SUSHRUTA AND MODERN SURGERY
The British East India Company established the Indian
Medical Service (IMS) as early as 1764 to look after Europeans in British
India.. IMS officers headed military and civilian hospitals in Bombay, Calcutta
and Madras, and also accompanied the Company's ships and army. The British also
established on 21 June 1822 "The Native Medical Institution"(NMI) in
Calcutta, where medical teaching was imparted in the vernacular. Treatises on
anatomy, medicine, and surgery were translated from European languages for the
benefit of the students. From 1826 onwards, classes on Unani and Ayurvedic
medicine were held respectively at the Calcutta madrasa and the Sanskrit college.
In 1827 John Tyler, an Orientalist and the first superintendent of the NMI
started lectures on Mathematics and Anatomy at the Sanskrit College which was
also founded by the British. In general,
the medical education provided by the British at this stage involved parallel
instructions in western and indigenous medical systems. Translation of western
medical texts was encouraged and though dissection was not performed, clinical
experience was a must. But the government was not satisfied with the medical
education imparted at the Native Medical Institution. Ayurveda had no knowledge
of virology, anatomy, surgery, Otolaryngology
(Ear, Nose & Throat), pediatrics and neurology. Surgical instruments were
never used in Ayurveda because Ayurvedic system stressed a balance of three
elemental energies or humors: Vāyu vāta (air , space –
"wind"), pitta (fire & water – "bile"). This
was a primitive belief and Ayurvedic conception of elemental energies has no
scientific basis for the treatment of patients.. Even basic equipments such as
thermometer, stethoscope and BP apparatus were unknown to Ayurvedic physicians
and they were seeing them for the first time in 1822 at the NMI. The British wanted to improve the quality of
medical education in India. Lord William Bentinck appointed a Committee
and it
consisted of Dr John Grant as President and J C C Sutherland, C E
Trevelyan, Thomas Spens, Ram Comul Sen and M J Bramley as members. The
Committee criticized the medical education imparted at the NMI for the
inappropriate nature of its training and the examination system as well as for
the absence of courses on practical anatomy The Committee recommended that the
state found a medical college 'for the education of the natives'. The various
branches of medical science cultivated in Europe should be taught in this
college. When the Calcutta Medical College was established in 1835, the Indian
Medical Service (IMS) was dissolved and the Ayurvedic students, except
Madhusudan Gupta, were expelled. Madhusudan Gupta is the first Indian surgeon,
not the fictive Sushruta. It was during this period that the infuriated
Ayurvedic teachers and students produced spurious Sanskrit manuscripts in the pretentious
names of Chraka and Sushruta. The instruments
shown as Sushrutas’ are not excavated artefacts but imaginary drawings, crude
imitation of surgical instruments of Calcutta Medical College. The Asiatic Society scholars in Calcutta
accepted these fake manuscripts as genuine and published research papers in the
Society journal. To legitimize this false claim, fanatical Sanskrit pundits,
Ayurvedic physicians and some Orientalists chalked out a well planned strategy
by which they linked the fictitious Sushrusa with world renowned Western
surgeons. In 1815, Joseph Constantine Carpue wrote about a rhinoplasty
performed on a wounded soldier whose nose had been all but destroyed in battle,
and another patient whose nose had been damaged by arsenic. His work, the
“Account of Two Successful Operations for Restoring a Lost Nose” became a
standard work in medical colleges. Although the Italian surgeon Tagliacozzi’s
treatise on making a nose from an arm flap, De curtorum chirurgia per
insitionem(Venice, 1597), was an outstanding work, the condemnation of
operation by religious authorities resulted in complete withdrawal of this
practice. Students of Calcutta Medical College, founded in 1835, were taught
about the works of Tagliacozzi and
Carpue and the successful rhinoplasty performed by Carpue .Ayurvedic proponents
wanted to show that Carpue and Tagiliacozzi learned rhinoplasty from Sushruta’s
technique. It is quite transparent
that the essential points in Carpue’s work were plagiarized and Sanskrit
manuscripts were published in the fictitious name of Sushruta. To camouflage
this act, Ayurvedic physicians claim that Carpue came to India and stayed for
20 years to learn Shusruta's technique of rhinoplasty. But the fact of the
matter is that Carpue had never come to India. The British medical journal
Lancet is categorical that Carpue stayed and worked in London only. They also
claim that the Italian Tagliacozzi also learnt from Sushruta's method. To
substantiate this false claim they had invented a story that Sushruta's work
was translated into Arabic during the Abbasid Caliphate and from there it went
to Europe. What a fantastic manipulation! There is no Arabic translation of
Shusruta's work during the Caliphate.The famous physician in the Caliphate was
Avicenna and he produced treatises and works that summarized the vast amount of
knowledge that scientists had accumulated, and was very influential through his
encyclopedias, The Canon of Medicine and The Book of Healing.
There is absolutely no reference to Sushruta or rhinoplasty in his works. What
is more, there is no statement by European surgeons that they received
Sushruta's Arabic translation from the Arabs during the Renaissance. As there is little evidence to prove their false contention,
Ayurvedic exponents now say that Sushruta’s technique of rhinoplasty is
mentioned in The Gentleman’s Magazine. The Gentleman’s Magazine was founded in
London in 1731 and it was not a contemporary account because the date of birth and
period Shushruta lived are still uncertain. There is absolutely no
reference to Sushruta in the Gentleman’s Magazine, although it contains a fabricated
story of nose grafting, not by a doctor but by an illiterate mason
(brick-maker). And that claim is also made on the basis of an imaginary
painting of a grafted nose and not on genuine records.
Another ridiculous attempt to legitimize the fictitious
Sushruta was the Bower’s manuscript. Like the Pitman’s hoax, Bower produced some manuscripts The Bower
Manuscript, like the Pitsdown Hoax, is a hoax. Hamilton Bower wanted to get
name and fame for himself. During the period of his service in India, the
Asiatic Society was making all endeavors to construct the History of India. In
the absence of printed texts, scholars of the Society were collecting old
manuscripts. Due to the long Muslim rule and due to the political uncertainty
in India there was no manuscript library, no storehouse and no temple to
preserve manuscripts, if at all they were available. When the Society called
for manuscripts, thousands of fake Sanskrit manuscripts were produced and they
were presented before scholars. Many English men such as William Jones,
Colebrooke, Wilson and many others used Brahmins to produce fake manuscripts.
Strachey and Colebrooke attempted to prove knowledge of science and mathematics
in ancient India. In the absence of printed texts, it was easy for these
scholars to invent stories by using spurious and manipulated Sanskrit
manuscripts. Jones wanted to establish the fact that ancient India had advanced
system of surgery and scientific knowledge. Jones wanted to be knighted and for
this purpose he produced many stories using spurious manuscripts. One Islam
Akhun was notorious for producing fake manuscripts in Sanskrit and Brahmi.
Hamilton Bower probably would have got these fake manuscripts from Akhun.
Hoernle who deciphered these manuscripts was also fooled by these fake
manuscripts. Birch bark-leaf manuscripts
were alleged to have been found in 1909, and one may wonder how could these
manuscripts survive for several centuries? We are told that fortune seekers
found these manuscripts. How did the manuscripts find their way to Turkestan?
So on the face of it everything is fraudulent and it was a cunning attempt of
Bower to get name and fame for him. Doubting the authenticity of the
works, Sir Aurel Stein met with Islam Akhun in Khotan in
the spring of 1901. Stein questioned Akhun on the manuscripts and concluded
that the manuscripts were fake. Eventually, he exposed Akhun for imitating Brahmi characters
and inventing similar-looking characters. There are fanciful claims of achievements in plastic surgery and even the existence of aeroplanes in ancient India, but they are not buttressed by solid evidences. There are manipulated Sanskrit manuscripts about surgery, but impartial investigation will prove they were all plagiarized from medical books and written in Sanskrit to claim precedence and originality. The
Indian History Congress in its 75th session, held in Delhi on
December 31, 2014, has, in a resolution, criticized Prime Minister Narendra
Modi's recent statement that an ancient plastic surgeon must have attached the
head of an elephant on the body of Ganesha. At its ongoing 75th session here, it criticised
attempts in "influential quarters" to rewrite history through
"ancient mythology", "speculative chronology" and
"fresh myths". "Unfortunately even the Prime Minister has
suggested that in the hoary past Indians had learnt, and then, forgotten,
plastic surgery of a kind going far beyond what is now possible," the
resolution said. Famous economist and Nobel laureate Amartya Sen commented at the Indian Science Congress 2015 that some evidence is required in the controversial claims made in the Indian Science Congress regarding the achievements of ancient Indians. He said, "The idea that human beings can fly is known to human beings from birth. The idea that human beings might be able to be on the air has been talked about a lot. If that was true, then we would like to find some evidence." Further, he elaborated, "As our epics show, Indians have thought about flying for a long time. But it would be fanciful to say that India invented the aeroplane. If ancient India had airfare technology, we would like to see some evidence. I agree there are a lot of claims that have nothing to do with achievements." The Hindu newspaper commented (January 6, 2015) " The 102nd Indian Science Congress being held in Mumbai will be remembered for a very long time to come, but for all the wrong reasons. For the first time, the science congress had a session on “Ancient Sciences through Sanskrit”. If the Indian Science Congress had long lost its eminence as a forum where results of serious science being done in the country are presented and discussed in most sessions, the inclusion of Ancient Sciences through Sanskrit has only lowered its standing further. Even as a public session, there is no real reason whatsoever for it to have been included in the proceedings. At best, a session could have been devoted to the history of Indian science which has real and substantial achievements to celebrate, with serious scholars working on the subject presenting papers. With Prime Minister Narendra Modi setting the tone for this antiquity frenzy with his implausible claims that cosmetic surgery was practised thousands of years ago and in-vitro fertilisation-like procedure was resorted to long back, and different political leaders following it up with several other incredulous claims well before the start of the national event, the reason for the inclusion of the session becomes supremely clear. Instead of fostering scientific temper, the congress has provided a forum to seed the minds of young people with pseudoscience. Some of the papers presented were about Indians’ “knowledge of making aeroplanes” that could undertake interplanetary travel, between 7000 and 6000 BC, and “radars” that worked on the principle of detecting energy given out by animate and inanimate objects and finding out if a body was dead or alive.
