Gandhi’s connect with nature at Pune’s National Institute of Naturopathy

A clinic, which dealt with ways to cure diseases with the help of natural remedies run by Dr Dinshaw Mehta, attracted Mahatma Gandhi to visit Pune on multiple occasions. Gandhi stayed for 156 days at this small clinic inside a bungalow at Tadiwala road, behind Pune railway station, since 1944 after he met Dr Mehta.

The bungalow called the ‘Bapu Bhavan’, is now housed at the Natural Institute of Naturopathy (NIN) and the room where Gandhi stayed is still preserved as it is. On October 2, special celebrations will be held at the institute. NIN, Pune is an autonomous body under the Ministry of Ayush and came into existence in 1986. Currently, the institute has a governing body headed by the minister of Ayush as its president. 

Talking about Gandhi’s attachment to the institute, professor Dr K Satya Lakshmi, director of NIN, said, “On his 150th birth anniversary, we are trying to revisit some of his commitments to health - what Gandhi’s focus was, what all experiments he did and what conclusions he arrived at. We have researched all his naturopathy experiments which he had compiled in a book form. In our research, we realised that Mahatma Gandhi was looking at health system to replace doctors and hospitals and was looking for health needs from within oneself. So, if a body is afflicted with a disease, the seeds of recovery are also present within the body, according to this theory, which Gandhi called nature cure.” 

At the ‘Gandhi room’ inside the institute, various items which were used by him like two charkhas, a bed, one writing table with a chair, four photo frames and his walking stick, have been preserved. 

“Along with Dr Dinshaw Mehta, Gandhi conducted a lot of experiments. With the help of these experiments, after the age of 70, Gandhi and Dr Shaw were able to do three 21-day fasts due to naturopathy. Out of the three fasts, two were done under the supervision of Dr Mehta. Another historical thing which happened at NIN was that Gandhi signed a document committing himself to promoting and propagating natural cure. Gandhi was also a signatory lifetime chairman of the trust as he wanted the institute to grow into a university, so that people from all over the world could come here,” added Dr Lakshmi.