Resentment is brewing among the hundreds of practitioners and manufacturers of Siddha medicines in Tamil Nadu against the Ayush department authorities for not initiating speedy and pro-active steps towards establishing the national headquarters in Chennai for the approved Central Council for Research in Siddha (CCRS).

The union government, about 10 months ago, had given its nod for setting up the separate Siddha Central Council after bifurcating the Central Council for Research in Ayurveda and Siddha (CCRAS), New Delhi.

When the proposal of the Ayush department for the separate central council was endorsed by the health ministry in March last year, it was decided that the Council would be headquartered in Chennai as Tamil Nadu has a large number of Siddha physicians and a large scale of manufacturing industries. But the booster dose step initiated by the government was yet to take its original form because of the passive attitude of the officials in the Ayush department, ISM industry sources told Pharmabiz.

When contacted, Dr M A Kumar, deputy advisor for Siddha system with the Ayush department, said the functioning of the council has begun, but there are some technical problems before it, which would be solved soon. Regarding the posting of a director he said, some procedures are there for appointing a director and they are in the pipeline.

The Council, which was earlier designed to establish in the form of a research institute, has so far not started its function in Chennai, but people with direct knowledge of the department said operation has already begun in New Delhi separately under an officer-on-special duty. The supporters of Siddha system in Chennai are of the opinion that the officer-on special duty is not a Siddha doctor, and demanded that the government should reconsider its decision while posting a permanent head for the Council. They demanded that scientifically qualified and experienced doyen from Siddha community should be the leader of the Council. They asked, by sitting in the national capital, how the officer-on -special duty can take stock of the situation in south India. As a matter of fact, the Council has not started its operation in Chennai.

According to sources in the Ayush department, the government could not appoint a director for the approved Council even after 10 months of its emergence. Besides, the authorities have also failed in conducting an official inauguration either in Delhi or in Chennai. A state like Tamil Nadu, where the number of Siddha goers is increasing day by day, there is no independent testing laboratory for Siddha. But according to sources, if the formation of Central Council is done formally, the existing lab at the ISM directorate premises, Captain Srinivasa Murthy Research Institute for Drug Development for Siddha and Ayurveda, can be merged with the Central Siddha Council as its own property.

When the proposal for the Siddha Central Council was approved by the union cabinet, the idea of the Ayush department was that the existing clinical research units in Siddha at Chennai, Pondicherry, Palayamkottai, Thiruvananthapuram and the Survey of Medicinal Plants Unit & Siddha Medicinal Plants Garden at Mettur could be brought under the Council. Earlier a senior officer in the Ayush department had told Pharmabiz that the government was keen to encourage the system, particularly in Tamil Nadu, hence it decided to establish the headquarters in the state capital.