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"I don't agree with your Prime Minister. Any system of modern medicine must be based on hard scientific facts and not on myths." These were the words spoken to the then Prime Minister of India, Morarji Desai, by Dr. Celia Oakley, a British Cardiologist of International. Morarji Desai had, while inaugurating 'International Conference on Advances in Internal Medicine' at Mumbai in 1978, said, “Indigenous systems of medicine are not without respect for other branches of medicine. Please learn to cooperate!”
Desai’s comment did not go down well with several doctors, especially from outside India. Media claimed that the conference was an attempt at promoting pseudoscience.
Dr. K. K. Datey, an Indian cardiologist of repute, was reported by the media that he, “as usual, spoke about the miracle cures for cardiac patients through Yoga.” It was no wonder that guests criticised the conference from its very stage.
Nobel Laureate Dr Rosalynn Yalow, who developed radio-immuno-assay methods, commented, "Some of the papers read were mere reproductions from American textbooks."
Dr Rosalynn Yalow
In fact in the recent Himalaya Drugs’ Liv. 52 and Dr. Cyriac Abby Philips (TheLiverDoc) controversy a much quoted study in support of Liv. 52 was, Leprous Hepatitis: Clinico-Pathological Study and Therapeutic Efficacy of Liv.52. This paper was actually presented at this conference.
India Today reported, “The public lecture on VD (Sexually Transmitted Diseases) was no less bizarre. Dr B.A. Daruwalla lamented the low priority given to this "sneaky disease" which is practically beyond control. VD rates have just got out of hand in Bombay and Pune. In the northern states, folklore and quacks advised VD-infected males to have sex with virgins or young boys to get rid of their scourge, warned Dr T.K. Mehta.
“The public lecture on drug abuse turned out to be a pointless slanging match between druggists, drug manufacturers and doctors. The druggists wanted higher commissions on goods sold, without the slightest advice on the qualifications needed to become druggists; drug manufacturers moaned about how the brand names had to be protected, and the "quality of our products.”
“Doctors grouched about the bizarre proliferation of modern antibiotics and their side-effects, and how patients re-used prescriptions and self-medicated themselves. An Australian doctor present disgustedly said: "This is becoming irrelevant. The whole discussion is political."