,” TVK 1, no.6 (1922): 120-124; idem,
“Tamil Siddhargaḷum, Tamil Maruthuva Nōṛgaḷum,” TVK 1, no.8 (1922): 161-167.

257
differences between Siddha medicine and other medicines. Former was founded by immortal
Siddhas and later by ordinary humans.118

Likewise, Shunmugananda Swamigal wrote in his Tiruvaḷḷuva Nāyaṉār

Vaguththaruḷiya Pañcha Rattiṉam 500 and Tirumoolar Vaidyam-Karukkiḍai 900 about
Siddhas and requested Tamils to support Tamil medicine. He said that Siddhas were immortal
beings who had reached complete freedom – a state where there was cessation of fear of death,
sufferings and sorrow, a state of infinite freedom, perfect knowledge and complete peace.
Siddhas were the ones who had transcended time - past, present and future. They attained
blissfulness by yoga, gnana and kaṛpa medicine. They could dematerialise and spiritualise the
body and know how to transmute the corruptible physical into incorruptible super physical
basis of life. Siddhas attained eight siddhis that are aṉimā – the ability to become as minute as
an atom, mahimā – the ability to expand infinitely, laghimā – levitation to float through the air,
karimā – the ability to reach everywhere, prakāmyā – freedom of will, or the ability to
overcome natural obstacles, isitvā – the ability to create or control, vasitvā – domination over
the entire creation and kāmavasayitvā – the gift of wish fulfilment or the ability of attaining
everything desired or to attain the stage of desireless. So hereafter, Tamil people should
understand the powers of Siddhas who were the forefathers of Tamils as well as to Tamil
medicine.119 T.V. Sambasivam Pillai pointed out the eight attainments of Siddha and special
aspects of Siddha medicine as follows:

The word ‘Siddha’ comes from the word ‘Siddhi’ which means ‘an object to be
attained’ or ‘perfection’ or ‘heavenly bliss’. Siddhi generally refers to Ashtama
Siddhi i.e., the eight great supernatural powers which are enumerated as Anima
etc., Those who attained or achieved the above said powers are known as
Siddhars… The Siddhars were further the greatest scientists in ancient times. They
were men of highly cultured intellectual and spiritual faculties combined with
supernatural powers. Their works in Tamil are supposed to be more valuable than
many that have been written in Sanskrit. They are said to be works less shackled
by the mythological doctrine of the original Ayurveda.120

118
Ibid.
119
Shunmugananda Swamigal, Tirumoolar Vaidyam Karukkiḍai 900, 1-10; idem, Tiruvaḷḷuva Nāyaṉār
Vaguththaruḷiya Pañcha Rattiṉam 500, 1–4.
120
Sambasivam Pillai, Portions selected from the Introduction of Thiru. T.V. Sambasivam Pillai’s Tamil – English
10-11.

258
 By this sort of rhetoric, Siddha physicians tried to get legitimacy for their medicine
through claiming the supernatural powers of Siddhas. Tamil Siddhas were projected as heads
of all Siddha cult in the country and also propagated as the forefathers of Tamils. They strived
to establish the superiority of their medicine through branding other medicines as the products
of ordinary humans. Siddha physicians gave more importance to kaṛpa medicines and
rejuvenating capability of Siddha medicine along with projecting the absence of that
knowledge in other medicines. When the Tamil physicians constructed the superiority of their
medicine in the public sphere, what were the arguments in responses of ayurvedic physicians
and the counter arguments of Tamil physicians? The following section answers this question.

5.4 Contest Between Siddha and Ayurveda

When Siddha physicians constructed Siddha as a separate legitimate medicine on the

basis of metals and minerals, ayurvedic physicians did not accept it as a separate medicine
instead they projected it as a part of Ayurveda Rasa Sāstra. For instance, Kaviraj Gananath Sen
said that there were chemist-physicians who produced medicines from metals, minerals, salts
and alkalis which had been always a part of Ayurveda, whereas a present group of physicians
called this methods as Siddha system.121 Pandit Duraiswami Aiyangar stated in Usman
Committee that the Siddha system was not a new system. It was only a new name. Taking a
step further, he told that the Tamil works did not give much stress on Rasāyana tantram.122
Moreover, Sanskrit physician now projected another history of Ayurveda based on Rasa
Sampradāya coming from Sivanar (lord Siva).

Pandit Duraiswami Aiyangar wrote the history of Rasa Sampradāya as a part of

Ayurveda. According to him, that Rasa Sampradāya developed from an earlier period onwards
in this country. From the fourth century A.D, the physicians used the metals and mineral
substances to cure diseases. Prior to this period, physicians might have considered metals and
minerals as poisonous substances to the human body but during the later period, physicians
discovered purifying methods and developed Rasa Sampradāya as a part of Ayurveda. Due to
this reason, earlier Sanskrit ayurvedic texts like Caraka and Sushruta did not talk about the
medicines of minerals and metals. But lot of medical texts on Rasa Sampradāya were written
from the fourth century A.D. which comprised Nagarjuna’s Rasaratṉākāram, Sivaperuman’s
Rasarṉavam, Nithyanadha’s Rasaratṉākāram, Govinda Bhavathbathar’s Rasa Hirudayam,

121
Gananath Sen, “Ayurveda Sāstiram,” Sri Dhanvantari 1, no.11 (1923): 7.
122
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 465-466.

259
Yasodharan’s Rasa Prakāshā Sitagāram, Govindachariya’s Rasasāram, Samunda Vaidya’s
Rasa Saṅgētakaligā, Sri Bindu’s Rasa Paththādi, Sireswar’s Lōgesarvasvam, Madhavan’s
Ayurveda Prakāsham, Somadeva’s Rasēndra Suḍāmaṇi, Patanjali’s Lōga Tantra, Vishnu
Devan’s Rasarāja Laxmi, Madhanandaga Devarishi’s Rasa Cintāmaṇi, Devadathtan’s Dādu
Rathiṉamālai, Gobala Bhat’s Rasēndrasāra Saṅgiragam, Madhanasimghan’s Rasa
Nakshatramālai, Rasēndra Cintāmaṇi, Rasarāja Sundaram, Rasa Kaṛpam, Swavachchānda
Bhairavam and Nandi’s Rasa Tantra, Rasa Pradēpika, Dādu Mañjari etc. Further, he
questioned that while many of the Rasa medical texts were already written in Sanskrit language,
how could anyone accept the Tamil medical system as a separate system on the basis of Rasa
medicines? Besides, no Tamil Rasa text was equal to Sanskrit Rasa text like Rasaratṉa
Samuchchayam and it was very difficult to find systematised Tamil medical texts about Rasa
medical aspects.123 Pandit Duraiswami Aiyangar insisted that the name of Tamil medical texts
ending with Vāgaḍam indicates that these texts had been vernacularized from the Sanskrit
books of Vagabhata. One who read Vagabhata’s books could conclude that Tamil medical texts
were plagiarised version of Sanskrit texts.124

Like Duraiswami Aiyangar, Pandit Narayana Iyengar also wrote about the Rasa
Sampradāya of Sanskrit Ayurveda. He stated in his journal Vaidya Chandrika that Rasa
Sampradāya was developed and written in Sanskrit language from an early period of time.
Earlier physicians concentrated on herbs to cure the diseases, but later, physicians found that
minerals and metals could be purified and used for the betterment of human life. Rasa
Sampradāya came from lord Siva. From him, a lot of Siddhas learned and produced the
medicines to immortalise their body of them first twenty seven Siddhas were prominent. They
found new mineral and metallic drugs and wrote a number of books in Sanskrit language. They
were Adimar, Chandrasenar, Langesan (Ravanan), Visaratharar, Kabali, Mathar, Mandavyar,
Baskarar, Surasasenar, Rathnakosar, Sambu, Shathvigar, Naravagar, Indiradumar,
Munisirester, Kabilar, Vyadi, Nagarjunar, Siranandar, Nagabothi, Yasodhanar, kandar,
Kabaligar, Banasiran, Govindar, Lambagar and Bali Chakravarthi. After these Siddhas, a lot
of Rasa physicians had written Rasa texts which were Nithyanathar’s Rasaratṉākāram,
Vagbhata’s Rasaratṉa Samuchchayam, Rasēndra Cintāmaṇi, Rasa Mañjari, Rasa Prakāsha
Sitagāram, Rasasāram, Rasa Saṅgētakaligā, Ayurveda Prakāsham, Rasēndrasāra Saṅgiragam

123
Duraiswami Aiyangar, “Introduction,” in Rasaratṉa Samuchchayam, 8-10.
124
Ibid, 26-27.

260
etc. Tamil Siddha medical texts were not only texts which include metallic and mineral
medicines.125

When ayurvedic physicians did not accept Siddha as a separate medicine of Tamils,
Tamil physicians continuously propagated their medicine as separate medicine of Tamils in the
public sphere and endeavoured to establish it. Besides, they contested the claims and criticism
of Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians along with marginalising Ayurveda. They articulated
the glorious past of the Tamil civilisation and projected Tamils as a great community in the
world. In this process, they made Tamil medicine as superior to Ayurveda. Moreover, Tamil
physicians defamed Ayurveda as a compilation of superstitious practices. For example, Pandit
S.S. Anandam discussed in his journal Maruthuvaṉ regarding Tamil and Sanskrit medicine
regularly. He countered Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians regarding their criticism of
Siddha medicine by arguing that while the whole world was uncivilised, Tamils were living a
glorious life having achieved advancement in arts, crafts, education, agriculture, trade and
politics. They inaugurated literary conferences five thousand years ago to develop their
language and literature. While the whole world faced illness and did not know about preventive
and curative medicines, the Tamil people lived a long and healthy life. How could anyone
believe that this highly esteemed people who achieved in arts and crafts, lived without their
126
own medicine and depended on Aryans for their healthy life? Further, S.S. Anandam
attacked the Brahmin community for claiming Sanskrit solely as their language and rejected
Ayurveda as a separate medicine. He pointed out that Sanskrit was a common writing language
for mystical aspects and Ayurveda was a compiled medicine from vernacular texts. He wrote
that ancient physicians selected Sanskrit as written language for Vedam, Upanisam, āgamam,
yōgam, gnaṉam, jōtisham, mantiraṅgaḷ and vaidyam as there existed twelve vernacular
languages in India at that time. They thought that if these highly mystical aspects were written
in any one of those languages, they wouldn’t reach all sections of society. So they chose
Sanskrit as a common language and translated the vernacular texts containing these mystical
aspects into that language at a later period. Therefore, medical texts written in vernacular
languages were the basis for Sanskrit medical texts and not vice versa. Sanskrit language did
not belong to any particular community. It was used by all the Siddhas and physicians. But at
present, one group of people, i.e. the Brahmins, was claiming Sanskrit as its own language and

125
Narayana Iyengar, “Vaḍamoḻi Siddha Vaidyam,” VC 1, no.5 (1925): 10-18.
126
Anandam, “Tamil Vaidyamum Samaskrita Vaidyamum,” 93-94.

261
projected it as a Deva bhāsha (God’s language) while marginalising other vernacular languages
as a Sudra bhāsha (Sudra language). This should be condemned.127

While Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians criticised Tamil medicine as plagiarised

version of Sanskrit texts, S.S. Anandam responded that when Tamil scholars were working
hard to revive Tamil language through different modes, Brahmin physicians were projecting
Tamil medical texts as plagiarised versions of the Sanskrit ayurvedic texts. Just as Sanskrit
texts like the Vedas or Upanishads and Tamil works like Tirukkuṛaḷ or Nālaḍiyār could not be
attributed an English origin because they had been translated into that language by the colonial
scholars, the many medical texts which had been translated from Tamil to Sanskrit could not
be said to have a Sanskrit origin. In the same way, how could anyone accept that just by
translating Tamil herbs like karisalāṅkaṇṇi, vēmbu, sukku, miḷagu and kaḍukkāi as briṅgarāja,
nimbā, sukṭi, marisam and haritaki into Sanskrit these medical products belong to Sanskrit
Ayurveda? He further added that if some Sanskrit words occurred in Tamil language, it could
not be said that the Tamil language originates from Sanskrit. Likewise, certain diseases like
Ēlai Nōi, Veppu Nōi, Vāḻai Nōi, usually were called by Sanskrit terms as Tsayam, Juram, and
Vātam in the Tamil medical texts. So how could they claim that Tamil medicine was a
plagiarised version of Sanskrit medicine on the basis of the names of the diseases?128
S.S. Anandam wrote a repartee to the criticism of Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians
regarding the standard of language in Tamil medical texts in his journal Maruthuvaṉ. He stated
that the standard of language in Tamil medical texts was low while comparing with Sanskrit
medical texts as projected by Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians. Because, Tamil medical
texts were written many years before the emergence of Sanskrit medical texts. Further, Sanskrit
medical texts were compiled from Tamil medical texts. While compiling from different
sources, usually, they would be arranged and written in high standard which ultimately proved
that Tamil medical texts were foundational to Sanskrit texts. Moreover, because Siddhas
preferred to pass valuable knowledge to common people, they wrote in colloquial language.129

While retaliating Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians, Tamil physicians condemned

Aryans as outsiders as well as spoilers of Tamil civilisation. They pointed out that Tamils lived
in egalitarian society which was destroyed by Aryans through introducing their caste system.
Furthermore, Tamil physicians pinpointed caste prejudices in the Sanskrit medical texts. For

127
S.S. Anandam, “Tamil Vaidyamum Samaskrita Vaidyamum,” Maruthuvaṉ 1, no.5 (1929): 121-122.
128
Anandam, “Tamil Vaidyamum Samaskrita Vaidyamum,” 96.
129
Anandam, “Tamil Vaidyamum Samaskrita Vaidyamum,” 123.

262
example, T.V. Sambasivam Pillai wrote about Tamil civilisation and Tamil medicine. He stated
as follows:

As every tyro in Indian History, knows that, prior to the Aryan migration, the
dravidians were the first inhabitants of India of whom the Tamilians were the most
prominent. The early history of the Tamil country and the earliest tradition of the
Tamilians are still shrouded in obscurity… Tamilians were not only the earliest
civilized but those who made more considerable progress in civilization than any
other early people…I shall endeavour to mention these placing them in such a point
of view that will both serve to throw light upon their arts, institutions, manners and
customs and to satisfactorily account for the eagerness of the Aryans and other
nations to assimilate the product of all their indigenous and remarkable activities.
From the most ancient available account of the Dravidians in India, we learn that
the distinction of social ranks according to profession – not to speak of castes and
creeds, was thoroughly in vogue during those time…It is only after the Aryan
immigration that they divided themselves into four castes.130

Likewise, Pandit S.S. Anandam indicated the caste prejudices in Ayurveda. He had written in
his article, entitled, Tamil Vaidyamum Samaskrita Vaidyamum that Sanskrit Ayurveda
followed caste distinctions to provide treatments which were absent in Tamil medicine which
considered all people equally with Jēvakāruṇyam (compassion). For example, colours of
maternity room was dictated in ayurvedic texts based on the caste. Colours of maternity rooms’
of Brahman, Kshatriya, Vaishya, Sudra and Pañjama were white, yellow, red, mixed colours
of black and red and complete black respectively which symbolised caste prejudices in
Ayurveda.131

Apart from these, Tamil physicians argued strongly that Ayurveda was outsiders’
medicine and a plagiarised version of Tamil medicine. They made Aryans as conspirators
against Tamil community and being a cause of downfall of Siddha medicine as well. For
instance, Virudai Sivagnana Yogi pointed out that Sanskrit medicine did not belong to Tamil
country. Only one thousand five hundred years ago, Ayurveda emerged.132 But, even before
Aryan came here, the Siddha system was prevalent and ayurvedic physicians gradually

130
Sambasivam Pillai, Portions Selected from the Introduction of Thiru T.V. Sambasivam Pillai’s Tamil – English
3- 4.
131
Anandam, “Tamil Vaidyamum Samaskrita Vaidyamum,” 140.
132
Sivagnana Yogi, “Tamil Vaidya Saṅga Naḍavaḍikai,” 87.

263
developed their system by incorporating the methods of Siddha system.133 Shunmugananda
Swamigal had written in his book Tiruvaḷḷuva Nāyaṉār Vaguththaruḷiya Pañcha Rattiṉam500
that Aryans, like the English people and Muhamadans, came from outside and colonised Tamils
for their interest. Moreover, Ayurveda, Aryan medicine, was also a medicine of outsiders like
Western medicine which wouldn’t be suitable to the Tamil people.134 Shunmugananda
Swamigal explained the cause for the downfall of Siddha medicine. He pointed out that though
Aryans were a minority in Tamil country, they were all educated and working in government
departments. So these people were pacifying the government to the development of their
language and medicine and working against Tamil language and Siddha medicine. Moreover,
ayurvedic physicians of Tamil region were becoming successful in their treatment by using
Tamil medicine but cheating the people by calling it as Ayurveda medicine.135

While Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians projected their medicine as scientific and

superior, Tamil physicians compared Ayurveda with their medicine and criticised texts of
Ayurveda as documents of spurious stories. S.S. Anandam stated that Sanskrit ayurvedic texts
were spurious documents. For example, several wonderful deeds were attributed to the twins
Asvini Devas. They cured the moon’s tuberculosis after a prayer. In the same way, Saturn was
blessed with a metal leg after he lost a limb. Kuberan lost his eyesight and approached Asvini
Devas for help. His eyesight was restored after an operation. Similar miracles like plastic
surgery, lithotomy and others were described in ayurvedic texts. Ayurveda comprised of these
sorts of unbelievable stories rather than any useful knowledge. But ultimate aim of Siddha
medicine was to make one realise the relationship between body and soul which led to the
attainment of mōksha.136 Further, S.S. Anandam interrogated the assertion of superiority of
Ayurveda that if Ayurveda was a perfect science as asserted by Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic
physicians, why Mahatma Gandhi, C.R. Das, Surendranath Banerjee and other important
national leaders approached Western medicine for their diseases. If Sanskrit Ayurveda was
perfect in anatomy, physiology, surgery, paediatrics and midwifery, why ayurvedic institutions
borrowed the concepts of above said subjects from Western medicine? Thus, Sanskrit texts
were there for name sake rather than having principal medical qualities.137 Likewise,
Ka. Pu. Ma. Kadhar Muhayadeen Rawuthar had written that whatever things were being found
by Western physicians, all these aspects were already discovered by Tamil Siddhas. Further,

133
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 444-445.
134
Shunmugananda Swamigal, Tiruvaḷḷuva Nāyaṉār Vaguththaruḷiya Pañcha Rattiṉam 500, 7- 8.
135
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 341.
136
Anandam, “Tamil Vaidyamum Samaskrita Vaidyamum,” 139-140.
137
Anandam, “Tamil Vaidyamum Samaskrita Vaidyamum,” 94.

264
he stated that though Buddhism and Ayurveda both emerged in North India, Buddhist monks
carried Siddha medicine of Southern region to foreign countries instead of their regional
medicine Ayurveda. These two aspects showed the superiority of Tamil medicine to
Ayurveda.138

Thus, when carefully analysing the contest between the two ‘systems’, Ayurveda now
broadened its boundary to metallic and mineral forms of medicine and rejected Siddha as a
separate ‘system’. At the same time, Tamil physicians opposed vehemently Aryans as
conspirators and Ayurveda as degraded and outside medicine. Both physicians asserted their
respective medicine as the base and other one as plagiarised version. In this process, they tried
to construct a legitimate medical sphere and create space for their respective medicine in a
competitive milieu. Though both the ‘systems’ existed as part and parcel of the Āyuḷvedam
earlier, the two different medical ‘systems’ were constructed on the basis of their linguistic and
racial identity in the early decades of the twentieth century. But these systemic constructions
based on language and race did not escape the condemnation from the physicians who looked
both as a part of single ‘system’ in the Tamil region.

5.5 Voices Against Systemic Boundary Constructions

Some physicians in Colonial Tamil region criticised the bifurcation of the medical
sphere on the basis of nature of the medicine, language, race and region. They propagated a
common knowledge stock of indigenous medicines and tried to prove that both herbal and
mineral medicines as part of same stock. When Siddha physicians were constructing Siddha as
a separate medical ‘system’ on the basis of mineral and metal nature, these physicians showed
a lot of evidence to prove the availability of Rasa medicines in Sanskrit texts also. At the same
time, their understanding of the meaning of Ayurveda was different from Sanskrit-centric
ayurvedic physicians. They were propagating Ayurveda as common name to indigenous
medicines comprising texts of Sanskrit and vernacular languages and attacked those Sanskrit-
centric physicians who condemned Tamil medical texts. They questioned separatists about the
criteria for bifurcation and continuously promulgated separatists as selfish physicians. The
physicians of such importance were Pandit Narayana Iyengar of Madurai, Vaidya Ācharya
S.R.V. Das from Vellore, C.Ta. Arumugam Pillai, Pandit R.M.K. Velusami Pillai, Narayan
Nayar and others.

138
Ka.Pu.Ma. Kadhar Muhayadeen Rawuthar, “Eṉadu Nōkkam,” 1-2; idem, “Namathu Vaidyam,” 181-182.

265
 These physicians pointed out the common nature of both Ayurveda and Siddha
medicines, and provided evidences to prove that Rasa Sampradāya emerged as a part of
Ayurveda in the historical development. Vaidya Ācharya S.R.V. Das from Vellore wrote
continuously in his Tamil medical journal Āyuḷvedam that Āyuḷvedam meant the medicine
which improved longevity of life, was written in Sanskrit and vernacular languages. From
ancient times onwards, Āyuḷveda was gradually developed by the critical analysis and
experiments. Each and every stage, the pharmacopeia of Āyuḷveda was enlarged by
incorporating new herbs and medicines after scientific research. Earlier rishis treated diseases
by herbal medicines but in the later period when they failed to treat new types of diseases,
found metals, minerals and alkalis as crucial medicines. Both Oushādi and Rasa medicines
were added into the pharmacopeia of Āyuḷveda, written in Sanskrit as well as in vernacular
languages by respective Siddhas like Somanathar, Nagarjunar, Nithya Nandar, Agastiyar,
Theraiyar and others. So medicine should not be divided based on herbal and minerals. Both
were part and parcel of Āyuḷveda evolved during the historical development.139 Further, Das
questioned these two separatist groups of physicians that if there were two different and
separate systems, why the fundamental theory, diagnostic methods, diet patterns, ashṭavargam,
ashṭamōlam, thashamōlam, triphalai, trikaḍugu and trikandam etc., were identical in
Ayurveda and Siddha.140 He requested practitioners of indigenous medicines to understand the
historical development of indigenous medicines and avoid dividing the physicians on the basis
of race and languages. Besides, he interrogated the separatists that if the same products were
wrapped in different colours, could the products be considered different due to the colour of
the wrapper? In the same way, common medical knowledge was written in different languages
for the understanding of regional people. So how common medical knowledge could be divided
on the basis of language? S.R.V. Das pointed out that instead of improving indigenous
medicines, these selfish separatist physicians were creating unnecessary tension based on
language and race in the medical sphere. Medical intellectual should denounce the attitude of
these selfish physicians.141

Another important protagonist in this group was Pandit S. Narayana Iyengar who
propagated the commonality of both ‘systems’ and attacked both groups of separatist
physicians for their stand and criticism of one another. He tried to prove that Rasa Sampradāya
of Tamil medicine was identical with Sanskrit Rasa Sampradāya. He said before the Usman

139
S.R.V. Das, “Bhāsaṇaṅgaḷ,” Āyuḷvedam 1, no.5 (1923): 107-110.
140
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 372-374.
141
S.R.V. Das, “Bhāsaṇaṅgaḷ,” Āyuḷvedam 1, no.6 (1923): 136.

266
Committee and wrote in his journal that Siddha and Ayurveda proceed on the tridoṣa theory.
He further, stated that the antiquity of Ayurveda could be traced with sufficient accuracy. The
treatment in indigenous systems has reference to three things, viz. the minerals, Rasas and
uparasas, and nāḍi. Besides, there were eighteen Tamil Siddhas and twenty seven Sanskrit
Siddhas; both were distinct from each other. Agastya system was complete. The Tamil Siddha
parampara came from Eswara. The Sanskrit Ayurveda parampara traced to Brahma while
Sanskrit Siddha parampara to Siva. Except the difference in the names of the Siddhas in the
two branches, there was no difference between the Sanskrit and Tamil schools.142

While projecting that both schools were the same, he condemned separatist Sanskrit
and Tamil physicians. He attacked those Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians for criticising
Tamil medicine as illegitimate practice. For instance, he wrote that some Sanskrit-centric
ayurvedic physicians criticised Tamil medical texts written by Theraiyar, Tiruvalluvar,
Agastiyar, and Dhanwanthri as fake documents. It should be condemned. Tamil medical texts
also were written on the basis of tridoṣa theory. So it had equal respect as Sanskrit ayurvedic
texts. Moreover, Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians defamed Tamil Siddha medical texts as
if they did not contain medical knowledge instead more on yoga, gnana and unnecessary
blabbers. Besides, they were targeted for the standard of language. There was no proper reason
to these attacks without understanding of the real cause for this. Siddha medical texts were
written after critical analysis and experiments. It comprised yoga, gnana along with medical
aspects which were considered as significant aspects in human life by Siddhas. Due to that
reason, they wrote these aspects in their texts. But, Siddhas like Theraiyar, Dhanwanthri had
written exclusive medical texts in Tamil language. Siddhas had written very simple and
colloquial language for common man’s understanding rather than for any mystical aspects.143
Simultaneously, S. Narayana Iyengar attacked Tamil physicians also for constructing a separate
medical boundary. He stated that a group of Tamil physicians constructed Tamil Siddha
medicine as a separate medical system on the basis of metals and minerals and propagated
Siddha medicine as different from Ayurveda. But actually a look at medical texts proves that
both the ‘systems’ were written in Sanskrit and Tamil languages. Moreover, Tamil Siddhas
themselves accepted their borrowing from Sanskrit texts. Further, he advocated that nobody

142
Narayana Iyengar, “Vaḍamoḻi Siddha Vaidyam,” 10-18; The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous
Systems of Medicine, 2: 454.
143
Narayana Iyengar, “Swadēsha Nōlgaḷ Pōli Grandaṅgaḷa,” VC 1, no.10 (1926): 10, 1-5; idem, “Tamil Vaidyam
Allatu Siddha Vaidyam,” VC 1, no.1 (1925): 25.

267
could claim the Siddhas on the basis of race, caste and languages.144 He concluded that
indigenous medical systems were written in Sanskrit and vernacular languages by physicians
of respective regions. Even though there were marginal differences in their treatment, the
fundamental theory and diagnostic methods were the same.145

A critical analysis of oral and written presentations of physicians of Madras Presidency

before the Usman Committee reflected ambiguities on ‘systemic’ differences among the
physicians. For example physicians like R.M.K Veluswami Pillai, V. Narayan Nayar,
K.C. Subramaniyam Pillai, M.V. Sastri, Muthia Pillai, Krishna Rao and others presented their
views against the construction of separate medical ‘systems’. They pointed out that they used
herbal and mineral medicines in their treatment. Pandit R.M.K. Velusami Pillai pointed out
that indigenous medical systems were commonly grouped as Āyuḷvedam which comprised
herbal medicines like chūraṇam, lēkiyam and mineral medicines like bhasmam, sendūram.
These medicines were discovered by Siddhas who emerged from different parts of India and
wrote in different languages such as Sanskrit, Nagaram, Telugu and other vernaculars. He
concluded that no evidence was available to call Sanskrit based system as Ayurveda and Tamil
based system as Siddha medicine.146 Pandit K. Sesha Ayyar from Tirupati presented his views
about ‘systemic’ differences before the Usman Committee. He stated that the sāstras comprised
about mercury and kindred mineral substances were called Rasa tantra, and the persons
proficient in them were called Rasa Siddhas. Rasa Siddha was a term applied only to those
people who handled mercury and kindred substances to the exclusion of all vegetable drugs.
So that branch of science was isolated from the main therapeutic branch. Rasa Hridaya Tantra
and Rasasāra were the books which dealt about mercury and kindred substances. So the Siddha
system was only a development of the Ayurveda system, and that it took its origin from the
Ayurveda system. There were about 18 samskārams for Rasa and if these 18 samskārams were
made, then Rasa would stand the test of fire. These things were to be found in Rasa Sāstras. It
was called as Rajapathi Vidya and Hemapathi Vidya. It was not peculiar to Siddha system
alone. Ayurvedic physicians also used mercury and kindred metals. The book which were
generally used in regard to this knowledge were Rasēndrasāra Saṅgiragam and Yoga
Ratṉākāram and Sāraṅgadāra Samhita. Finally, he concluded that Siddha medicine was
recorded as Rasa tantra and part of Ayurveda.147

144
Narayana Iyengar, “Tamil Vaidyam Allatu Siddha Vaidyam,” 18-25.
145
Ibid.
146
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 366.
147
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 459-460.

268
 Apart from these aspects, some physicians questioned the criteria of bifurcation. For
instance, V. Narayan Nayar pointed out that the language and phraseology could not make two
systems separate from each other. If differentiation was to be made on the basis of languages,
then the Ayurveda should be divided into so many systems as Bengali Vaidyam, Telugu
Vaidyam, Hindi Vaidyam or Malayali Vaidyam and dealt with separately.148 Thus, when
analysing the oral and written evidences of practitioners of indigenous medicines of Madras
Presidency, they reflected ambiguity about their systemic consciousness. Moreover, above
discussed physicians vehemently opposed the separate systemic constructions and questioned
both group of physicians for their criteria of constructions. When constructing two different
medical systems in the Tamil region, there were voices of physicians against these
constructions on the basis of the nature of medicine, language and race. These physicians tried
to project the commonality of both medicines and bridge the gap between the opposite positions
of the physicians. They propagated that Ayurveda was a common name to indigenous
medicines which comprises both herbal and mineral medicines and texts of Sanskrit and Tamil
languages. Systemic medical constructions and bifurcation of Ayurveda and Siddha medicines
was not an uncomplicated process as it was considered in scholarly works earlier. The present
research has highlighted the ambiguities, contentions and contradictions among the
practitioners of indigenous medicines of the Colonial Tamil region. It is to be noted that during
the process “quackery” came to be defined based on the language of the medical texts rather
than on pretentious medical knowledge of physicians.

Āyuḷvedam in the Tamil region was a plural medical practice to improve ‘ayul’ that
comprised both Tamil and Sanskrit treatises and it hadn’t witnessed any language or racial
markers until the late nineteenth century. The Buddhist, Nath and Rasa Siddhas found the
alchemical medicines for getting the immortal body to attain gnana. This clandestine
alchemical knowledge was secret earlier but was brought into society later where it mingled
with herbal medicines and labelled as Āyuḷvedam that was in itself plural in nature. But this
meaning and boundary were transformed during the contest and marginalised Tamil medical
practices and practitioners as illegitimate and inauthentic. Moreover, the emergence of new
possibilities and opportunity during the last part of the second decade of the twentieth century
intensified contest among indigenous physicians for gaining the social and economic benefits.
This induced the practitioners of Tamil medicine to form a new identity, construct new
boundaries for their medical ‘system’ and propagate it as a legitimate practice of Tamil culture.

148
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 222.

269
This process led to the formation of the new axis of Dravidian-Tamil against Aryan-Sanskrit
on the lines of the social, political and cultural movements in Tamil region. As a result two
different medical ‘systems’ were constructed on the basis of linguistic and racial identity in the
twentieth century. But this construction was severely condemned by indigenous physicians
who used both language texts for their practices. Formation of systemic boundaries were not
easy process instead it comprised confusion, contention and contradictions among indigenous
physicians. Though rigorous propagation of commonality of medical practices, two different
systemic identity was established by Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians as well as Tamil
Siddha physicians on the base of language and race due to political patronage.

Except in Colonial Tamil region, the construction of separate medical identity did not
emerge in any part of Colonial India. Claiming systemic identity based on nature of medicine:
herbal and mineral, was emerged here only. But, when looking at subjects taught in other parts
of ayurvedic colleges, they comprised Sanskrit mineral texts and courses without pushed out
mineral medicines as Siddha ‘system’. For example, the Government Ayurveda College in
Jaipur had mineral texts books such as Rasamañjari, Rasēndrasāra Saṅgiragam and Rasēndra
Cintāmaṇi. Prabhuram Ayurveda College in Bombay provided the course for the certificate of
Rasavaidya which consists of five academical sessions of six months each (two years and
half).149 So it indicates that Sanskrit-centric ayurvedic physicians established their medicine on
the basis of language rather than nature of the medicine. Though Siddha physicians claimed a
separate medical identity on the basis of nature of the medicine, it was also constructed based
on language and race. A close reading of the Usman Committee Report informs us on what
premises the Tamil physicians constructed their medical ‘systems’. C.S. Murugesha Mudaliyar,
a member of Tamil sub-committee, prepared a list of books which belongs to Siddha ‘system’
for the Usman Committee. Examining the list exposes on what basis the books were divided.
The books written in Sanskrit were the part of Ayurveda and same books which were
vernacularized into Tamil were the part of Siddha ‘system’. Likewise, Veerama Munivar’s
medical books comprising the treatise of Tamil medical texts and Western medical practices
as well were added to the Siddha ‘system’ due to its language. However, canonical Ayurveda
books like Sāraṅgadāra Samhita, Aṣṭāṅga Hrdayam were excluded from the Siddha
irrespective of the fact that they had been already vernacularized. It can be deduced that books
were divided on the basis of language rather than practices.

149
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 1: 117-134.

270
 Apart from these, in the Usman Committee enquiry, Virudai Sivagnana Yogi requested
to set up three separate boards for Ayurveda, Siddha and Unani as these are in three different
languages.150 Taking a step further, Murugesha Mudaliyar claimed that his medical practice
could be called the Dravidian medicine instead of calling it Tamil medicine because Siddha
medicine had witnessed its development in all five Dravidian languages Tamil, Telugu,
Malayalam, Kanarese and Tulu. These above statements show that their understanding about
medical practices was based on languages and race.151 During the third decade of the twentieth
century, medical practices based on Tamil texts had acquired new cultural meaning and
boundaries by excluding Sanskrit texts and encompassed non-textualised medicines. For
example, Sanskrit Rasa texts: Vaidya Ratṉākāram, Rasa Cintāmaṇi, Rasa Suḍāmaṇi, Rasa
Prakaraṇam, Rasamālai, Rasa Rasāṅgam and Vaidya Cintāmaṇi, written by Rasa Siddhas,
though they were referred to and followed by Tamil Siddhas to write their texts, were pushed
outside the boundaries of Siddha medical ‘system’ due to their Sanskrit language. The same
language helped these books to enter into Ayurveda medical boundaries. Siddha physicians
included even non-textualised medical traditions of Tamil region such as grandma medicine
and bone setting techniques into Siddha systemic boundaries. Even some physicians
propagated separate systemic boundary in public sphere, they practically used both nature of
medicines such as herbal and minerals and both language texts. Tamil Vaids continuously
approached to Duraiswami Aiyangar’s Vaidya Kalanidhi for their doubts. These aspects shows
that there were bifurcation of medical ‘systems’ for particular interest rather than nature of the
medicine. Thus, there was a process of transformation in the medical sphere of Colonial Tamil
region during the late nineteenth and the early twentieth century. Though both the ‘systems’
existed as part and parcel of the Āyuḷvedam until the late nineteenth century, they took two
different directions after the first decade of the twentieth century. Henceforth, Sanskrit medical
texts and practitioners were associated with Ayurvedic medical ‘system’ and, Tamil medical
texts and practitioners were concomitant with Siddha medical ‘system’. Thus, the present day
systemic boundaries and identities of Ayurveda and Siddha are the outcome of the
homogenising and counter homogenising project of Indian cultural nationalism and for
economic and social interests.

150
The Report of the Committee on the Indigenous Systems of Medicine, 2: 444.
151
Ibid., 238-239.

271