Countries across the world are withdrawing state support for homeopathy. In India, public funding for it has more than doubled in the last decade.
Homeopathy is hokum, say scientists. But Prime Minister Narendra Modi doesn’t seem to think so. At the National Homeopathic Conference in 2012, he explained how he had experienced its benefits first-hand.
“This was in 1991-92,” Modi, then Gujarat’s chief minister, recalled. “I was on the road for 45 days as part of the Ekta Yatra from Kanyakumari to Kashmir. Every 15 kilometres, we would stop at a village, give speeches. It’s obvious that one’s throat would give out. Then, [actor] Manoj Kumar sent some homeopathic medicine for me. For the next 45 days, it made sure I was okay.”
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Omkar specializes in long-form narrative features and has reported from India, the UK, Germany and the Maldives. He writes across beats, from politics and crime to cinema and sports. His works have been published in Indian and international outlets including The Caravan, Mint Lounge, the BBC, Al Jazeera and The Huffington Post.
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