Supreme Court issues notice to Centre, Ramdev for criticising allopathic medicines

The Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to hear a plea by the Indian Medical Association (IMA) seeking action against yoga guru Ramdev for criticising allopathic medicine. The apex court has issued notice to Ramdev and the Centre seeking a reply on the plea seeking initiation of action.

The top court observed, "Ramdev popularised Yoga but how can he criticise allopathic medicine? "What is the guarantee that ayurvedic medicines perform better than allopathic medicines? Baba Ramdev is accusing doctors, and other medical systems of hurting public health."

The IMA in its plea alleged that a smear campaign against the vaccination drive and modern medicines are being conducted in the country.

Ramdev's Patanjali Ayurved had on February 19, 2021, said that the Coronil tablet had received certification from the Ayush Ministry as a medicine supporting Covid-19 treatment as per the World Health Organization's certification scheme.

However, Patanjali's managing director Acharya Balkrishna later made a clarification about the certification through a tweet saying, "We want to clarify to avoid confusion that our WHO GMP compliant COPP certificate to Coronil is issued by DCGI, Government of India. It is clear that WHO do not approve or disapprove any drugs. WHO works for building a better, healthier future for people all over the world (sic)."

The announcement regarding the Ayush certification for Coronil and release of research paper calling it the "first evidence-based medicine for COVID-19 by Patanjali" was done at an event attended by former health minister Harsh Vardhan.

Patanjali had launched Coronil on June 23. Balkrishna claimed that the medicine could cure Covid-19 patients within 5-14 days.