India has been home to some of the world's most ancient systems of medicine, prominent among them being Ayurveda. The entire corpus of Ayurvedic knowledge has been chronicled since time immemorial in myriad works among which the Bruhat-trayi (literally 'The larger triad') and the Laghu-trayi (literally 'The smaller triad') occupy a predominant place. The former include Charaka-samhita, Sushruta-samhita and Ashtangahridaya and the latter, Sharngadhara-samhita, Madhava-nidana and Bhava-prakasha. Ashtangahridaya is comparable to Ashtangasamgraha, another Ayurvedic work of repute to which it owes its origin. The authorship of these two texts is a matter of controversy, but is mostly ascribed to Vagbhata. Both works deal extensively with all the eight limbs of Ayurveda. Ashtangahridaya professes and fulfils in an exemplary manner its objective of bringing together the individual essences of each of these limbs. However, because of its extremely terse style, it can scarcely be understood in its entirety without the help of commentaries in which aspect it is not wanting at all, almost 34 of which have been listed by Pt. Bhishagacharya Harishastri Paradkar Vaidya in his preface to the edition of the work incorporating the commentaries of Arunadatta and Hemadri, Sarvangasundara and Ayurvedarasayana respectively. In the case of Ashtangasmagraha, however, the Ayurvedic fraternity has not been fortunate enough to obtain all commentaries written on it. Shashilekha by Indu is, at present, the sole representative of this genre.

Keeping this enormous Ayurvedic knowledge-base in mind, the Centre for Theoretical Foundation (CTF) of the Institute of Ayurveda and Integrative Medicine, Bangalore, has brought out the edited, search facility-aided CD-versions of Ashtangahridaya and Astangasangraha along with their popular commentaries for the benefit of primarily, but not exclusively, the Ayurvedic fraternity. The medical fraternity at large and anyone interested in the scientific and cultural contributions of India to the world are bound to be greatly benefited by this CD.

A few words on the Centre itself will not be out of place at this juncture. Its primary objectives are to uncover the theoretical foundations of Ayurveda Shastra, examine the relationship between the theoretical foundations of biomedical sciences and Ayurveda, expose comprehensively the key concepts, categories and perspectives of Ayurveda, undertake textual and literary research that will result in the dissemination of source works of Ayurveda and prepare a comprehensive catalogue of India's medical manuscripts along with the decipherment, digitization, cataloguing, editing, translating and publishing of important medical manuscripts. The centre has to its credit a training programme on medical manuscriptology, publication of an English translation of Kshemakutuhalam, a 16th century work on Ayurvedic dietetics and conduction of week-long Re-orientation Training Programmes on the contribution of Indian philosophical systems to Ayurveda. An exhaustive encyclopedia of Ayurveda, publication of an English translation of Bhojanakutuhalam, yet another work on Ayurvedic dietetics and preparation of source books on the theoretical foundations of Ayurveda are some of the Centre's other activities in pipeline.

Last but not the least - IAIM expresses its sincere thanks to the Department of AYUSH, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Govt. of India, for providing financial support to this noble endeavor. It is hoped that the Dept. of AYUSH will continue to support similar such endeavors in future also and help in the protection and propagation of the Indian Medical Heritage. IAIM also expresses its sincere thanks to the Director General of the CCRAS for the overall support and the Director of the NIIMH, Hyderabad for the collaborative effort in the present project

I congratulate the CTF team of our organization who have put in honest and sincere efforts in bringing out this e-book. I hope that the contributions to this field will continue in future and enhance the utility of Indian Medical heritage for a long time to come.

Dr. G.G. Gangadharan
Joint Director,
Institute of Ayurveda and Integrative Medicine, FRLHT,
Bangalore