The Healer of the Ancient Path

In the quiet village of Khandadeuli near Raisingpur in Asika, Odisha, a boy named Ghanashyam Mishra was born on 10 October 1922. The son of Bauribandhu Mishra and Chitrakala, he grew up surrounded by the living traditions of Ayurveda—the ancient science of life that had sustained the people of the land for centuries.

He studied at Utkal University and dedicated himself to the rigorous discipline of Ayurvedic medicine. Over the decades that followed, Dr. Ghanashyam Mishra became one of Odisha’s most respected Ayurvedic physicians and researchers. He served as Principal of the Gopabandhu Ayurveda Mahavidyalaya in Puri, guiding generations of students who would carry the knowledge forward.

In Kavisuryanagar he founded the National Ayurved Pharmacy, a centre devoted to the careful preparation of medicines and to research that kept the classical formulations alive and effective. He established a Sanskrit Mahavidyalaya in the same town so that the language of the ancient texts would continue to be studied and spoken. In his birthplace he raised a primary school in his father’s name—Bauribandhu Primary School—so that the children of the village might have the education he himself had valued so deeply. At Berhampur University he instituted gold medals in the names of his parents, rewarding the highest academic excellence.

He wrote important works on Ayurveda, among them Dravyaguna Kalpataru and Netrottama, texts that deepened understanding of medicinal substances and eye care. He served on the Odisha State Council, the Faculty of Ayurvedic Medicine, and the Central Council of Indian Medicine, helping to shape the future of the system he loved. He was also a member of the Senate and Syndicate of Sri Jagannath Sanskrit University.

For his lifelong service to Ayurveda the Government of India awarded him the Padma Shri in 2006. The title “Ayurveda Bachaspati” had already been conferred upon him in recognition of his scholarly and clinical contributions.

Dr. Ghanashyam Mishra passed away in Bhubaneswar on 1 June 2014 at the age of ninety-one. Yet the institutions he founded, the books he wrote, the students he trained, and the patients he treated continue to speak of a life spent in quiet service. In the pharmacies, colleges, and clinics of Odisha, the ancient path he walked remains open—steady, healing, and full of light.