Ayurveda, the ancient holistic way of maintaining healthy and happy life, has come out of last millennium’s lean phase. However, despite the improved popularity, it continues to be viewed to be based more on “faith” than on rational scientific underpinnings. This unfortunate situation stems largely from the lack of interactions between scientific and Ayurvedic communities. Ayurvedic practitioners have largely refrained from attempting to understand the bases of classical Ayurvedic texts in the light of modern biological, chemical and physical sciences. On the other hand, most of the “scientific” studies on Ayurvedic formulations have applied the reductionist approach of identifying the “active principle”, which is counter to the holistic approach in Ayurveda. 

Modern medicine has roots in the diverse traditional health-care systems. Yet, practitioners of modern and traditional medical systems often view each other with suspicion and contempt because of the perceived differences in their underlying approaches and philosophies. There is a strong need to find commonalities in their languages and philosophies. While the practitioners of Ayurveda need to come out of their "shell" and begin to understand human biology as understood today, the scientists and modern medicine practitioners need to appreciate the holistic approach of Ayurvedic health-care system to re-interpret those principles in our current understanding of sciences,

Expert: professor Subhash C. Lakhotia, former BHU Professor Emeritus and Raja Ramanna Fellow (Dept Atomic Energy, Govt. of India), is currently working as INSA Senior Scientist at the Cytogenetics Laboratory, Department of Zoology, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India.. He is Editor-in-Chief of the Proceedings of the Indian National Science Academy (New Delhi) and member of editorial boards of J. Biosciences, RNA Biology, Cell Stress & Chaperones and Annals of Neurosciences. Currently, he is one of the Vice-Presidents of the Indian National Science Academy (New Delhi).

Professor Lakhotia has supervised 30 PhD students and has authored more than 150 research publications, and a large number of articles/editorials on various issues relating to higher education, research and Ayurvedic Biology.  

He is a fellow of Indian National Science Academy, New Delhi, Indian Academy of Sciences, Bangalore and the National Science Academy India, Allahabad. He has received many research awards including the S.S. Bhatnagar Prize (CSIR) in Biological Sciences, Jagdish Chunder Bose Award (Hari Om Ashram Trust, University Grants Commission, New Delhi), Jawaharlal Nehru Visiting Fellowship (Indian National Science Academy), S.L. Hora Medal (Indian National Science Academy, New Delhi), Career Award in Sciences (University Grants Commission, New Delhi) and Medal for Young Scientists (Indian National Science Academy, New Delhi).