27 Sep 2016-|Gurgaon (Manesar) | MDP Room, A- Block
Amity Institute of Biotechnology, Gurgaon organized Guest Lecture on Plant Based Traditional Medicines and Intellectual Property Rights(IPR) Issues
<p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; text-align: justify;">Amity Institute of Biotechnology, Gurgaon organized Guest Lecture on Plant Based Traditional Medicines and Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Issues by Dr. B. Subramanian on 27</span><sup style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; text-align: justify;">th</sup><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; text-align: justify;"> September 2016.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: justify; line-height: normal; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">During the talk he expressed his views that Traditional medicine practices were learnt by human beings by: (i) hit and trial methods, and more so by (ii) observing the animals what they eat when they are sick (zoopharmacognossy) or hungry (regularly consumed plants). Traditional medical knowledge has evolved at the grass root level and is dynamic, changing according to the needs of the communities. It is passed on from generation to generation and can be codified or can be oral knowledge.There are several cases of misappropriation of oral traditional knowledge. For example, for the medicinal properties of Kava (<i>Piper methysticum</i>) and also of bark of <i>Banisteriopsis caapi</i> , patents have been taken without giving benefits to the knowledge holders. </span><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: justify; line-height: normal; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He expressed that Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), New Delhi and Department of AYUSH have developed a novel mechanism to prevent misappropriation of India’s codified traditional knowledge. A database has been created on traditional medicine knowledge called Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL) existing in Ayurveda, Unani and Siddha systems, and also postures of Yoga. According to Prof. Subramaniam this tool is made available to International Patent Offices under non-disclosure agreement for preventing the grant of wrong patents on India’s codified medicinal knowledge such as turmeric for wound healing properties, etc. So far more than 200 patent applications based on India’s traditional knowledge have been either rejected, modified, withdrawn, declared dead, etc. TKDL, a maiden attempt by India has enabled prevention of grant of wrong patents based on India’s traditional knowledge by establishing prior art of the knowledge. The wrong patent claimed invention gets rejected as TKDL proves that there is no novelty step in the invention and has been taken from the traditional knowledge texts existing in India.</span><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: justify; line-height: normal; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Dr. B. Subramaniam made aware on the current state of research of traditional and plant-based medicines. He covered the current status of ethnomedicine and medicinal plant discovery. The talk was much inspirational for all the researchers and faculty members of AUH who attended the lecture.</span><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: justify; line-height: normal; background-image: initial; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Prof. Dr. P.B. Sharma felicitated<b> </b>Prof Dr. B. Subramaniam after the talk and the vote of thanks were delivered by Prof. Manju Anand, AIB.</span><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>