A BHU spokesperson said Bhoot Vigyan, which is part of Ashtanga Ayurveda, deals with psychosomatic disorder

LONDON/VARANASI: The BBC is being accused of mocking Hinduism and India after it ran a story about a new course at Banaras Hindu University that it said teaches "doctors' ghost studies."

BBC online ran the story with the sensational headline: "Bhoot Vidya: India university to teach doctors Ghost Studies." The story -- the second lead in the India section on the BBC website on Friday -- was referring to a six-month certificate course in 'Bhoot Vidya' starting in January at the Ayurveda section of BHU's Institute of Medical Science (IMS).

The BBC website stated: "A prestigious Indian university is offering a certificate course to teach doctors how to treat people who claim to see or be possessed by ghosts." It ran the story with an image of doctors wearing green scrubs getting ready to perform surgery on a patient.

The British Hindu Press Association responded with a Facebook post saying: " BBC News fails to translate a Sanskrit word 'Bhoot Vidya' and confuses 'Psychotherapy' with 'Ghost Studies'!!! It's unfortunate and shameful to see that BBC doesn't have a single competent staff to understand Sanskrit and translate into English?" (sic)

General Secretary of the National Council of Hindu Temples UK Satish K Sharma told TOI: "This is a deliberate attempt to mock and denigrate India and Hinduism. Saying ghost studies is an inadequate and sensational translation."

The BBC story said: "Officials say it will focus on psychosomatic disorders which are often confused with paranormal occurrences." It quoted a BHU official who spoke to an Indian news agency that "a separate unit of Bhoot Vidya (Ghost Studies) had been set up in the university" and that "such a course would teach doctors about the Ayurvedic remedies to treat ghost-related ailments".

The British public broadcaster then carried a series of tweets by individuals mocking the course with one comparing India offering such a course to "China commencing research in 6G technology" and another tweeting "Rest of the world: Big Data, Artificial Intelligence, Machine learning."

In Varanasi, BHU spokesprson Rajesh Singh said that Bhoot Vigyan, which is part of Ashtanga Ayurveda, deals with psychosomatic disorder. "The medicine course was based on ancient texts of Maharishi Charaka, one of the principal contributors in the field of ayurveda," he added.

Other branches of Ayurveda are Kayachikitsa (internal medicine), Shalya Tantra (surgery), Shalakya Tantra (ENT, ophthalmology, dentistry), Kaumara Bhritya (paediatrics), Agada Tantra (toxicology), Rasayana (geriatric medicine) and Vajikarana (aphrodisiac study).

"Of these eight branches of Ayurveda, five are already adopted by Central Council of Indian Medicine (CCIM), a regulatory body of Indian medicine under the ministry of AYUSH. Hence, on recommendation of the policy and planning committee of IMS (BHU), the academic council of the university has approved six-month diploma courses in Bhoot Vigyan, Vajikarana and Rasayana from January 2020," Singh said.

"Students who take up this course will be taught to treat psychosomatic disorders and psychiatric illness based on Ayurveda while a link will also be established with modern medical science. A graduate from any stream of modern medicine/Indian medicine and/or nursing is eligible to study Bhoot Vigyan. It is pertinent to mention that the nomenclature of the unit is based on texts written by Maharshi Charaka and it is not at all related to paranormal studies," Singh stressed.

Ayurveda faculty Prof Yamini Bhushan Tripathi could not be contacted by TOI despite numerous calls. A few days ago, a section of media had quoted her about a crash course in 'Bhoot Vidya and this was misinterpreted as 'the science of the paranormal'. It triggered a debate on social media about the course. A BBC spokesperson told TOI: "The same translation has been used widely in the Indian media - in English and Hindi reports. We would encourage people to read the article on the BBC website, which includes the full context of the story."

In London, Satish K Sharma told TOI that 'Bhoot Vigyan' means the body of knowledge on non-physical influences that impact a person. "It could be the influence of the moon or psychosomatic illnesses or it could refer to the atmosphere before a storm. English has a limited way of expressing the mind sciences. In colloquial use the word 'Bhoota' is often mapped onto the word ghost to mean something like poltergeist owing to its meaning of a non-physical influence having a detectable impact. But, what they are studying has nothing to do with ghosts nor are they illnesses caused by ghosts. This is what happens when you talk about esoteric or subtle sciences. The only people who can translate them adequately are those who have a solid foot in both cultures and languages," he said

Pradeep Bhardwaj, who established the India Centre UK in Swindon in Britain, said: "For an organisation of such global repute and more importantly one which is mainly funded by tax payers, the BBC needs to be more balanced, careful and diligent. When such portrayal of a country like India, the cradle of the human race, mother of all civilisations, becomes a pattern, it may also raise questions about the BBC's institutional bias."

Psychosomatic disorder - also called psychophysiologic disorder - is a condition where psychological stress adversely affects physiological (somatic) functioning to the point of distress. Disorders resulting from stress may include hypertension, respiratory ailments, gastrointestinal disturbances, migraine and tension headaches, pelvic pain, impotence, frigidity, dermatitis and ulcers.

