The millet perspectives

The millet story. Everything in perspective and proportion.

As we promote millets,in these times of needing to move to hardier crops as rains get uncertian, there is a word of caution.

Millets, as per ayurveda, is drying and depleting. So while it is good for well nourished people, and particularly for diabetics, it would not be good for poor and undernourished people.

Millets increases vata, and my village people already with joint pains and with too little of oil, ghree, milk or meat in their diet, will get more depleted. They will get drier and their joint pains will increase. This has also been observed.

An interesting fact that emerged in conversations was that in older times when millets was the mainstay, there was also a lot of aquatic meat in their diet as the tanks and wells had fish and crabs, and even the paddy fields had fish in those times. So there was a balancing effect.

There was also milk in all homes as all families had cows, even landless families, as agriculture was cattle based. Cowdung was sold, and bulls were essential to agriculture. Milk had not yet been monetized, and people had milk in their homes.

So millets with meat and milk maintained health. Today there is no meat, milk is all sold away. Their food has little oil or ghee. In this situation pushing millets into the diets of these poor people will aggravate joint pains and other vata related complaints.

This is as per ayurveda, and this is as per our experiance.

SreeHarsha Thanneru My mom also stopped cooking Sajjalu as soon as the heat wave started here in Hyd. Agree on the double edge sword scenario.

Aparna Krishnan Sajjalu is actually cooling. But the point is that in summer due to dryness vata increases, and millets will increase vata more.

Aparna Krishnan Millets, like every other food, need to be had with understanding as to whom it is appropriate for, and in which seasons and situations. That is the only point I proferred.

Komakkambedu Himakiran Anugula This seems wrong; Millets were always the food of the masses, the ones who spend maximum time under the sun, toiling away. People in Western TN eat Kambu soru in the summer. So they knew what Millet to use when.

Komakkambedu Himakiran Anugula No one should eat just Millets or just rice; it was always a habit to eat it with meat or fish or some vegetable.

Even now, if you step outside Bengaluru, the preferred food served in hotels is Ragi Mudda (Balls) with meat gravy.

Aparna Krishnan That is exactly what I am saying. When those connections are lost, when it is simply proferred as a 'healthy food' or 'richer in minerals than rice of wheat' food, that unidimensional understanding can cause damage. Yes, meat and millets is a good balance as one reduces vata, and the other increases it.

Aparna Krishnan Village people understand these - but modern schooling is rapidly teaching them that these are superstitious understandings !

Hema Jain Here in our village, the practice is to eat fermented millets (kambu koozhu or raghi koozhu). Maybe the fermentation process makes it easier on the digestive system.

Aparna Krishnan Millets are laghu, meaning easily digestable. The issue is that they increase vayu. and for the poor who today have neither milk nor meat not enough oil in their diet, the balance is not there. Millets are ok - if we can restore a reasonable food plan to them, as actually seemed to exist in our area 30 years ago.