ABSTRACT
Ethnobotanical survey tours were conducted during year 2010-2011 to document the ethnomedicinal remedies for various ailments of the Kondh tribe inhabiting in the Anantprasad and Jeypur villages of district Cuttack, Odisha, India under Athagarh Forest Division. The paper presents 24 plants species belonging to 23 genera and 16 families used by Kondh tribes of this area and other local inhabitants etc. for the treatment of various diseases i. e. boils, cuts & wounds, joints pain, jaundice, constipation, earache, headache, dysentery, menstrual problems, snake-bite etc. The Plants are arranged alphabetically with their botanical name, family in bracket, local name, unani name wherever available, locality with collection number, part used, name of the disease(s) against which used, mode of preparation and administration and Informant who shared his valuable information is given for each recipe discussed. The information provided will help to discover new herbal drugs for many of the diseases, thus far, incurable in modern medicine.
ABSTRACT
Withania somnifera (L) Dunal is a well known Indian medicinal plant widely used in the treatment of many clinical conditions in India. It is an important drug commonly known as Asgand which has been used either single or in combination with other drugs in Unani as well as Ayurvedic system of medicine for centuries. It has been described by Dioscorides (78 AD) in his book “Kitab-ul-Hashaish”. Asgand consists of the roots of Withania somnifera which has various therapeutic actions such as anti-inflammatory (Muhallil-e-Warm), sedative (Musakkin), alterative (Muaddil) and aphrodisiac (Muqawwi-e-Bah). Keeping in view the medicinal properties of Withania somnifera Dunal (Asgand), an attempt has been made in this review paper to explore various dimensions of the drug including phytochemical and pharmacological studies carried out on this drug.