The list is ever expanding as scientific tests on a range of traditional remedies are revealing that they have "real benefits."

So now under the guise of Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM), India’s traditional medical systems are being mined by researchers in the West. They are discovering “scientific evidence” that validates traditional claims.

And, increasingly, it turns out to be the first step towards exploitation by multinational pharmaceutical companies.

This week, researchers at King’s College, London, claimed that the curry-leaf (Murraya Koenigii), which is traditionally used in both Ayurveda and Indian cuisine could aid people with diabetes.

The researchers found extracts from the curry-leaf appeared to restrict the action of a digestive enzyme called pancreatic alpha-amylase which is involved in the breakdown of dietary starch to glucose.

Because diabetics do not produce enough insulin to cope with rapid rises in blood glucose levels, slowing the rate of starch breakdown, by blocking alpha-amylase, can lead to a more even trickle of glucose into the bloodstream from the intestine, they reported.

The researchers are now looking at which compound in the curry-leaf tree has this effect. They say that, once it has been identified, it should be possible to evaluate if it could be better than existing anti-diabetic drugs.

Professor Peter Houghton, head of the research team, said: “The curry-leaf is used to control diabetes in traditional Indian medicine; it is not an uncommon ingredient in some curries and it is quite possible that people who take this regularly as part of their diet could control diabetes.

He added: “Any food which has this curry-leaf in could be helpful to people with diabetes.”

Houghton told the British Pharmaceutical Conference in Manchester that there was “scientific justification” for the use of such treatments, but said that full clinical tests would have to be carried out.

Houghton acknowledged: “There are people who have been using these plants for centuries and that is an indication that they could have an effect.”

The research is being supported by a leading US drug company, Merck Research Laboratories.

King´s College researchers, working with experts from Ghana, China and Thailand also looked at plants used as wound healing agents and cancer treatment agents in those countries.

They interviewed traditional healers to identify plants that they use, then tested the plants to see whether there was scientific justification for this use.

Complementary medicine experts say the new research was one of the first serious, big business-supported initiatives to try and unlock the treasures of Indian and Chinese plants.

´No surprise´ Edzard Ernst, professor of complementary medicine at the Peninsula Medical School in Exeter, told BBC News Online: "This research is very interesting, very promising. We need much more research of this sort.

"More and more research of this kind is coming out. It is no surprise to those who work in this field."

But he added: "This type of study can only be the first step in a line of research and at the end of this line, it´s necessary to have good clinical proof that this works."

Meanwhile Indolink has learned that S. Yadav and colleagues at the All India Institute of Medical Science have found up to 21 percent reduction in blood sugar levels in diabetic rats treated with curry leaf extract.

Similarly, M.S.Baliga and colleagues at Kasturba Medical College, Manipal, have found that spices such as curry leaf might be “potent and novel therapeutic agents for the regulation of pathological conditions.”

In another interesting development, B.A. Khan and colleagues from the Department of Biochemistry, University of Kerala, Trivandrum, have recently shown that both curry leaf and mustard seeds result in a reduction in total serum cholesterol.

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