Modernity or Indigenous Identity? Ayurveda as seen in the Bengali advertisements (1900-1947)

Abstract

This paper proposes to analyse the relationship between modernity and indigenous identity in a particular sphere of heritage-building. Ayurveda, India’s indigenous traditional medicine had a millenia-old textual tradition and area of praxis. During the British colonial period the tradition underwent major phases of loss and recovery. To trace that trajectory, this paper proposes to look at Bengali advertisements of Ayurvedic medicines and practices in two different kinds of early twentieth-century (1900-1947) print media. On the contrary, advertisements of Ayurvedic products in the Bengali newspapers during the same period, mostly presented a corporate face of Ayurvedic products. While panjika advertised various kaviraj and vaidya - traditional practitioners of Ayurveda, newspaper advertisements were almost mandatorily reflected Ayurvedic corporate houses that modelled themselves like the producers of patent medicines of the previous century. By comparing and contrasting the advertisements of Ayurvedic products and practices in Bengali newspapers and panjikas during the heyday of nationalistic period, leading to India’s independence, this paper concludes that the terms of reference leading to construction of such key terms like indigeneity and modernity manifested themselves in quite unexpected ways. Various axes like rural-urban, traditional-modernizing, too played out in these arenas of advertising.