The present study is an attempt to study the health and nutritional status of the Khond in Andhra Pradesh and their counterparts across the border in Odisha.

The objectives of the study are: to gain empirical knowledge on consumption of food and to measure the gap ,if any, between actual intake and ideal need . The sample of 110 households is drawn from three villages, two in A.P and one in Odisha. The data pertain to Socio-economic and demographic aspects, body measurements, items of food taken in each household and within household by each member.

The results indicate that 74.30 per cent or 3/4 population in the sample is under fed. As per Body Mass Index the men seem to be better nourished than women and 75 per cent children are under nourished. The subjects of the Andhra Pradesh villages are better fed than their Odisha counterparts.

Medicine and disease have had a undeniable effect on the history and culture of the mankind. Every human society has evolved a pharmacopoeia and a therapy, it may be magico-religious, secular or empirical or scientific. However, in the context of India, a number of tribal communities are still pursuing the traditional system of medicine, which is based on indigenous knowledge and practice. But in the changing scenario of modern medical system, the tribal people are reluctant to practice their system of medicine.

In order to preserve, foster, and further develop the knowledge of medicinal plants, pharmacognosy, pharmacology, and treatment systems of the traditional system of tribal medicine, Muddha Mooppan Centre for Tribal Medicine Development Hospital was founded in January 2011 (to perpetuate the memory of the late Sri Muddha Mooppan, a renowned tribal healer) under the auspicious of L K Ananthakrishna Iyer International Centre for Anthropological Studies (AICAS), Palakkad, Kerala. We have been able to identify, and assist the tribal practitioners of this system to derive the maximum benefit, ethically and financially, from their expertise.

The main objectives of the Centre are:

1. To protect and safeguard the Intellectual Property Rights of the tribal people of India in their unique medicinal and scientific knowledge system, their pharmacopia and their practical applications;

2. To promote the living standards including health and nutrition of the tribal people.

3. To interface with modern scientific advances like Information Technology for furthering the knowledge base on tribal Medicine.

Through the history, it is understood, India was a land of tribals and was abode of tribal's in these forests. Until the migration of people from the adjoin continents and the invasion done by the Europeans there was no sign of civilization. Obliviously, the Indian subcontinent took a long time to attain civilization, has seen elsewhere in the world. During, 15th century A.D, India had equal share of tribal's and civilized population. Since the civilized society was not having unity and they were ruled by number of kings, this weakness gave rise for the establishment of coloninal rule by the Portuguese, French and the British. During the British period, the entire people of indian subcontinent was classified into two categories, such as inclusive and exclusive system in their administration. The inclusive societies were given the ownership of land as per their size of land holding through generation, but, they were subjected to pay tax for their agricultural land. Where as the exclusive category was tribal's, they were kept outside the purview of law during British administration. After the independence, the tribal's were also brought under the purview of law. From the point of development of the tribal's and to bring the tribal's into mainstream of the society, the government of india passed the tribal bill act in 1964. Thus the tribal's were rehabilitated from an independent form of life style to a dependent form of life style.

Nutrition and health status of tribal's in Bhadragiri Tribal Block and high altitude zone in Chinthapalli were selected for this study. Adults, Boys and girls and children between 4-12 years in both the blocks were selected. Food intake, nutrient intake, anthromomatic measurements of children, nutritional grades as per the Gomez classification and Waterloo's classification of malnutrition were carried out.

Food and nutrient intake of tribal's in Bhadragiri block indicate expect millets, cereals and other vegetables the intake of all other foods were found to be lower than the recommended allowances. The calorie intake of adults were more than the RDA . Similar pattern was observed in boys and girls as well as in children. The intake of pulses and other vegetables were close to RDA. Pulse intake was deficient by 43 to 75%, consumption of all other foods were much below the recommended dietary allowances.

Anthropometric measurements of children reviled 39 to 100% of boys and 33 to 58% of the girls in all age groups were found stunted as per the height for the age. Night blindness, anemia and angular stomatitis, xerosis of the skin were also seen.

Key words: Tribal's, Food, Nutrients, Malnutrition, Deficiencies

The original knowledge is still protected and transformed to generations among the tribal people living in the most ancient land blocks like Africa and in India. These tribal people has been cornered into patches where the present tribal generation struggling hard to retain indigenous knowledge and also to strike a balance between the present day way of living and the indigenous knowledge.

Among the various tribes living in patches in different parts of India, The Soliga tribe is one among them distributed along the forest tracts of Western Ghats of south western India. This tribe have a long history of their origin and still they are preserving the indigenous knowledge inherited from their ancestors. Their knowledge about plants, animals, ecological balance and atmospheric variations are unique and genuinely preserved. They have good knowledge about medicinal properties of each plant and animal by-products. This paper reveals their in-depth knowledge about indigenous medicine. Secondly, an earnest effort has been made to make a document of medicinal plants, which are at the verge of extinct. Thirdly, conserving such plants and propagating the value of this knowledge is one of the objectives of this paper.

A culture includes a conception of medical authority important for cultural identity. The Muddha Mooppan Centre in Kerala will continue to change the concept of medical authority. Medical authority in the United States is ascribed not only to social roles such as "Western" (e.g., US authorized) medical doctors, but also to associated healthcare roles. Contrary to an idea prevalent among many persons in the West (that medical authority is justified mainly by formal education that is centered on certified scientific and technological expertise) medical authority currently has (and has always had) important aspects that are not entirely scientific in the usual specifically Western sense, but broadly "bio-political-cultural-psychological". Comparisons and intercultural connections are possible of some features of US medical authority with systems in India (including more specifically local tribal systems in Kerala). "Western" style medical authority, when shared with the authority of tribal healers in India, can generate questions about a changing system of medical authority. These changes are a feature of globalization. Medical tourism between the US and India is likely to change medical authority in the US. These changes include but go beyond transnational migration of doctors and other medical personnel such as the well-known Kerala nurses; patient tourism and institutional recognition of cross-border medical authority will need to be addressed. We anticipate that changes will occur in the conception of medical authority that are the outcome of globalization, including contacts between the US and Kerala medical systems.

The wide spread poverty, illiteracy, malnutrition, non-availability of safe drinking water and unhygienic living conditions and poor maternal and child health services have been reported in several research studies as the possible contributing factors for dismal health conditions prevailing among the tribal communities in India. Ill health of tribals is one of the hurdles for their development and due to this; they are unable to contribute for their societal and nation development. In this paper an attempt is made to explain the influence of ecological, cultural and technological factors on tribal health, their indigenous medicinal practices, and relationship between health and development.

The research paper forms the part of the major research project study titled "Influence of eco-technological factors on nutritional practices and health disorders among tribals of Visakha agency: A participatory Action Research" sponsored by Department of Science and Technology (DST), New Delhi. The study was carried out in Visakha agency area, covered the major tribes like Bagata,Valmiki, Kondadora, Konda kammara, Mali, Nookadora, Kotiya, Dulia or Mulia, Konda kapu, Gadaba, Porja and Khond, distributed in eleven tribal mandals of Visakhapatnam district. The paper highlights the various causative factors for the ill health of tribals and how these health problems can be tackled by an Action Anthropologist in the field situation. It also provides the practicing anthropological knowledge in dealing with health and socio-economic problems of tribals as a case study of sub-plan area of Andhra Pradesh, India.

The recent investigations carried out by the authors revealed that the current status of the tribal medicine in Kerala is very pathetic and many of the youngsters among the communities are not willing to preserve their age old medical practices. This could be due to their changing life style and also betterment of socio- economic status.

The merits and demerits of this transmission will be discussed in this paper and also debate the necessity of protecting the valuable knowledge base with a view to reorganize and revive this system of medicine. Even today, though we have highly sophisticated system of modern medicine and other recognized traditional systems of medicine like Ayurveda, Sidha, Unani, etc., we are not able to provide adequate health care solutions to handle the modern day health issues due to the limitations of the conventional streams of medical system. The emerging and re-emerging diseases and also high incidence of certain non-communicable diseases are creating havoc in the medical sector. In this context, the role of tribal medicine is highly important and we need to scientifically validate such healing techniques to work out the scope of recognizing the tribal medicine in a phased manner. The legal implications connected with the issues are to be studied and we need to formulate new guide lines for developing rules, policies and programmes in this direction.