Do You Expect Prime Minister Narendra Modi Resolve the Address Proof Crisis of Indian Citizens?

Have you ever experienced the address proof crisis of modern India? If you have not understood what I meant, either you are the real permanent resident of India or you are one of the invisible kinds for whom such proofs do not have any relevance!

Let me make things clear, if you have not understood what I meant. This blog is of some importance in your life if you have to shift your residences in India on a few occasions on account of any one of the following reasons:

1. You have to change your residence because your employer keep transferring you from place to place and you do not belong to the special privileged category of the ruling class of India such as the Ministers, MP, MLA, Judge, IAS, IPS, IRS, IFS, Political Leader, Prominent Media Personality, Celebrity of India or any one enjoying the government security cover and the like.

2. You are a businessman who needs to change your place of residence for various reasons but neither one holding much influence on the ruling class nor having your own agents to resolve petty headaches that require interactions with any one of the ruling classes.

3. You are a self employed person who needs to change residence occasionally.

4. You are a student staying in hostels and keep changing your residence in connection with your studies

5. You are an young professional who keep changing your job seeking better options.

6. You  have been a non-resident Indian but have come back to India to live here.

7. You do not have your own home and live with some well wisher for some time 

8. You have to live in rented home or room and have to keep shifting for various reasons.

9. You are a Public Sector company executive who needs to change the place of residence for various reasons.

10. You are unemployed and is in the look out for a job and keep changing your place of residence in your job hunting pursuit.

11. You live in the rural area in a temporary hut or in an urban slum.

12. You are land less and homeless.

13. You had a job, but now jobless and no need to stay in the place where you lived in connection with your job.

14. You have retired from active service and now wants to settle down in a new place in a new residence, either rented or purchased or leased or to share the accommodation with some one related to you.

Now for availing the basic minimum services in this country, you need an address proof. But from where you get the address proof? Who is the authority who attests your place of residence? The stupid government authorities who keep drafting the rules and procedures do not foresee this.

The government of India do not have a law which stipulates the procedure to make an address proof by a citizen. Only recently they have come up with the idea of making an identity proof based on bio-metrics called the Aadhaar. But this in itself has no statutory relevance. Our law makers do not see any benefit for them to spent time to draft and pass such laws. Instead, they leave it to the officers to make rules and procedures the way they understand the things only to be challenged by the courts of law.

Now how to get the damn address proof in India? (Click this link to read the anguish expressed by an Indian citizen and the responses in the social media)

The manner in which the stupid Indian civil servants have worked out the rules clearly shows the lack of intelligence in the Indian bureaucracy. The so called Indian civil servants who join the service by passing the most difficult selection tests for the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) cadre seem not so intelligent as we the common folks used to think. Otherwise how could these stupid rules in India? Else, these IAS bosses never bother to read the rules that keep getting issued in India that determine the day to day Indian governance system. Perhaps, these are the brain work of lesser order officers of the government and there is no one who bothers about the bad impact these have on the overall well being of the country as a whole!

When the new Prime Minister of India, Shri Narendra Modi ji, keeps talking about good governance, we wonder why such small things are ignored. It is the prime duty of the government to make rules that are practical and workable. It is the right of the citizens to get an address proof document without any hassles. If the government cannot think of a good system, they should simply get rid of the rules that insist such documents for availing simple services such as making a bank account, purchasing a vehicle, getting a mobile or telephone connection, getting a gas connection, etc.

The government should review whether its rules in this context reflect governmental stupidity or not. Why do the government needs to have these so called bureaucrats when they fail to evolve proper rules that helps to achieve good governance?

When privatization is an acceptable principle of the government, why do the governmental systems still try to cling to the pre-independence bureaucratic practices even today? For example, why don't the governmental rule makers do not allow a recent private bank statement from even the most reputed banks such as the ICICI, IDBI, Axis etc as a valid document for address proof? Mere stupidity or irresponsibility? Remember, they had been clinging to the age old practice of attestation of documents by gazetted officers so long. Only very recently, the Modi government could issue a circular that allows the citizens to self attest their own documents!

If good governance to really happen in this country with deep rooted systemic rot, the top boss needs to be an assertive task master. Not only he does that, he should have some real systems to know the real pulse of the people. Often, people fail to respond with their real problems when responses from them are solicited in a formal manner!

Coming to the address crisis of India: Whom do the governmental bureaucrats think as the best person to certify where he or she lives? Is it the person concerned or some babu sitting somewhere? For that matter, how many babus personally know the people other than their households and their offices? 

Some years before, the best address proof document accepted everywhere as the most fundamental has been a self addressed post card posted and delivered by the most people friendly national level government office- the Post Office. Why is it not so now? Why do some of the babus try to belittle one of their own departments? The government which cares for good governance should feel ashamed of this! What is the harm in accepting such a post card as the primary address proof for opening a bank account? When banks can handle and recognize a person for the most important function involving money transactions, why banks should not be entrusted with the task of certifying a person with regard to his or her identity and address?

The first and foremost requirement for good governance is the coordination and inter departmental trust the various governmental functionaries have to develop. If they function with malice towards each other, no one can ensure good governance. Government officers and staff can and will perform well towards good governance when they honestly feel that their political bosses are reasonably good people who could be trusted! But when this trust is broken, they could also work in such a way that peoples' anger is directed towards the political bosses!

When the government employees work in that fashion without any logic or justification, it would be better to remove such a person from government service. He or she is just not fit for the good of the nation! In the long run, it is not the politicians that ultimately brings good governance! It is the millions strong government staff that is government for the people. If the peoples' representatives cannot make the government machinery to work for the people, no good governance can come in to effect!

So, what is your opinion? Will our PM succeed in achieving good governance? 

Remembering Two Deceased Great Uncles and Their Air India Connections!

An aircraft has been a real fascination to me right from my childhood. It remains so even now. Becoming a pilot was one of my childhood dreams. Unfortunately, it did not materialize. Sitting by the window seat of a commercial aircraft and viewing the aerial geography still remains as a fascination for me.

A couple of years ago, I wrote a blog in my mother tongue Malayalam that highlighted my fascination with air crafts and their adorable  pilots!

In continuation to what I wrote yesterday, I was thinking of writing something more elaborating our problems with good governance.

I changed that idea because a cousin sister of mine reminded me of a long forgotten tragic incident of an air crash  by sending a WhatsApp link to a blog that brought back much details of those things forgotten.

The blog described the details of the long forgotten Air India DC-3 Dakota Plane crash in the Nilgiri mountain ranges of South India that happened in December 1950. That was the first year of existence of the independent Indian Republic!

An Air India DC-3 Dakota Aircraft

Similar to the one which crashed in the Nilgiris in 1950

It was some information I had been seeking since my childhood, but couldn't. My cousin, Saro and the blog writer, Ms.Nina Varghese, deserved to be thanked for the unexpected help in this context. It helped me to brush up some past memories and to know more. Google helped to find another blog that provided some more info.

Now coming to the reasons of my interest in this. There are more than one reasons. Late, Mr.C.Luke, who happened to be last listed passenger of this ill-fated Air India DC-3 Dakota flight was my mother's uncle (husband of my grandmother's younger sister, whom we used to call as Kundara Ammachi.). During my childhood, it was usual for my mother and grandmother to take me with them to their home at Kundara . The photograph of the deceased young head of the family adored the front wall and the handsome face made a long imprint in my young mind. This widowed aunt used to be a qualified nurse who in those days earned a reputation as a trusted registered medical practitioner. I used to enjoy the visits to the Kundara home during those days because of the company I used to get from my mother's cousins who were all only a couple of years elder to me.

Late Mr C.Luke (Source: Family Photo Albums)

Whatever the little I had known about this uncle, Luke, was from my mother, late Mrs.Chinnamma Mathew. From her, I had learnt that this uncle of hers who met his untimely death in the air crash few years before my birth was a promising businessman and entrepreneur. The air mishap had ruined all those business and much of the family's fortunes!

In those days, there was not much of facilities for me to know more about airplanes, the flying machines about which I used to be in my childhood fantasies. In the late Fifties and the Sixties, I remember running after to scan the skies in search to have a glimpse of the aircraft that made much noise from up in the sky, only to be contented with the small silvery image that looked some thing like a small cross and disappeared as fast as it appeared.

As a child I had some rare opportunities to view some small airplanes including an opportunity to sit in the pilots seat inside a small flying club machine kept in the hangar at the small aerodrome of Trivandrum of Nineteen fifties. All these enhanced my curiosity to know more about airplanes and the fellows who flew these marvelous flying machines of modern times.

My fascination with the subject prompted my father, late Shri T.M.Mathew, to reveal a surprising truth to me. It was about his uncle (his mother's younger brother) late, Mr.K.M.Daniel (Kulanjikombil-Kumplampoika).I was much thrilled to learn that this uncle was then a serving pilot of Air India of those days. I remember my father once making a plan to take me to Kochi where he lived in those days and meet this uncle. Somehow this never happened and it remained as a disappointment for me.

A few years later, in the early years of the Nineteen sixties, some unfortunate incidents happened in the glamorous pilot life of my great uncle. He lost his job at the fag end of his flying career. A couple of years later, circumstances and fate played the cruel joke in his life that he became a resident of my own home for about three years.

Dani Appachan, we called him fondly so, became a close companion and an amazing well wisher of mine in those days when I was a high school student. Every night we used to spend hours together discussing about his past experiences first as a high school teacher, then as a World War-2 veteran of the Royal Air Force and later as a commercial pilot of Air India. I used to listen to his world trotting stories with eyes and ears fully opened!

Without actually seeing an big aircraft, I learnt much about those from this pilot uncle and in my fantasies I piloted those wonder machines! While I nursed the fantasies of flying, I also kept the hidden fear of air accidents which were not uncommon in those days. The guidance of my pilot uncle could have helped me to pursue a flying career. But to be honest, the hidden fear of air accidents prevented me from doing so! Perhaps the thoughts about the unfortunate fate of Luke uncle pulled me back!

It was Dani uncle who gave me much information about the unpredictable weather conditions that among various other things caused air accidents. I still remember him explaining how an air craft dropped like a stone when it happened to enter what is known as air pockets, the nightmares of pilots! ( Incidentally I experienced the horror of one my self some time in the Nineteen nineties while on board an Indian Airlines Boeing 720 from New Delhi to Raipur. Sitting by the window, I watched the plane losing height suddenly and then stopping  abruptly causing a few of the luggage doors getting opened to throw some of the luggage out!)

Air travel has improved much and the facilities both at the airports and the commercial air crafts have enhanced even in this country. Air travel is no more considered as a risky proposition! It is much safer than many other modes of transport, thanks to the advancement in technology.

Yet, the pilots deserves to be admired for their skills for smoothly maneuvering those huge machines with the help of some on board instruments and the instructions from the air traffic controllers. The skills and dedication of the air craft maintenance engineers and technicians also need to be honored. Modern air travel is possible due to the coordinated efforts of several people!

Luke uncle and Dani uncle are no more in this world. But they were pioneers of Independent India. 

Like wise we are all destined to fade out from the face of this world.

Do we have some destinies beyond that? 

My curiosity has now shifted to that! Perhaps I would find more information to satisfy my quests!

The Twelve Essential Safeguards to Ensure Progressive Democratic Governments!

Democracy is by and large the best form of government for all progressive peoples. But this system could also cause degenerative governments to come into existence when the majority people who exercise their franchise are either irresponsible or do not have the basic mental maturity to discern right and wrongs.

It is the responsibility of the people to create their systems of government. They should not expect that there would be some divine intervention or help for them to create their system of governance. Whenever the governments cause extreme distress to the people, it has been natural for people to expect some divine help. But what they fail to understand due to their own immaturity is the ability that they have to set things right within themselves. Often it is their own stupidity that cause their miseries!

Humans in large groups often fail to evolve collective wisdom for their own good because most of them do not use their divinely bestowed intellect to analyze situations wisely.

Humans do have abundant freedom of choice and that is a divine endowment. However, it is also divinely mandated that they take the responsibility of all their acts and decisions. Wrong acts and decisions by the individuals and the groups could cause miseries to the wrongdoers and also to their innocent fellow beings.

When it comes to the selection of their leaders and their governmental systems, it is the responsibility of the people to use their intellects properly. If they fail to do it, they will face the consequences.

They should chose the wise men and women among them to create the most appropriate constitutions or guiding principles of their governments. If they fail to judge the wise among them, they will face the consequences.

Wise men and women are not those intelligent fellows with the least character. These are the clever ones and not the wise ones on whom they can trust. When the clever ones are entrusted with leadership, they would definitely take them for a ride!

So it is essential for the people to use their utmost available brains to find and select the worthy among them as their leaders. 

For representatives in the legislative branch they should elect only those who are qualified intellectually and morally to fulfill such sacred responsibilities. As judges of their high and supreme tribunals only those who are endowed with natural ability and who have been made wise by replete experience should be chosen.

If people want to live under good governance, they should prevent the following 12 things from happening:

1. Gain of unwarranted power by their elected leaders.

70:12.8

2. Machinations of ignorant and superstitious agitators.

70:12.9

3. Retardation of scientific progress.

70:12.10

4. Stalemates created by the dominance of mediocrity.

70:12.11

5. Domination by vicious minorities.

70:12.12

6. Control by ambitious and clever would-be dictators.

70:12.13

7. Disastrous disruption of panics.

70:12.14

8. Exploitation by the unscrupulous.

70:12.15

9. Taxation enslavement of the citizenry by the state.

70:12.16

10. Failure of social and economic fairness.

70:12.17

11. Mixing of religion with governance

70:12.18

12. Loss of personal liberty.

[ Adapted from the Urantia Book] 

Some Fundamental Truths About the Evolution of Wars and Governments

The first major challenge for the human races which had been evolving on earth was learning the techniques for acquiring the essential things for life such as food, shelter, family and the groups or clans. Once this was mastered at least partially, the next task was the regulation of human contacts.The development of industry demanded law, order, and social adjustment; private property necessitated government.

Not only on earth, but on all evolutionary planets beaming with evolutionary life such as that is on earth, development of antagonisms among the evolving humans are a natural phenomena. That is because, the evolving humans are not yet perfect in their mind levels. This causes the humans to be with varying capacities of understanding each other. Misunderstanding, mistrust and consequent animosities are therefore, natural.

When this is so, human groups have to learn the technique of bringing peace and soon they begin to appreciate the necessity for peace among them. They learn how to regulate themselves so that peace is established among them.

Anarchy causes misery and therefore establishment of law and order becomes essential for the evolving human groups to reduce their miseries.

The need for bringing law and order necessitated formation of governments.

It was essential for the struggling humanity to forcefully adopt the path of civilization as a necessity for their own existence. This is the natural tendency of evolutionary growth in all evolutionary worlds in this universe!

War is the natural state and heritage of evolving man; peace is the social yardstick measuring civilization’s advancement. 

Before the partial socialization of the advancing races man was exceedingly individualistic, extremely suspicious, and unbelievably quarrelsome. Violence is the law of nature, hostility the automatic reaction of the children of nature, while war is but these same activities carried on collectively.

And wherever and whenever the fabric of civilization becomes stressed by the complications of society’s advancement, there is always an immediate and ruinous reversion to these early methods of violent adjustment of the irritations of human inter-associations.

War is an animalistic reaction to misunderstandings and irritations; peace attends upon the civilized solution of all such problems and difficulties.

But there could be no such phenomenon as war until society had evolved sufficiently far to actually experience periods of peace and to sanction warlike practices such as sports and games. 

The very concept of war implies some degree of organization.

With the emergence of social groupings, individual irritations began to be submerged in the group feelings, and this promoted intra-tribal tranquility but at the expense of inter-tribal peace. 

Peace was thus first enjoyed by the in-group, or tribe, who always disliked and hated the out-group, foreigners. Early man regarded it a virtue to shed alien blood.

Modern air travel has reduced the limitations of distances.

But that has not yet enabled man to remove his suspicion about the foreigners!

When the early chiefs would try to sort out misunderstandings among their clans, they often found it necessary, at least once a year, to permit the people to have some other kind of fun-fights among themselves. The clan would divide up into two groups and engage in an all-day battle. And this for no other reason than just the fun of it; they really enjoyed fighting. The nature of enjoying a fight is within the minds of all underdeveloped humans. Humans will remove this trait only when they become perfectly developed in civilization!

Warfare persists because man is human, evolved from an animal, and all animals have a tendency to fight! In humans, this animal tendency of fighting and killing slowly gets removed from the human mind as human perfection of mind takes place with successive generations!

As it stands now, war and fight among humans in some form keep taking place due any one of the following reasons:

1. Scarcity of food: Man will fight to get food at any cost when food becomes scarce.

2. Scarcity of woman or opposite partner: Imperfect man would not mind fighting or killing for fulfilling this!

3. Showing off pride and superiority: Imperfect man does not consider others as equals. They would resort to violent ways to establish their superiority! They will resort to violent methods when their egos are hurt!

4. Imperfect humans have the animal tendency to acquire leadership at any cost. They would not mind resorting to violent means for achieving this. In olden times it used to be slavery. In today's world, it is all kinds of bossism. All imperfect humans would like to become adorable bosses to others. When they get the power or opportunity, they might even become sadistic to trouble those who happen to be under their control! Wars can happen for establishment of leadership!

5. Imperfect animal minded humans cannot forgive the wrongs of others and they get satisfaction only when they take revenge. The human imperfection of revenge is another cause for wars!

6. Imperfect humans cannot tolerate long term peace as their minds do aspire for fighting. Such imperfect humans create war like situations during long term peace times. Sports and games, to some extent, help the imperfect humans to vent their fight loving agitations of mind!

7. Religions of imperfect humans invariably approve war to establish superiority of their own faith. It is extremely difficult for the imperfect humans to understand the true divine nature of God!

Man will never accept peace as a normal mode of living until he has been thoroughly and repeatedly convinced that peace is best for his material welfare, and until society has wisely provided peaceful substitutes for the gratification of that inherent tendency periodically to let loose a collective drive designed to liberate those ever-accumulating emotions and energies belonging to the self-preservation reactions of the human species.

Nature confers no rights on man, only life and a world in which to live it. Nature does not even confer the right to live, as might be deduced by considering what would likely happen if an unarmed man met a hungry tiger face to face in the primitive forest. Society’s prime gift to man is security.

When rights are old beyond knowledge of origin, they are often called natural rights. But human rights are not really natural; they are entirely social. They are relative and ever changing, being no more than the rules of the game—recognized adjustments of relations governing the ever-changing phenomena of human competition.

Natural justice is a man-made theory; it is not a reality. In nature, justice is purely theoretic, wholly a fiction. Nature provides but one kind of justice—inevitable conformity of results to causes.

Justice, as conceived by man, means getting one’s rights and has, therefore, been a matter of progressive evolution.

Law is always at first negative and prohibitive; in advancing civilizations it becomes increasingly positive and directive.

Mankind’s struggle to perfect government on earth has to do with perfecting channels of administration, with adapting them to ever-changing current needs, with improving power distribution within government, and then with selecting such administrative leaders as are truly wise. 

So long as the majority humans remain without achieving reasonable levels of mind perfection, their evolutionary progress is incomplete. The last strains of genetic features they carry from their animal origins need to be polished by successive generations of evolutionary growth. This progress does not happen uniformly across all and therefore human society at any time during its evolutionary progress remains as a heterogeneous lot with varying levels of imperfection. The chances of democratic systems achieving near perfect governance under such a situation is very low and non-sustainable. Yet democracy is the ideal and desirable form of governance for humans who have surpassed their primitive stages of development.

While there is a divine and ideal form of government, it is a futile exercise to give the details of it to humans when they remain vastly under lower levels of mental maturity. The minds of such people will not accept the principles of such a governance even when that is divinely revealed!

So, humans of earth has to go forward to future generations facing all the trials and tribulations which in essence are there own creation. 

But that does not mean that the human race is going to be doomed.

On the contrary, it will progress continuously and every generation ahead would have some improvements over their predecessors! 

It is divinely destined that all evolutionary planets reach to their respective perfection levels at some point of time. No living planets are divinely destined to be doomed! Such a destiny is not in the plans of their divine creators!

Hence, earth too would eventually reach a glorious future. A future time when its peoples and its governments are more or less with the highest possible material perfection!

[Adapted from the Urantia Book-Paper-70]

What Could Be the Best Criteria to Identify the Best Corporate Entities?

Before I try to find the possible answers to the title question above, I think I should find out the most appropriate answer to another question:

What should be the most important purpose of my life in this world?

Live in Style? Is it the Purpose of Life?

Photo Courtsey: Sunil Mathew

I have been pondering over that question for quite some time.

I have been hearing and reading what others say about it.

Some say: Make money and enjoy as much (before you die, of course!)

Some say: Do some thing so that you become a well known celebrity! In other words, by this they mean acquiring the attention and admiration of others by showcasing some of their abilities by which they can project themselves as superior to others in some manner! The inferior souls then would be so willing to flock behind them to be pushed to fame, political power and all the associated material enjoyments! 

Fame to celebrity status can be due to some really good qualities and also on account of clever crookedness. Either way such celebrities get immature followers who would be all willing to surrender their self to their heroes and heroines.

So some keep trying to become celebrities and to acquire as many followers as they could while some others get enjoyment by being followers of their demigods. 

Then there are the neutral ones who do not come under any of the above. They live either blissfully ignorant of their lives or as silent saints contented with the life as it is!

And yet another group too exist. They are the disgruntled ones. They are with malice towards one and all. They are born to criticize and fight every other. They exist to add pain and suffering to all others and also to themselves! 

All the above are realities of human life. You cannot deny it. 

But then, being human is something unique and special. A human life is superior than all other types of material life forms that our world has. At least that is what I now believe.

And that superiority comes from our multifarious abilities of language, creativity, intelligence and other body and mind capacities. But on the top of all these are our unique capability of Creator (God) consciousness and our ability to love and help others.

Inherently we are conscious of good and bad , whether we actually act accordingly or not. And we have the natural tendency to do good and be of help to others without expecting anything in return, though all of us may not be like that always. And that comes from our God consciousness!

But many of us do not nurture our God consciousness and the divine qualities of goodness that are within us. As a result we fail to live as real humans!

Our prime mission in this human life, in my opinion, is to enhance our real human character and values that are inherent within us.

And it is not difficult to accomplish that mission. Be aware of God always as our Creator and source of life, while recognizing all other humans as equally receiving the same unique gift of life from God. 

In simple terms that amounts to loving God the Creator and also His creations just for the great wisdom of God in everything. When we realize the greatness of Our Creator God, then and there we start realizing our limitations.

When we begin to have that great realization, we begin to forgo our egos and our pride in our own greatness. When we see another human, we start seeing the wisdom of God reflecting in some way. We then automatically learn to love God and live our lives in goodness. Our world will then begin to change as a place of divinity!

Now the best corporate entities or companies are those formed of humans with more and more divine qualities.

For such companies, the prime motto or objective is not enhancing profits by cleverly depriving others in some clandestine manner.

If they happen to enhance profits to disproportionate levels, they use their intelligence to remove such anomalies and to carry on with their work in a balanced manner that benefits all.

They work to propagate happiness to all, their customers, employees, suppliers, shareholders, the government and the general public. 

They embrace values and character while discarding selfishness and the urge to control others.

They should be doing business as a noble, sustainable service to others and our planet.

Unfortunately, the majority of us are yet to acquire and nurture our divine qualities of goodness. Till such time, we would not be in a position to discard our fears, anxieties, envies, greed and such other negative qualities. 

When such among us are predominating our business entities, our companies cannot have the real human character. Profit and growth in profit  would predominate our criteria to judge our best corporate entities!

Whether it is good or bad, you should try to analyze yourself.

Experimenting Food Supplements for Self Managing Type-2 Diabetes

A couple of years ago, I too joined the growing community of diabetic patients. All of a sudden, I discovered that my normal blood sugar levels are no more within the limits prescribed by learned medical researchers. The practice of visiting the doctor at regular intervals and the practice of extracting blood samples began as a routine.

For a couple of months, it was abstinence from free sugar intake, that was tried for control of blood sugar level. So, coffee, tea and other sugar drinks became bitter. Soon, diet control had to be discarded as it became ineffective. Various  Ayurvedic  and homeopathic medicines as available in the market too became not so effective. Then the doctor decided it was time for the chemical drugs of modern medicine.

It began with Metformin slow release tablet 500 mg once a day, only to be supplemented by Glimipiride 1 mg. In a couple of months, that too was not enough and the doctor was inclined to prescribe higher dosages and perhaps other possible combinations of diabetic drugs as available now (see this chart).

Experienced diabetic seniors have all gone through this regime and they knew that this disease is not manageable by oral tablets for a long time. Sooner or later, they have to inject insulin into their bodies for making up the shortfall of this hormone which is otherwise produced by the endocrine gland called pancreas. 

It is believed that several health problems that people have are due to hormonal imbalances within the body. Hormones are complex chemicals produced by some glands or organs within the body. These complex chemicals are circulated in the blood circulation system in small quantities for helping the body to perform various functions such as digestion, growth, etc.

When hormones are absent, more or less in the body, various health problems arise. The hormone producing glands of the body start behaving abnormally due to various reasons, the most prominent being ageing. Besides, absence of certain micro nutrients within food could also cause hormone imbalances.

One of the common ailment that a good majority of humans develop at some stage of life is due to the imbalance of the hormone called insulin which is produced by the body organ called pancreas. Insulin is essential for the body to convert carbohydrates and sugars in the food to energy and to convert excess sugars to fats to be stored up in the body for future use. Insulin helps in the control of sugar concentration in the blood within certain limits.

When insulin production by pancreas gets affected due to some reason, the result is the debilitating, but mostly manageable disease called Diabetes mellitus (DM) or simply, diabetes. There are a few types of diabetes. But the most common that the majority of people have is the type-2 diabetes. I, too have type-2 diabetes.

There are various methods by which diabetes can be treated or managed. Modern medicine (Allopathy),  homeopathy,  Ayurveda  and other systems all have some kind of medicines and methods for the management of diabetes. But none of these systems provide a permanent cure to the disease. Complications due to high blood sugar affects the person seriously at some later stage of life. However, the quality of life could be made better by adopting proper diabetes management procedures.

When the pancreas has got some ability to produce insulin, medicines and drugs could be used to enhance the insulin production. But when this organ become fully dysfunctional, insulin injection practices may have to be followed.

But, there are several food or dietary supplements, mostly originating from herbs, that are said to provide some benefits to diabetic patients. These are mostly herbal products that are being experimented world wide which are said to have some beneficial effects for various kinds of ailments that people have. These products do not qualify as drugs or medicines as the research work on them are not fully proven in accordance with the scientific norms and are not approved by the statutory drug approving authorities. Essentially, these dietary supplements when consumed help the body to obtain some form of  chemical molecules or elements that are essential for the body through the digestive system. These micro nutrients are essential for the body to synthesize the complex hormones.   

Food supplements have some beneficial effects and may not have much detrimental effects when consumed within some reasonable limits. They can be thought as similar to vitamins and minerals that are essential for proper functioning of our biological bodies.

One such supplement is derived from the plant called Gymnema sylvestre. It is found in India and is called Chakkarakkolli (in Malayalam) and Gurmari (in Hindi) both literally meaning destroyer of sugar.

Gymnema as a dietary supplement has been widely accepted for its benefits especially for the management of type-2 diabetes. Extracts from this plant in the form of capsules and powder are now marketed in many countries. Consuming one or two capsules daily has been reported as useful by several patients in controlling their blood sugar levels. 

Gymnema dietary supplements can now be procured online from reputed online market places such as Amazon. In India it is available in various forms as produced and marketed by various firms under various trade names such as Zenith Nutrition Gymnema capsules, Gymnema Meshashringi Diabetic Support capsules, Gymnema Herbal Powder, Gymnivit Gymnema Powder Capsules, etc.

It is not a bad idea to have some self experiments with these products for the management of diabetes. However, it is important to have as much information as possible before such experiments are tried out and to monitor the blood sugar level changes during such self management regimes. Having a glucometer and its test strips at home may prove useful. (More options here!) 

Another item that may be of interest to diabetic patients is the natural sweetener called Stevia. The purified sweetener powder obtained from Stevia plants can be safely used to sweeten food and beverages without worrying about enhancing blood sugar levels. Now Stevia powder can be ordered online in India too.

When we discuss about the management of common diabetes, it is not justified if I avoid mentioning about Ayurveda, the ancient medical system of India. This system has many cures for diabetes. Unfortunately, not all Ayurveda doctors are confident of their system of medicine. Incidentally I have been trying this system and have found much benefit in bringing my blood sugar levels under control. Since, successful Ayurveda medicines and formulations are still confidential secrets of many successful practitioners, I would not be in a position to provide more details about those medicines through which I got benefits. For example, this product is marketed as an ayurvedic supplement for diabetic control which contains Gurmari and other ayurvedic ingredients.

So, if you are not scared to experiment, try out and share your experiences here. That may be of help to those interested.

I would also suggest my readers to share their experiences in this context using the comment tool below in this page.