Odisha occupies an important position in the ethnographic map of India for having the largest variety of tribes. Festivals form an essential aspect of socio-cultural life of the tribal people of the state. They are highly religious by the fact that their society and culture is mostly governed by religious beliefs and practices which aim at ensuring personal security, health and happiness as well as community harmony.

The empirical study is conducted in a rehabilitated tribal village of SABAR community. The community has accessibility to modern healing practices. In spite of this it still uses the traditional technique of healing common illness like diarrhoea, dysentery, vomiting, jaundice, hallucination etc besides addressing other allied issues of community.

The SABAR people believe in "goddess Bhuasuni" - the village deity, fondly called as 'Maa Bhuasuni'. The village priest who is also the community medicine man is a devotee of 'goddess Bhuasuni'; he gets possessed by some supernatural power through which he could communicate with the goddess. The period during which the goddess enters into the body of the man and communicates with people is called 'KALISI'. KALISI listens to people's illness/problems and prescribes solutions to manage the same.

Now, the question is … does this practice play an important role in the healing process of people when the village is situated nearest to the capital city having all modern health care facilities? Is it essential for a healthy community life? Does this practice act as a defence mechanism in the community? My paper has tried to analyse these queries.

The primitive tribes have been living in social isolation for centuries. Traditional knowledge and technology developed early in the history of our civilization, along the development of our society. It was very much a part of our social growth. The roots for the modern technology are the indigenous scientific knowledge of different human groups. In the 1950's and 1960's theorists of development felt that indigenous and traditional knowledge as inefficient, inferior and an obstacle to development. But, in recent times most of such knowledge is used for the sustainable development of rural and tribal folk. In this context the present paper high light the ethno-medical practices of treatment for the ill health among the Kolams of Andhra Pradesh shows that how in the modern times the indigenous practices help the Kolam to survive from the health problems even in the era of globalization. Their health hazards also explained through the religious performances, which is unique in the present day context.

The success of human species is in no small measure due to the ability to cope with medical problems, (Laughlin - 1963). This paper deals with empirical data from a forest dwelling tribal community from North-Western Maharashtra in India. Treatment of Etiological Factors comprise therapies like ritual/psycho-social/herbal/physical-intervention. Treatment of Ailments comprise treatment using organic -(floral/faunal)material and inorganic material.

Medicinal items are processed in various ways. Certain items are used without processing. Some items are used as medium for administration of medicines. Certain items are taken in combinations.

Mode of dosage varies from -internal/external/internal and external.

Treatment of certain ailments comprise treatment with apparently ritualistic therapies and relatively peculiar therapies. Treatment of some ailments require physico-mechanical intervention. Some ailments are treated with the help of rituals.

Preventive Medicine presents a broad spectra which includes: Treatment at proper time can prevent the ailment from becoming serious; Use of 'strength giving' items; Use of certain items to improve quality/quantity of blood; Use of some items to improve quality/quantity of breast milk; Use of certain items as contraceptives; Use of items as cosmetics; Use of rituals;

Ethno-medical system among Pawra Tribal community certainly has a potential to be an useful support system for many more years to come.

Health seeking behavior is an important concept used in Medical Anthropology. The behavior of the patients and their immediate kith and kin in seeking health care is studied in the context of culture. 'Therapy management'(Janzen,1978) and 'health seeking process'(Chrisman 1977) describes the same process and Nichter and Sickle(2002) study reveals that poverty, poor infrastructure, crowding and modernization are the factors for health problems. Present study focuses on the classification, cultural meaning of Illness (both somatic and mental) and the health-seeking behaviour of the Baiga. It is based on an extensive fieldwork conducted among the Baiga, a primitive tribe in Baigachak of Dindori district (earlier Mandla), Madhya Pradesh State of Central India. Traditionally, they are shifting cultivators, priest for Gonds, medicine men, hunters and bamboo workers but now became settled cultivators. The rearing of pigs and poultry birds, agricultural labour and collection of minor forest produce are their main economic subsistence.

The Baiga believe that, wrath of deities, Intrusion of evil spirits like Bhut (ghosts), Churelin (female evil spirit), Raksa (male evil spirit), and Mua (child evil spirit), and witchcrafts or sorcery is also prevalent among the Baiga tribal society. For such cases, treatment through sympathetic magic, simple recitation of mantra, treatment by medicinal plants are the popular treatments among them. Besides, visit the primary health centres for the diseases not diagnosed by their own medical system.

Ganwati dawa forms the basic institution of ethnomedical beliefs and practices among the Siddi of Uttara Kannada District in coastal north Karnataka. It refers to that medical system which is followed by people at large during all the seasons as a response to the changing climatic conditions of the region. These ethnomedical practices form a defense mechanism or a response to the change in ecological conditions on one side, and the ability to sustain themselves to the needs of their livelihood on the other. The cultural-temporal sequencing of the "ecological- ethnomedical - livelihood" among the siddi forms an integral part of their survival. Each one of these components has to fit in the remaining two, in order to make their life possible. But the rupture in this sequencing is brought about by the various forces of globalization like fragmentation of family structure, shift in occupational patterns, mining in forest-lands, industrialization of cultivable land and so on. All these factors have inflicted unforeseen miseries on the life and culture of the siddi.

The cultural-temporal sequencing of the various naturally occurring reproductive experiences of women residing in rural locales is severely altered by the intervention of the new reproductive technologies. The major driving force behind such an extraneous disruption in the indigenous life-styles of the women has been the process of medicalization that ultimately finds expression in the multifarious ways of the contemporaneity. However, such a state of affairs is widely contested across all the sections of society right from the academics to the common men. The present paper therefore looks in the intricacies of this process by which women inscribe their indigenized rural spaces with that of the unknown and modernity ridden health care facilities of the urban locales. Under these circumstances it becomes imperative on our part to study the role played by the new reproductive technologies in situating the discourse between medicalization as an agenda of modernity and the indigenous perceptions of reproductive processes as accentuated by the intermittent disjunction between the rural and the urban. For this purpose, the author makes use of the home grown analytical tool of anthropology known as 'liminality' that clearly brings to fore the rupture in the rural-urban continuum.

Kodagu is known for its natural beauty, for its landscape and dense forest. Even in this modern period more than 45% of Kodagu consists of forests. A Kodava always equates nature with religion and for him what is beautiful in nature is the manifestation of divine beauty, worthy of worship. His temples, shrines and other important places of worship are situated only in such attractive and beautiful surroundings. He believes that by visiting these places he gets relief from many of the physical and mental ailments. He has classified certain trees as of good omen. The peepal trees (Ficus religiosa) are a symbol of Eshwara and gooseberry (phyllanthus emblica) as a symbol of parvathi. Kodavas plant these two trees together and put a platform around them. When they grow to a certain height, a marriage between the two is performed and they believe that by going around this platform many diseases are cured.

Tulasi (Ocimum sanctum) is believed to be a sacred plant, doing puja to this plant will improve the immunity power of the body. This plant is always planted in front of the house.

Kodavas give top prominence to rice in both auspicious and inauspicious rituals. The ritual sprinkling of rice on objects and persons usually accompanies salutations. Turmeric is considered to be an anti viral and antifungal agent. By using leaves, barks and roots of the wild plants many of the deadly diseases are cured. All these traditional techniques of healing will be discussed in this paper.

Beliefs about health, as well as what makes people ill, are influenced by culture and these beliefs tend to guide people with which healing approach they should apply. It has also been recognized by medical practitioners that many African patients often attribute illness to a spiritual or social cause rather than a biomedical cause. This has influenced particular African communities to opt for what they consider to be a more holistic healing approach emphasizing the whole body, mind and spirit. Given this, the study proposes to probe the methods used by the Southern Nguni of the Eastern Cape in South Africa in healing ukuhanjwa illness. The Southern Nguni describe ukuhanjwa as an 'attack' of a person, young and old, by the 'familiars' which penetrate the body through any bodily opening, resulting in ukuhanjwa illness. The study works through attributional theory which recognises that illness is attributed to spiritual and social causes, in this instance, the Southern Nguni's recognition of illness signalling the entry into the body by 'familiars'. By probing the specific healing methods of the Southern Nguni, the study seeks to probe how the causal link is constructed between the illness and the familiars, as well as the connection between the illness and the healing methods preferred. The ethnographic focus will be the OR Tambo District Municipality in the Eastern Cape, South Africa. Data will be collected using qualitative research methods focusing on in-depth interviews and observations amongst a sample group of 70 participants.

Tulunad is a geo-cultural linguistic region of west coast in South India. The population consists of Hindus of many castes, Muslims and Christians. Modern education is well spread. The health care scenario presents a combination of ethno-medical practices, classical Ayurveda and Homeopathy.

Classical Ayurvedic texts like samhita apply astrology only in prescribing days and time for collection of materials and processing of drugs: Astrological texts correlate the horoscopic positions of the planetary bodies and the physical physiological and mental development of the person including susceptibitaties to diseases, deformities and disasters in the course of one's life. There is also an astrological practice called prasne, balme, panchanga and astamangala in which the planetary positions at the time of enquiries with respect to a randomly chosen sign of zodiac using cowries is correlated with the health stratus. While the former approach can be called an astrological prognosis the latter an astrological diagnosis. In both the cases astrological solutions known as parihara are prescribed.

The present study is based on the observation of some cases of astrological consultations and performance of astrologically prescribed preventives and remedial performances and the interviews of the astrology practitioners and the participant beneficiaries. It found that people across different religion, castes, educational and social status resort to astrology for prognosis, diagnosis, prevention and remedy.

The solutions are in the form of vaidik and folk rituals like homa, pooja, danma seve, Teerthayathre, nemakola, tambala and bali performed in the service of puranic deities and folk forms called bhoota.

In India, it is reported that traditional healers use 2500 plant species and 100 species of plants serve as regular source of medicine. Eighty per cent of the world's people depend on traditional medicine for their primary health care needs. The Irular is the second numerically largest tribe in Tamil Nadu with major concentration in the northern districts. The Irular are traditionally honey collectors, snake catchers and gatherers of minor forest produce. Most of their villages are located near the forest areas as they depend on the forest resources for their daily needs and have sound herbal knowledge of herbal remedies. The Irular traditional healers use varieties of herbal medicines because of the rich floral diversity for treatment of various body ailments and common diseases like scabies, skin allergies, cold, cough, ear ache, wounds, headache jaundice, poison bites (scorpion, insect, centipede and snake), toothache, stomachache, diarrhoea, bone fractures, leucoderma, rheumatism, diabetes, leprosy, asthma, dysentery, small pox, fertility problems, etc. Information on medicinal plants, with their local names, parts used, mode of preparation and administration were collected from the traditional healers and medicine man through interviews. In this paper we bring information on traditional knowledge of the primitive tribe, Irular and their indigenous knowledge of ethno botanical plants, herbs and creepers and the application of medicinal plants and their usage to maintain their primary health care by adhering to the traditional practices.

Human being by nature depends on Mother nature.From time immemorial,people have been gathering knowledge about the nature and his environment.This knowledge gathered from his/her experiences become inevitable part of human society and human life.The knowledge gathered by the human being has been passing from generation to generation.Such traditional knowledge about different species of flora,their use, their conserve habits and strategies due to inebriating effect and curative properties of various ailment as well as other benefits.The present study is an attempt to discuss the knowledge of traditional ethno-medicinal plants and their use by the Sonowal Kachari people of Assam.The Sonowal Kachari is one of the plain tribe of Assam.The main concentration of Sonowal Kachari is in Dibrugarh district.The material collected for this paper is from a village of 3000 families called Bhekulajan.

Marriage is a universal institution and birth of a child is a fulfillment of a cherished dream and the ultimate desire of a married couple. In Indian society, a childless woman is considered as malati or 'dry womb'. Her life will always be seen as incomplete due to her lack of motherhood. Due to her own sterility or her husband's sterility, she is not considered worthy to attend family, religious or social functions as her presence in such occasion is considered inauspicious.

Every transition stage of woman is oriented with her femininity and fertility. Therefore the transition stage of the woman is performed with many rites and rituals in order to honour her femininity and fertility. As the barrenness is a matter serious consequence. This paper brings out the magico-religious and indigenous medical practices for treating the barrenness among the rural dalit women of Pudhucherry.