AYUSH to woo more foreign tourists to India in coming years
Representative image
The coming together of Ministry of AYUSH and the Ministry of Tourism will result into a win -win situation for both in terms of promotion of tourism and AYUSH both, opines Shripad Yesso Naik, Minister of State (I/C) for AYUSH, Govt of India. “Foreigners are attracted towards the yoga. We have to develop infrastructure as more tourist will be attracted to India due to yoga. We had a meeting with Union Tourism Minister and the Minister agreed to help us in promoting AYUSH. We are trying to work out how we can proceed jointly,” he said.
Replying to a question over AYUSH emerging as a major contributor in establishing India as medical tourism hub, Naik informed that the Ministry of AYUSH has signed MoUs with 12 countries for cooperation and research. “We have 10 chairs in foreign universities just to teach Yoga and other ancient medicines. Our information centres are working there. Gradually we are going outside the country and people are accepting this,” he informed.
Enumerating the initiatives taken by his ministry, Naik said that All India Institute of Ayurveda was opened last year in Delhi to bring in the synergy between traditional wisdom of Ayurveda and modern diagnostic tools and technology. “It is a good model and at par with AIIMS in allopathy. It has started working towards facilitating quality patient care and research, bridging gaps in scientific information about quality, safety and efficacy of Ayurveda products, and developing benchmarks of Ayurvedic education, research and healthcare. At the time opening, 400 people were coming per day and this number has now gone upto 1200. We are developing such type of institutions as per our Budget. We need more funds to open more such institutes and have asked for enhanced Budget from the government,” he informed.
He also informed that his ministry has opened North Eastern Institute of Ayurveda and Homeopathy at Shillong in Meghalaya. The institute is having College ofAyurveda and College of Homeopathy with admission capacity of 50 students each along with a 100-bed Ayurvedic hospital and 50-bed homeopathy hospital. “We are getting good response. There are 50 seats for graduation and all seats are full. In Tripura, we started recently Regional Homeopathic Research Centre and Hospital,” he said and informed that the Ministry has announced AYUSH hospital in each district of the country. “We have already approved 100 such proposals of different states. We will have more than 600 hospitals in next 5 years. It is progressing step. We have adopted 10 districts where AYUSH and homeopathy is coming. The biggest benefit is creating awareness about health. We will take 100 districts and these all will have integrated facilities for alternative medicine,” he said.
Naik also informed that his Ministry is looking at an integrated Ayurveda resort in Goa, Rajasthan and Kerala. “We are also looking at promote AYUSH with tourism. We have already started working in this direction. In next 8-10 years, AYUSH will not be alternative system of medicine but it will be in the mainstream,” Naik informed.