Challenges of mainstreaming: Ayurvedic practice in Delhi Government health institutions

Abstract

This paper is an attempt to understand the project of mainstreaming in India's health care system that has started with an aim to bring marginalized and alternative systems of medicine in mainstream. The project has gained much attention with the establishment of Department of Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha, and Homeopathy (AYUSH) in the year 2003, which is now a ministry. It has ushered some positive results in terms of growth of AYUSH hospitals and dispensaries. However, it has also raised challenges around the theory and practice of mainstreaming. With an emphasis on Ayurvedic practice in Delhi Government Health Institutions, this article has tried to analyze some of those challenges and intricacies. Drawing on Weber's theory of bureaucratization and Giddens's theory of structuration, the paper asks what happens to an alternative medical system when it becomes part of the bureaucratic set-up. Along with the questions of structures, it also tries to combine the question of the agency of both patients and doctors considered to be the cornerstone of the Ayurvedic medical system. Although our study recognizes some of the successes of the mainstreaming project, it also underlines the challenges and problems it faces by analyzing three points of view (institutions, doctors, and patients).

Keywords: Ayurveda; Bureaucratization; Mainstreaming; Medical pluralism; Public health.