Kairali Ayurvedic Centre Featured in
an article on Fat Loss in The Hindustan Times

The Hindustan Times
featured in interesting article about the fight of fat loss in its Saturday
magazine issue. It mentions that many
people are opting for Ayurvedic and other trational therapies for weight loss .
Kairali Ayurvedic Center, Mehrauli got featured as one such Ayurvedic center where
people are going by droves for natural and invasion free weight loss treatment.

On
The Fat Track

There was time when the nation?s
heart-throbs were well endowed beauties like Thunder Thighs Sridevi, Wet Lips
Mumtaz, Playgirl Katy Mirza and plump Silk Smitha. Today?s pin up girls are Twiggy super waifs
like VJs Ruby Bhatia and Sophia.

Chiffon-clad socialites , who risk asphyxia,
holding their breaths and tummies, and Karol Bagh matrons struggling in
constricting tight kameezes, are fighting the same battle of bulge over the
sari-petticoat line.

An interesting sidelight is the rising
incidence of smoking among women. Women risk dying of cancer by smoking rather than
giving up smoking, because cigarettes are appetite suppressants. ??Better a slim corpse than a corpulent corpse,??
said a 36 year old smoker with a macabre sense of humour. ?? A light corpse can
be carried faster to the crematorium ,?? One slimmer making the rounds of the
get-slim clinics to get the perfect one, says food has become like sex,
combining guilt and pleasure in equal proportions.

Others cheerfully submit going under the
knife and allow large portions of themselves to be craved out in abdominal
apronectomys (the tummy tuck) and liposuction (just what it sounds like: extra
fat is sucked out)

Many doctors have voiced concern over the weight
reducing therapies being practiced in clinics in every corner of the country.
The limited period efficacy of these clinics has fuelled the search for a magic
cure taking it towards traditional therapies which are considered more natural
, gentler and safer. Instead of the
Western models these therapies are based in Ayurveda, yoga, Chinese and Tibetan
herbal medicine, acupuncture, homeopathy and naturopathy.

Alternative therapy clinics are
resounding to the drip, drip, drip of
the Ayurvedic dhara or oil massage therapy. The 7000 year old Ayurvedic branch
if medicine is rooted in the Rigveda. It stresses prevention rather than cure,
and uses more than 1000 plants, ranging from herbs to trees.

There are more than 100 Ayurvedic doctors (those
with a degree of ayurvedic medicine) vaids ( who have learnt the system under
apprenticeship) and hakims ( who practice both ayurvedic and Unanai medicine)
in Delhi. Each one prescribes a difertent nuska for slimming. Slimmers who come to this system have usually
already tried the Western system and lost faith in it.

Veena Kapoor, a home-maker, shifted to
Ayurveda after a bitter experience at two slimming centers. She said that at
the first clinic she paid Rs.5000 and lost 3.5 kg, but soon after she did not
only regained them but she put on an extra half kilo. At the second clinic she paid Rs. 7000 and
was given diet powder, but she did not take it fearing that it might have drug and she would become addicted to it.
Kapoor says that the ayurvedic method is slow but safe. It does not prescribe
artificial pills or powders, or- here?s the good news for slothful- rigorous exercise.
The weight loss is gradual bit permanent.

Vaid Chhironji Prasad claims that Ayurvedic
system is scientific. He says the body?s normal functioning depends on
vaata,pitta and kapha also known as dosha. Prasad says: ??We enjoy good health
so long as these doshas are in equilibrium. Whenever this state is disturbed we
suffer ill-health. Excess weight is linked to this imbalance. The Ayurvedic
method emphasizes correct eating habits,
and looks for the causes of the weight rather than prescribing medicines for
instant results.?

The Kairali Ayurvedic Centre is set in
sylvan surroundings near Mehrauli. Since the medicine is traditional, from
Kerala, the landscaping and architecture are ethnic , and the modcons are not
overlooked. Geeta Ramesh , managing director, says the Centre has brought in
Ayurvedic experts from Kerala. She added , that fear of obesity was brining in
patients in droves. ? Earlier people came to us with problems such as
hypertension and diabetes but now many come specifically for weight loss??.

The centre offers a 14 day health programme
with herbal oil massages and Ayurvedic medicines to reduce excess weight.
Ramesh says that the center?s special oil massage have been practiced in Kerala
for centuries and are based on works of renowned vaids such as Charaka,
Shushtra and Vaghbata. The massages are carried out on wooden bedsand while
being used to reshape the contours of the body they also help to
rejuvenate it by improving the circulation of the blood, slowing down the
ageing process and delay wrinkles.

Published on: September
23 1995

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