‘Yoga therapy can help deal with effects of space travel’

Former ISRO chief speaks at medical university convocation

06/03/2020, STAFF REPORTER,CHENNAI

Governor Banwarilal Purohit at the convocation on Thursday. From left, Sudha Seshayyan, K. Kasturirangan and R. Chidambaram are seen. S.R. RaghunathanS.R. Raghunathan

With India aiming for human space missions, a new dimension needs to be created in medical education to handle the physiological and psychological challenges the country’s astronauts have to face, K. Kasturirangan, former chairman, ISRO, said on Thursday.

Delivering the convocation address at the 32nd convocation of the Tamil Nadu Dr. M.G.R. Medical University, he said that yoga therapy could help deal with the physiological and psychological effects on human beings surviving in space.

He added that even Rakesh Sharma, the first Indian to travel to space, had spoken about performing yoga while in space.

He said that a number of changes happen in the human body under microgravity conditions in space.

While counter measures in dealing with some of these effects include exercises, he said that India’s very own valuable heritage in this connection was yoga therapy. He said that yoga therapy helped maintain core and neck strength, besides helping overcome the problems of space motion sickness and the psychological impact.

“We need to create specialised courses as well as institutions to impart education with necessary simulation and training infrastructure in this connection,” he said.

Arguing that the quality of medical education and the aspects of governance in India leave much to be desired, Mr. Kasturirangan, who headed the committee that drafted the National Education Policy (NEP), said that the NEP and the newly-formed National Medical Commission had tried to address many of these issues.

R. Chidambaram, former Chairman, Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, said that artificial intelligence and machine learning were expected to be more useful in diagnosis and drug development.

Tamil Nadu Governor Banwarilal Purohit presided over the convocation. Sudha Seshayyan, vice-chancellor of the university, presented the annual report.

A total of 17,590 graduates from medical, dental, AYUSH, and allied health sciences received their degree.

For the first time since the inception of the university, the convocation was conducted on the university premises, the V-C said.