Ethnomedicinal survey of the Paliyar tribe: a case study of Kadamalaikundu, Theni District

Abstract

The Paliyar tribe of Kadamalaikundu, Theni District of Tamil Nadu, India, has been deeply associated with forestry and ethnomedicinal practices for ages. The study aimed to identify the important medicinal plant species used by this tribe for ethnomedicinal purposes in the local vicinity. Eighty-nine informants were interviewed using the ‘specimen display’ and forest walk method, semi-structured open-ended questionnaires, interviews, and personal observations. The people from the region reported ninety-three plant species having medicinal properties. The Solanaceae family was recorded as the most dominant plant family, reporting seven different species of medicinal plants, followed by six species of the Acanthaceae family. In the study, Coccinia grandis had the highest use value (2.5), followed by Withania somnifera (2). In contrast, Cardiospermum halicacabum, Gossypium hirsutum, and Ocimum tenuiflorum with use value (1) and the ICF (Informant Consensus Factor) of value 1 accounted for 15 diseases out of forty-one categorized ailments. This study confirmed that the Paliyar tribe was dependent on a large number of medicinal plants for their primary healthcare and veterinary well-being, which require immediate conservation owing to their population fragmentation and the reluctance of the younger generation to adopt ethnomedicinal practices as occupation, which could lead to the loss of traditional knowledge as well. The study also documented the various important medicinal plant uses that could pave the way to the new pharmacological dimensions for modern wellness programs.

India is one of the world’s wealthiest countries in terms of biodiversity. According to species richness, India is one of the 17th mega-biological countries in the world, home to many tribal people. Their population is about 70–80 million, i.e., about 8.14% of the total population reported in the 2011 census (www.censusindia.gov.in). The Botanical Survey of India reported that Tamil Nadu was the first state to initiate the recording and documentation of ethnobotanical data in the early eighties to provide the preliminary status for critical studies about tribal people and their traditional knowledge (Karthik 2016). In Tamil Nadu, 36 tribal communities, namely, Adiyan, Aranadan, Eravallan, Irular, Kadar, Kammara, Kanikaran, Kanikkar, Kaniyan, Kanyan, Kattunayakan, Malasar, Malayali, Paliyar, Pulayar, Sholiga, Toda and likewise are spread across different districts. The Paliyar community is one of the dominant communities in Theni District. Paliyar tribal people are classified into three categories based on their lifestyles, namely Nomadic (do not build houses), Semi Nomadic (small huts), and Settled (permanent houses). Occupation-wise, many still collect food and non-timber forest products from nearby forest areas (Ignacimuthu et al. 2006). They use primarily local plant-based medicines from cultivated lands or forest areas to cure different disorders across all age groups.

1 Introduction

Medicinal plants have constituted a vital part of the traditional medicine systems (TMS) for several thousand years and continue to do so. Traditional medicines, which have been used since immemorial, use organic products derived from macro and micro-nutrients, plants, and animals. According to the World Health Organization (www.who.int), 80% of the world’s population depends on local or indigenous medicine for their primary healthcare requirements (Mukherjee and Wahile 2006). The global estimate indicates that over 75% of people have to count on traditional medicines derived from medicinal plants as the outlay of modern medicines of allopathic origin is too expensive to afford for an ever-rising economically recessed world. In many countries, traditional knowledge systems or medicines are developed through many trials and errors, and the most important remedies are carefully transferred orally from one generation to another (Pei 2001). Since the beginning of the human healthcare system, plant-based medicines have contributed to it (Venkataswamy et al. 2010; Lulekal et al. 2013). However, such knowledge may disappear due to lack of consciousness, proper documentation, and gross mismanagement.

Most tribal people have used traditional methods to cure human and animal diseases for generations. The local inhabitants of isolated places use folk knowledge to heal different ailments. Ethnomedicines are widely used among the tribal and aboriginal populations to treat various diseases in humans and animals. For example, “Dongria Kandha,” a tribe of the Kandhamal district of Odisha, India, practices consuming 10 species of Dioscorea genus (a type of tuber) as food and medicine to cure various ailments (Parida and Sarangi 2021). Traditional Indigenous Knowledge can be efficiently preserved through ethnomedicinal surveys (Idolo et al. 2010; Mahmood et al. 2011). Global awareness about medicinal plants and their traditional uses has escalated in recent decades. Many scientific investigations have been conducted in the Indian peninsula about different tribal communities and their knowledge of ethnomedicine (Swain et al. 2022; Marak and Mathew 2022).

In addition, for the last two decades, several ethnomedicinal studies have been carried out in different states in India. The eastern parts of Rajasthan reported 213 species of medicinal plants belonging to 68 families (Upadhyay et al. 2010). Bankura district of West Bengal documented 25 plants used by the Santal people to formulate 40 ethnomedicinal preparations for curing 27 diseases (Rhaman and Karmakar 2015). There are records of 85 medicinal plants belonging to 49 families against 19 different ailments from Nelliyampathy hills, located in the Palakkad district of Kerala (Vijaykumar et al. 2015). Kathua district of J&K reported 197 plants from 87 families and 174 genera (Rao et al. 2015) for ethnomedicinal properties.). Satpura Hills from central India revealed 52 species of plants belonging to 36 families with 14 new ethnomedicinal uses of plants (Kosalge and Fursule 2009). 121 plant species belonging to 105 genera and 53 families were reported for use as medicine for treating 93 types of ailments from Jasrota hills of the western Himalayas (Singh et al. 2020), and western ghats of Karnataka documented 102 plant species with seven endemic species showing ethnomedicinal properties (Bhat et al. 2014). Sixty beneficial plant species belonging to 38 families, used for local health care needs, including ten veterinary useful species, were reported from the Pakyong sub-division of eastern Sikkim (Tamang et al. 2023). Many diseases or ailment-centric ethnomedicinal studies were done in India, such as snake bites (Upasani et al. 2017), epilepsy (Sharma et al. 2013), and skin diseases. The ethnomedicinal research has not been confined to field studies; serious discussions have also been held at policy-making levels in India.

In a momentous initiative, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Government of India signed an agreement in 2022 to establish the WHO Global Centre for Traditional Medicine at Jamnagar, Gujarat, India. It will concentrate on building a solid evidence base for policies and standards on traditional medicine practices and products. The WHO Global Centre will help India integrate traditional medicines as appropriate into its health systems and regulate their quality and safety for optimal and sustainable impact. The Gujarat Declaration of the first WHO Global Summit on Traditional Medicine at Gandhinagar, India in August 2023, articulated an action agenda focusing on research and evidence. It is proposed appropriately using existing and new research, evidence syntheses, and knowledge translation principles. It also recommended capacity strengthening to produce, translate, and use Traditional, Complementary, and Integrative Medicine (TCIM) research and Indigenous Knowledge and supporting the evidence-based integration of TCIM in national health policies and systems based on the highest quality research (WHO report). Ministry of AYUSH, Government of India is already promoting Indian Traditional or Indigenous health care systems like Naturopathy, Ayurveda, Yoga, Unani, and Siddha, which integrate various facets of ethnomedicine. Also, the National Institute of Research in Tribal Health (NIRTH), Jabalpur, Madhya Pradesh, is taking great interest in documenting the ethnobotanical and ethno-veterinary practices of the state tribal people as they are the critical observers of their natural environment and conserving the environment through their cultural-traditional values and customary resource management. Similar attempts have been taken up by the Tribal Research Institutes (TRI), the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), the Botanical Survey of India, the Anthropological Survey of India, and the Ayurvedic Institutions to document tribal medicinal knowledge. The SVASTIK (Scientifically Validated Societal Traditional Knowledge) initiative of CSIR implemented by CSIR-National Institute of Science Communication and Policy Research (NIScPR), New Delhi, is also playing a pivotal role in popularizing Indian traditional knowledge including TSMs and ethnomedicines (Lata and Barman 2021).

Valid and comprehensive data can only reveal and help in policy-making concerning traditional knowledge to be authenticated and documented. The government should make a policy that keeps a view of tribal/traditional knowledge and insights and incorporates them with scientific facts (Singh et al. 2022). Throughout the world, ethnobotany is indispensable for developing healthcare and conservation programs. Proper documentation of ethnobotanical studies, methodical and scientific research of traditional medicinal plants, scientifically guided collection practices of the plant parts, enhancement of local classification systems, proper communication through language, global efforts for the preservation of human cognition, cultural history, and beliefs by maintaining world peace, developing social networks globally and access to information for the creation of database management systems are few concrete steps which could augment the restoration of ethnobotanical knowledge worldwide.

Among ethnobotanical studies in the Paliyar tribe, Duraipandiyan et al. (2006) reported the antibacterial activities of 18 medicinal plants, and Ignacimuthu et al. (2006) gave details of 60 medicinal plants. However, the total number of informants was 12, of which only 4 belonged to the tribe. Shanmugam et al. (2009) accounted for 58 medicinal plants identified by the tribe of Virudhunagar district, and Denisia et al. (2022) gave details of the socio-economic status of the tribe of Kodaikanal region with a backdrop of specific traditional culture. The present study aims to analyze and record orally transmitted knowledge by 89 informants of the Theni District of Tamil Nadu on 93 medicinal plants, which is of great importance compared to the previous studies. Although there is another study by Ignacimuthu et al. (2008) from a similar district with 101 medicinal plants, the number of informants was only 15. Jeyprakash et al. (2011) worked in the same district with mixed tribes, some informants, and medicinal plants. This study adds to the baseline information to the existing knowledge for more research-based investigations that may lead to the discovery of new plant-based herbal drugs in the coming decades. Therefore, this article is the first study of its kind as it fills the gap for the previous studies.

The objective of this manuscript was thus to collect information on the present status of folk ethno-medicinal knowledge of the Paliyar Tribe in the Theni District of Tamil Nadu.

2 Methodology

2.1 Study area

The study area is Kadamalaikundu, in the foothills of the Megamalai Hills in the Theni District of Tamil Nadu, India. The GPS coordinates for the place are between 900 53’N and 100 22’ N and 770 17’E and 770 67’E (Fig. 1). This area is rich in plant biodiversity. The temperature increases from March to July, whereas the rainy season is from July to November. The maximum temperature is 28–30 °C. Due to its location at the base of the Western Ghats and adjacent to Kerala State, the district has a cooler temperature.

Fig. 1

Map of Theni District

2.2 Survey within the community

Field trips were conducted during this study from July 2022 to September 2022 in Theni District, Tamil Nadu. The standard methodology (Jain 1967) used was a structured survey to gather information about ethno-medicinal knowledge from Paliyar tribal people. Different age groups of tribal practitioners (between 18 and 90 years) (Fig. 2) were interviewed about the medicinal uses of 93 plants. The study was based on purposive sampling, depending upon the informant’s choice of ethnomedicinal plants for which they were willing to share the information.

Fig. 2

Age distribution of tribal practitioners

The information regarding the usage of medicinal plants and the perceptions of the Paliyar tribal people regarding their use in common diseases were collected through a proper questionnaire (Fig. 3), and in addition to the vernacular names, collected data also documented parts of the plant used, method of preparation, form of usage, and addition of other plants or ingredients. The collected plant species were correctly identified through the flora of Tamil Nadu (Matthew 1983) and confirmed with BSI (Botanical Survey of India, Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu). The specimens were deposited at the Herbarium of Botany Department, Vivekananda College of Arts and Sciences for Women, Thiruchengode, Tamil Nadu. Methodologies like ‘Specimen Display’ and ‘Walking through the Forest’ were primarily used to collect data from the natives during the interview. Semi-structured open-ended questionnaires, interviews, and personal observations were used to extract ethnomedicinal information. Prior Informed Consent (PIC) was obtained from the respondents during data collection.

Fig. 3

Format of the Survey Form

2.3 Data analysis

The indigenous medicinal information of plant species was analyzed using two different techniques:

2.3.1 Use value (UV)

The UV is a quantitative method to determine the relative importance of indigenous plant species using the formula: UV = ΣUi /n where Ui represents the sum of the total number of plant parts uses citations by all informants for a given plant species; n is the total number of informants interviewed for a given species (Phillips and Gentry 1993). Use value (UV) is an index widely used to quantify the relative importance of useful plants. It combines the frequency with which a plant species is mentioned with the number of uses mentioned per species and is often used to highlight prominent species of interest (Zenderland et al. 2019).

2.3.2 Informant Consensus Factor (ICF)

ICF was used to indicate the evenness of information. All the mentioned ailments were classified into different groups. The number of citations for every plant claimed to cure that disease was too recorded using the formula: ICF = (Nur-Nt)/(Nur-1), where Nur is the number of plant use reports by the informants for a particular health problem or a number of the use-reports per ailment or plant-use classification. Nt is the number of plant species used for a particular health problem by all the informants, and Nt refers to the number of plant species or taxa reported to address a particular plant-use category. The resulting factor ranges from 0 to 1, where a high value reveals a high rate of informant consensus. Every report of a plant species’ use was considered one use-report. ICF values ranged from 0 to 1, where “1” describes the highest level of informant agreement. ICF is a quantitative analytical parameter used to evaluate the degree of agreement among informants’ knowledge and is essential in sorting plants for their applicability (Trotter and Logan 1986).

3 Results

During the scientific investigation, 89 informants were interviewed. Of them, 52 were males and 37 females between 18 and 90 years old. 35.9% of people belonged to the age group of 18–35 years, 15.7% of people belonged to 35–50 years of age group, 10.1% of people belonged to 50–60 years of age, 14.6% of people belonged to 60–70 years of age group, 13.4% of people belonged to 70–80 years of age group and 10.1% of people belonged to 80–90 years of age group. Thus, the highest percentage of informants comprised those between the 18–35 age group. The study included information about 93 plant species belonging to 46 families and 82 genera. These plants were used to treat various diseases in humans and animals. All the plants collected and the methods of preparation of ethnomedicinal formulations were tabulated in Table 1.

Table 1 Ethnomedicinal plants used by Paliyar tribals in Kadamalaikundu, Theni District

The remedies for curing various ailments were documented and classified into 13 types of preparation like decoction, juice, raw, paste, powder, latex, oil, mixture with other plants, cooked form, gel, infusion, and inhaled vapor, which were used externally as well as internally. The 93 plant species reported included 6 climbers, 1 creeping weed, 2 vines, 47 herbs, 10 shrubs, 3 small trees, and 24 tree species (Fig. 4).

Fig. 4

Distribution of medicinal plants

Among the collected data, 45 families of plant species have been recorded. Solanacaceae was recorded as a predominant family with 7 species, followed by 6 species in Acanthaceae, 4 species each in the family of Amaranthaceae, Euphorbiaceae, Fabaceae and Lamiaceae, 3 species each in the family of Asteraceae, Combretaceae, Cucurbitaceae, Myrtaceae, Malvaceae and Rutaceae, and 2 species each in the family of Aristolochiae, Asclepiadaceae, Caesalpinaceae, Fabaceae, Convolvulaceae, Leguminosae, Mimosaceae, Pedaliaceae, Rhamnaceae, Verbenaceae and Poaceae. In contrast, a single species was recorded in other families like Acoraceae, Agavaceae, Amaryllidaceae, Apocynaceae, Araceae, Arecaceae, Asparagaceae, Asphodelaceae, Begoniaceae, Cleomaceae, Dioscoreaceae, Flacortiaceae, Hypoxidaceae, Meliaceae, Moraceae, Papavaraceae, Rosaceae, Sapindaceae, Vitaceae and Zygophyllaceae (Fig. 5).

Fig. 5

Families of medicinal plants

Among the plant parts used by the Paliyar tribals, leaves constituted the major part of ethnomedicine. In some plant species, more than one or two plant parts were used for medicinal purposes. Medicinal plants were displayed and photographed thoroughly (Fig. 6), and the local traditional practitioners interviewed were familiar with the plant species (Fig. 7).

Fig. 6

Few medicinal plants (a) Santalum album (b) Justicia adhatoda (c) Ocimum sp. (d) Amaranthus spinosa (e) Tridax procumbens (f) Clitoria ternatea (g) Ruta graveolens (h) Euphorbia tirucalli (i) Veteveria zizaniodes (j) Senna auriculate (k) Hibiscus schizopetalus (l) Arisaema leschenaultii (m) Ipomea indica (n) Psidium gujava (o) Calotropis gigantea (p) Persicaria chinensis (q) Murraya koenigii (r) Cissus quadrangularis (s) Passiflora sp. (t) Terminalia catappa (u) Azadirachta indica (v) Syzigium sp. (w) Euphorbia hirta (x) Cerapegia sp. (y) Solanum pseudocapsicum

Fig. 7

Traditional medical practitioners of Paliyar Tribe, Theni District, Tamil Nadu

For the use value of different medicinal plants (Table 1), Coccinia grandis had the highest use value (2.5), followed by Withania somnifera (2), whereas Cardiospermum halicacabum, Gossypium hirsutum and Ocimum tenuiflorum recorded use value (1). With the change in location/area and knowledge of the native people about the use of medicinal plants, the values of UV tend to change. Thus, UV is volatile in nature, and differences in values ought to appear between the cited species and their quantitative value.

The lowest UV was calculated (0.04) for Asparagus racemosus and Tridax procumbens. In terms of the calculated UV, if a plant receives high values, it indicates its extensive application, high obtainability, extraordinary economic importance, and high perceived efficacy for medicinal purposes. However, it determines whether the plant is referred for a single disease or multiple diseases. High harvesting pressure is associated with high UV-rated medicinal plants; hence, these medicinal plants demand more attention towards their conservation for continued pharmaceutical use and possible future pharmacological studies. This result revealed differences in most cited species and their quantitative value.

Ailments have been categorized into 41 categories. In the present study (Table 2), the informant’s consensus factor was high (1.00) for 15 ailments (asthma, weak body strength, bone fracture, dysentery, easy pregnancy, eye infection, fungal disease, irregular menstruation, kidney problem, deworming, reduction of fats, throat infection, toothache, uterus problem, and vitamin source). For the ICF, a high value indicates that most informants have a consensus for a specific plant that may be used for a particular ailment. However, the lowest informant’s consensus (0.50) was reported for abortion and poisonous bites. The result indicates a lower level of unanimity or agreement among informants over using a reported plant species about a particular disease category. A low ICF value symbolizes the lowered use of some traditional remedies.

Table 2 Consensus Index (ICF) for medicinal plants

4 Discussion

The traditional medicinal/ethnomedicinal practices of different tribal groups are highly influenced by their living conditions, education level, socio-cultural conditioning, social-economic status, and socioreligious beliefs and practices. Traditional medicines are a vital but often underestimated part of healthcare. The study indicated that the study area is rich in medicinal plants. In a previous study, it was found that Paliyar tribal people strongly believe in folk medicine due to its low cost and being a part of their socio-cultural life (Jeyaprakash et al. 2011). The ethnomedicinal practices play a vital role in the daily lives of the Paliyar tribe people. They often use more than a single plant synergistically to cure diseases immediately. A fresh part of the plant is usually preferred for medicine preparation, but due to the unavailability of fresh plant parts, dried parts are also used as simple drugs. For example, to protect themselves from leech bites, the tribals crush the fruits of Solanum erianthum and apply them topically on their legs. Like other tribals, they, too, can distinguish characters of various plants and their beneficial properties (Ariharan and Revathi 2021). As the study results are in accordance with previous studies, people from different age groups have participated in the ethnomedicinal study of the plants. The percentage varied, but none of the age groups showed zero value. Similarly, identifying 93 species of plants by a community is again proof that the Paliyar tribe is thorough with their ethnic knowledge about the local plants in the forest area. Correspondingly, higher UV and ICF values for the listed plants further strengthen the belief that the locally available plants have much use in their daily lives from the point of ethnomedicine.

However, gradually, there has been an erosion in ethnomedicinal knowledge of the community because of the destruction of forests and their products, fragmentation, lifestyle change, and unemployment issues among the youth of the Paliyar tribe community. Therefore, there is an urgent need to document this oral knowledge as soon as possible for a broader application in the future. In the present study, more than 7 plants were used for the common diseases of skin problems, and several researchers also reported that the different plant parts used to cure wound healing and various skin diseases (Saikia et al. 2006; Harsha et al. 2003; Coon and Ernst 2004). Nowadays, hair problems are among the most common due to the use of adulterants in hair oil and stress. Study reveals that the Paliyar people, particularly women, are giving more importance to hair growth and using many plants to remedy hair fall. 11 plants were used for skin diseases such as allergies, psoriasis, or any patches. Ayyanar and Ignacimuthu (2005) also reported about the Kani group in the Thirunelvelli districts and 28 plants; among them, 13 plants were used for skin disease and hair growth.

Another common problem was headaches; most Lamiaceae family plants were used to treat colds, coughs, and headaches. In the study, the Paliyar tribal people used the decoction of plants of Poaceae (Cymbopogon citratus), Lamiaceae (Leucus aspera), and Verbenaceae (Vitex negundo) family to treat headaches. Ignacimuthu et al. (2006) reported that Ceropegia candelabrum and Vitax negundo were home remedies for headaches. Arisaema leschenaultii, Ceropegia sp, and Dioscorea bulbifera tubers are used to cure piles disease. Even in the Malayali tribals, the powder of roots of Hemidusmus indicus was used to cure piles disease (Suresh et al. 2011). In this study, interestingly, two plants were recorded as ethno-veterinary medicinal plants (Persicaria chinensis and Ipomoea indica), and both were used to increase the lactogen content of cows and goats. The remedies are expected to treat humans and animals. Apart from the medicinal properties of the plants, no other information was disclosed by the people surveyed. Some ethnobotanical studies have also been reported to explore the knowledge from various tribal communities of Tamil Nadu in treating humans as well as domestic animals (Rajan et al. 1997; Kiruba et al. 2006; Devendrakumar and Anbazhagan 2012).

In this study, ICF is used to evaluate the reliability of the information obtained about plant use. A high ICF value for a particular ailment signifies the use of some particular plants by many inhabitants to cure it, whereas a low value means the use of varied plants by many inhabitants to cure a particular health issue. The high degree of ICF also symbolizes that Indigenous people have a high degree of conformity to using specific plants for specific diseases due to their rich knowledge about the traditional use of that plant, which has been passed on to them through their ancestors. It also reflects that the current generation has kept knowledge intact by using it firmly to find solutions for day-to-day health problems but preserving existing traditional knowledge is a must before much has been lost. The more versatile the plant is with its therapeutic properties, the more cultural significance it holds.

Further, such traditional significance is related to the different uses of the plants known by different communities over the generations. The importance of ethnomedicinal plants is based on their adaptability and variety of applications, which could allow decision-making processes to include traditional medicines in the class of contemporary medicines. Most of the documented species in the present study may stimulate the appropriate legislative bodies to frame better conservation and management strategies for the plants used for medicinal purposes.

The oral transmission of traditional knowledge is a part of Local Environmental Knowledge (LEK) that has proved critical in allowing societies to survive in various environments and to adapt to social-ecological changes. The primary threat to such oral transmissions is the death of the older generations or the senior citizens of a community who hold valuable knowledge that can become extinct with their death. Other challenges include age-related differences in the perceptions of ecological changes and decreasing intergenerational knowledge transfer (Fernandez-Llamazares et al. 2015). It is the mutual responsibility of both the generations to transfer and imbibe the valuable ecological knowledge. Fortunately, in our study, the maximum number of informants (35.9%) belonged to the age group of 18–35 years, indicating a positive sign that the younger generations are aware of ethnobotanical knowledge. Rapid deforestation due to growing urbanization is another issue that comes under global ecological challenge, which is responsible for the extinction of many medicinally important flora that are identified by local names by the indigenous people. From the investigation, it can be concluded that the Paliyar community is essential not only for its tribal origin, which is slowly on the verge of extinction, but also for the quick revival of the traditional medicinal knowledge this community possesses. The importance of medicinal plants and the knowledge of herbal therapies carried out by the Paliyar tribe community were validated by UV and ICF. It proved to be rich in terms of knowledge and biodiversity. Tribal communities now differ from those of the past due to modernization and globalization.

Further, it is to be noted that ethnic medicine is making its way into modernization. Countries like Myanmar have been constructing a medicinal system based mainly on the Burman tradition across the country that could compete with biomedicine, if not overtake it (Codrey 2021). A U.K.-based survey indicated that the wide use of herbal medicine, or the general use of herbs for health, has recently gained momentum in the country (Lazarou and Heinrich 2019). Community trust in traditional medicines in Malaysia is still relatively high as the statistics reveal that the use of medicinal plants is based on use values ​​reaching 0.64 and animal-sourced traditional medicines of 92.59 (Henri and Erpandi 2021). After the COVID-19 pandemic, many countries look forward to traditional medicines and improved vaccines. In Africa, herbal medicines are used based on traditional African medicines (ATMs) to manage post-COVID health stress (Attah et al. 2021). Hence, it can be established from the above facts that ethnic medicine is prominent and influential globally. Traditional knowledge of indigenous medicinal plants is essential for further scientific investigation of plant species and their genetic diversification. The various traits can be used to formulate essential biomedicines to prevent and cure acute and chronic diseases. Ethnomedicine can become a viable option for Public Health by upscaling the knowledge of traditional herbalists and by providing approval about their traditional practices as well as widening the curriculum and job opportunities in the contemporary healthcare system to include ethnomedicine and verbatim traditional health concepts and practices (Mutatkar 2023).

Regarding the preservation of the Paliyar tribe of the Theni District, there should be sustainable development of their livelihood. To generate employment and a continuous source of income for rural communities, people need to commercialize a subsistence trade for non-timber forest products (NTFPs). The Theni District has not only assorted geography but also varied climatic conditions; hence, forest-grown MAP (Medicinal and Aromatic Plants) are highly available as important resources, making economically and botanically imperative for Southern India’s MAP industry. Some of the crucial measures taken for the tribe could be appropriate access to education facilities, hands-on training for the youth in collecting plants, workshops, seminars on preserving local flora, and sensitization towards the importance of traditional ecological knowledge. These should be arranged by the local legislative bodies to empower the younger generation towards the conservancy of traditional knowledge. There could be other possible recommendations, too, which are beyond the scope of the paper.

5 Conclusion

It has been summarized that being the ethnic community of the Theni District of Tamil Nadu, the Paliyar tribe has been responsibly preserving the ethnobotanical knowledge of the use of native medicinal plant species from one generation to another. This traditional knowledge has been passed orally through the pedigree, probably without written records. Hence, the study highlighted their efforts to conserve the ethnomedicinal knowledge of the native plants. The study can be considered a model for several more investigations about different tribal communities in India having ethnobotanical or ethnoveterinary knowledge of the local flora. Their knowledge can be tapped and pooled to construct an ethnomedicine knowledge bank in the country. A comparative study could be designed to collect the indigenous knowledge possessed by different tribal groups in India. The study also suggested that scientific surveys and protection of such ethnic groups are mandatory to preserve the ethnomedicinal knowledge of the plants. The listed plants and their medicinal usage found during the investigation, combined with expertise in modern medical sciences, could help improve healthcare systems in India as well as globally.