India is a resipository of medicinal plants rich in herbal treasure and floristic wealth. Plants are being used since ancient times as a source of drugs as depicted from Indian ancient Hindu scriptures like Rigveda (4500-1600 BC), Charak samhita (1000-800 BC), Sushrut Samhita (800-700 BC). The medicinal plants play an important role in folk-medicines among 104.2million ethnic communities inhabited in 5000 villages in India where no such modern facilities of hospitals exits, and also plays a significant role in socio-cultural, spiritual, health needs of communities, across the globe in developing and developed countries. Gradually, 85% of the herbal and folk-medicines are derived from plants on which 4.3billion people rely, across the globe. In Indian sub-continent folk-medicines are still prevalent among 25.2% of ethnic community in Madhya Pradesh are inhabited in 15% of the total geographical population of the country, who had accumulated a great amount of knowledge on use of plants. The paper precisely depicts some of the promising plants prevalent in Ethnic pockets viz. Chhatarpur, Satna, Jabalpur, Seoni, Chhindwara and Hoshanagabad districts in Madhya Pradesh in India.

Keywords: medicinal plants, herbal treasure, floristic wealth, drugs, hindu scriptures, folk-medicines, ethnic communities, artharva veda, charak, sushrita, tribal communities, gond, baiga, bhariya, bhil, bhilala, korku, kol, bediya, pardhi, khairwar, sahariya

India has a rich knowledge on plant based drugs both for use in preventive and curative medicines. The classical work of the “Artharva Veda”, many ancient Indian Scholars like “Charak” “Sushrita” and others had played a vital role in describing Indian medicinal Plants. The history of herbal medicines in India is thus very old, perhaps the oldest use of plants in herbal medicine had been documented in Hindu scriptures like Rigveda (4500-1600 B.C.), Charak Samhita (6^th-2^nd century BC), Atharvaveda (200 BCE-1000 BCE) who are known to had accumulated a great amount of knowledge on use of various plant species. The ethnic communities comprises of Gond, Baiga, Bediya, Bhil, Bhilala, Bhariya, Korku, Pardhi tribes been reported to be used in Indian sub-continent, but 500 of them are most commonly employed by different ethnic communities prevailing in the country.¹ The Indian sub-continent is inhabited by large number of ethnic communities and they live in forest and forest fringe areas.^2‒7 The Indian state of Madhya Pradesh 22.9734° N, 78.6569° E wherein the present study has been carried out, is inhabited by various tribal communities, who are known to have accumulated a vast knowledge on use of various plant species. The review of literature reveal’s that much work has been done on ethno-medicinal plants in Madhya Pradesh along with the documentation of floristic study and herbal medicines carried out by numerous ethnobotanist's.^{8‒22,25‒32,34‒38,40} but still there are some interior areas with pre-dominance of ethnic communities which need to be intensively surveyed.

Study site

The present study had been carried out in state of Madhya Pradesh in India, lies between latitude 17⁰ 48′ N and 26⁰ 52′ S and between longitude 74⁰ 2′ N to 84⁰ 24 ′ E in state of Madhya Pradesh; where by large number of tribal communities with wide diversity in ethnic races viz. Gond, Baiga, Bhariya, Bhil, Bhilala, Korku, Kol, Bediya, Pardhi, Khairwar, Sahariya etc. Ethno-medicinal data was collected in during survey conducted between theyears 2013-2016 in six tribal dominated districts of Jabalpur, Seoni, Chhattarpur Satna, Hoshangabad and Chhindwara in states of Madhya Pradesh, India between 2013 September to 2016 February

Data collection

The present investigation was carried out during 2013 September to 2016 February and data was collected from six clusters as shown in Figure 1. The study was conducted by interviews followed by focus group discussions with local indigenous communities. During the visits a number of traditional herbal healers and, elderly persons of tribal communities, were contacted and information was collected through interview, observations and discussion held during field survey. These medicinal plants were collected from wild. The local traditional herbal healers (vaids) had specialized knowledge about availability of these plants (trees, shrubs, herbs, and climbers) as well as their seasonal availability and time of collection for roots, leaves, seeds and fruits in cure of various ailments and preparation of herbal formulations.

Figure 1 Study districts: Chhatarpur, Satna, Jabalpur, Seoni, Chhindwara & Hoshanagabad.

Interview with informants of knowledge

The informants were asked about ethno-botanical uses from 25 respondents habitat in districts of Jabalpur, Seoni, Chhattarpur, Satna, Hoshanagabad and Chhindwada comprising of local vaidraj, traditional healers for 25 ailments and prescription presented in Table 1 for the ethno-botanical data (Local name of plant, Family, plant part used, formulation in medicine in cure of ailments were recorded for descriptive response. Moreover, these findings indicate awareness about folk medicines prevalent among ethnic communities in different tribal localities. The information is presented in Table 1.

The Ethno-medicinal survey was conducted in six districts of Madhya Pradesh, India which are having predominance of ethnic communities as shown in Figure 1. The study reveals that a large number of traditional healers (Vaidraj) belonging to different ethnic communities residing in different pockets of Madhya Pradesh are utilizing medicinal plant and their parts collected from herbs, shrubs, climbers and trees comprising from different plant families (Figure 2). The information was recorded from 25 traditional healers and elderly persons of ethnic communities belonging to Gond, Bhariya, Korku, Pardhi, Bhilala, Bediya and Kol tribes on 49 plant species with 54 uses of plants and their parts in different formulations such as powder, paste, decoction, extract, oil, raw and cooked parts of root, leaf, stem, whole plant (panchang), rhizome, bark and flower (Figure 4) used in cure of ailments viz. Arthiritis, Asthma, Baldness, Bronchitis, Cancer, Joint Pain, Dysentry, Fracture, Headache, Jaundice, in cure of Impotency in males and females, Leucorrhoea, Leucoderma, Loss of appetite, Malarial fever, Migraine, Memory loss, Piles, Skin infection/disease, Snake-bite, Stomach worms, Tooth-ache and Ulcer as presented in Table 1 & Figure 3. The plant species listed are found in abundance in forest eco-system.

The study revealed medicinal plants and their parts as rhizome, root, stem, leaves, seeds, fruits flower, and bark of trees, herbs, shrubs and climbers are used in preparation of formulations viz. powder, paste, decoction, oil, raw edible and roasted forms (Figure 2) (Figure 4) are being used by traditional healers and vaidraj. They have vast knowledge about plants available in and around their habitat and plant parts used in preparation of different formulation, dosages and mode of administration (Figure 3) in primary health care of localities in dense forest.

Figure 2 Plant parts of species prevalent in Folk-Medicines.

Figure 3 Plant formulations in folk medicines to cure promising ailments in Madhya Pradesh.

The results of plants used, formulations and dosages were different and not previously reported in any similarly conducted studies to document ethno-medicinal uses. As it is very clear from literature reviewed that different plant species were used in different tribal pockets of Madhya Pradesh like Gond tribes in Sagar district,⁸ Kol tribes in Rewa district,⁹ Baiga and Gond tribes in Mandla district in MP,^11‒14 Bheel tribes in Guna district^23,24 Chambal eco-region²² and Bhil tribes in Jhabua district,²⁴ Sahariya and Baiga primitive and other tribes in Madhya Pradesh,^25‒33 Gond, Bhriya and Korku tribes of Madhya Pradesh,^28,29 Bheel tribes in Jhabua district⁴¹ in Khargone districts,⁴² Bhilala tribes in Alirajpur district,⁴³ Sahariya tribe in Guna district.⁴⁴

Figure 4 Different Formulations in Folk Medicines prepared from Plant Parts.

The medicinal plants and their parts to cure ailments were documented (Figure 3) are used to prepare various formulations are prevalent since hundreds ofyears and are orally communicated from one generation to another, the discussions with local healers and villagers further revealed that the preferences in species to cure of ailments vary from one species to another species as a number of plants are used in cure of a particular ailment and the species, plant part used, formulation such as powder, paste, decoction, extract also vary from village to village in different tribal pockets, based on the ethnic culture and seasonal availability of medicinal plants as presented in Table 1. Based on the findings of present study, it has been found that tribal communities had rich knowledge on herbal folk medicines and distribution of plants around their habitat and used by them in cure of various ailments, and this vital knowledge is transmitted from one generation to another through oral communication as reported by.^{6,8,10,14,21,22,25–32,36,39,40} The villagers use different forest plant species in their daily life. Documentation of such information’s is useful for further generation as well as for their daily life. Hence due to changing life style detailed study of ethno-botanical studies became necessary to document traditional knowledge as it is at the stage of disappearance.

Figure 5 Some of the Promising Plants used in Folk-Medicines in Madhya Pradesh.

Figure 6 Documentation of Folk medicines in Madhya Pradesh.

The indigenous knowledge system of herbal practice is still very rich and available among tribal community of Madhya Pradesh. The establishment of modern medicinal health centres is in progress in many rural areas that may gradually change the existing pattern of indigenous knowledge system of health care. Hence it is necessary to document the traditional knowledge of useful plants and their therapeutic uses before being lost forever from the community.

Plants documented in the study needs to be examined for phyto-chemical studies to know active principle component present in them which are beneficial in cure of ailments as recorded during study and presented. The investigation can lead to formulation of new drugs by pharmacological companies for benefit of mankind.

The author is thankful to traditional healers of ethnic communities for sharing the information on plants used in folk-medicines in Madhya Pradesh. The author is thankful to Director, Tropical Forest Research Institute, Jabalpur for providing facilities and author is also thankful to Director General, M P Council of Science and Technology, Bhopal for providing financial assistance for conducting the study.

Author declares that there is no conflict of interest.

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