TWAK SHARIR WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO SPARSHANENDRIYA -A REVIEW

Priyanka Kashyap (P.G Scholar) and Dr. Ashok Kumar Dwivedi*

ABSTRACT

Ayurved is a science of life which can be taken as a vast sea of knowledge, which till date has not been fully explored or known. As gyan of Ayurved was given in „Sutra roopa’ by Acharyas, many topics and concepts in Ayurvedic classics are hidden or under cover. One of such topic is Indriya and Indriya-adhishthan. There are total „Ekadash Indriyas’ mentioned in texts, out of which five are Karmendyiyas, five are Gyanendriyas and one Manas which is known to be Ubhayatmaka. Acharya Charak has told five types of Gyanendriyas- Sparshanendriya, Chakshurendriya, Ghranendriya, Rasanendriya and Shravanendriya. He also described their sites, functions, compositions and properties. Out of these five Gyanendriyas, the Sparshanendriya is vyapaka and foremost seen. Twak/ Twacha or Skin is the largest organ of the body which covers the whole body and is Adhishthan (seat) of Sparshanendriya. Structurally it has got many layers according to Ayurved and Modern Science but when we talk about Sparshanendriya, it is a matter of concern that which layer or special structure is there in twak which can be considered as Sparshanendriya. It can be opined that Ayurvedic concept related to Indriya needs to be explored through research to provide evidence based information related to Indriya Sharir. Present paper is an effort made to compile and analyse the knowledge present in Ayurvedic classics about ‘Twak Sharir with special reference to Sparshanendriya’ and correlate it with modern science for better understanding of the subject.

Keywords: Indriya, Gyanendriya, Twak, Sparshanendriya.