YOGA LAND: India Patents 1,300 yoga moves
India has made available a list of 1,300 newly registered yoga poses, compiled to prevent the ancient moves from being exploited by patent pirates, the Times of India said. Hindu gurus and some 200 scientists from the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) compiled the list from 16 ancient texts, including the Mahabharata, the Bhagavad Gita, and Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, to prevent yoga teachers in the United States and Europe from patenting established poses as their own. The database, which includes 200 video demonstrations, will be made available to international patent offices through India's Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL). "We are making available the 30-40 most popular yoga asanas in the open domain," TKDL head, V K Gupta said. "The rest will be available only to patent offices."
He said more poses from another 20 ancient texts would be added to the list. Yoga has become a lucrative business in Europe and the United States since it was popularized by celebrities in the 1960s and 70s. In India, however, the centuries-old tradition is still taught free of charge in public parks. Indians have been outraged by attempts by "yoga gurus" in the West to patent poses. In the United States alone, the patent authorities have issued more than 130 yoga-related patents, 150 copyrights and 2,300 trademarks related to the ancient practice.
A friend of mine forwarded me this article early this morning, and of course right at opening time, I headed straight to the Café Loka to get Svami Duhkhananda’s take on this development. I found him at his usual table, as usual accompanied by his partner-in-time, Ratanjali. “I know why you’re here so early,” he said, pointing a crooked finger at me, even before I sat down, “and I don’t want to waste a lot of time talking about this foolishness.” I wasn’t surprised at this reaction but pretended I was to get the ball rolling. “Foolishness?” I replied in mock horror,” you don’t agree with the Indian government trying to preserve its country’s cultural and spiritual heritage from dastardly Western asana pirates?”
“First of all,” the Svami began, “the truly traditional asanas are nothing more than natural human positions, they may as well go ahead and patent sitting. All these fancy-shmancy backbends and so-called ‘standing poses’ have nothing to do with the tradition. They’re thoroughly modern additions to the practice, most of them actually have their roots in Western exercise routines. My goodness, did any of these people actually LOOK at any of the old books? Half the time, because of the cryptic way in which they were written, you have no idea what the old teachers were talking about. A true asana is a seat, my boy, nothing more, nothing less, and it matters not a whit what kind of seat I assume, it’s what I DO in that seat that counts. I could sit in Lotus till the cows come home, and if all I’m doing is thinking about what to have for lunch, all I’ll get out of it is bad knees. This is what you get when you have ‘scientists’ involved in areas where they have no business meddling, like that Broad fellow from the Times, and hide-bound ‘gurus’ whose idea of the tradition is woefully skewed and so a complete fantasy. You know what I’m talking about, the one where yoga is 5000 years old (guffaw from Ratanjali, whose little pointy nose, as usual, was buried in a thick book, the title of which was written in some strange Cyrillic-looking script I couldn’t identify).
But the real question here is, does ‘India’ have the right to do this patenting in the first place? The assumption is that the Indians somehow ‘own’ the asanas because yoga was first developed in India. But your admired teacher, what’s his name again?” (“Iyengar? I suggestd). Yes, Iyengar, what did he say about this ... ‘Nowhere in the ancient texts is it said that yoga is to be practiced only by the Hindus. On the contrary ... Yoga is a universal culture.’ (I later checked the accuracy of this quote, and sure enough, it’s right there on page 13 of the ‘Tree of Yoga,’ how the Svami knew it off the top of his head is a mystery to me). In other words, yoga EMERGED in India, like a baby emerges from its mother. But when that child grows up and is ready to leave home, does that mother ‘own’ the child? Can the mother patent the grown child’s behavior? Or let me ask you this: that horribly boring game called baseball was ‘born’ in the equally boring US. Do Americans own baseball? Even though it seems the Yankees believe they do, the game has moved beyond the borders of its origin and now belongs to the world at large. Why is it any different with the asanas? Because they’re ‘spiritual,’ that supposed to make them somehow ‘special’? As my dear departed grandmother from three lives ago was fond of saying, ‘It’s all narishkayt.’
But finally consider this, and I quote from one of the oldest and most basic ‘traditional texts’: chaturashityasanani shivena kathani. Do you know what that means?” he said, fixing me with his blackest look. “Even you with your kindergarten Sanskrit should know.” I stared back, determined to prove my Sanskrit mettle. “Shiva taught 84 asanas,” I translated triumphantly. “Ah, yes,” the Svami smiled. “SHIVA taught them, which means naturally that SHIVA, not the Indian government, owns them. Did anyone think to consult with Shiva on how he feels about this issue?” We all laughed. “Here’s a dollar,” said the Svami to me, “go get me my usual breakfast, and ask Ratty if he wants something too.”
He said more poses from another 20 ancient texts would be added to the list. Yoga has become a lucrative business in Europe and the United States since it was popularized by celebrities in the 1960s and 70s. In India, however, the centuries-old tradition is still taught free of charge in public parks. Indians have been outraged by attempts by "yoga gurus" in the West to patent poses. In the United States alone, the patent authorities have issued more than 130 yoga-related patents, 150 copyrights and 2,300 trademarks related to the ancient practice.
A friend of mine forwarded me this article early this morning, and of course right at opening time, I headed straight to the Café Loka to get Svami Duhkhananda’s take on this development. I found him at his usual table, as usual accompanied by his partner-in-time, Ratanjali. “I know why you’re here so early,” he said, pointing a crooked finger at me, even before I sat down, “and I don’t want to waste a lot of time talking about this foolishness.” I wasn’t surprised at this reaction but pretended I was to get the ball rolling. “Foolishness?” I replied in mock horror,” you don’t agree with the Indian government trying to preserve its country’s cultural and spiritual heritage from dastardly Western asana pirates?”
“First of all,” the Svami began, “the truly traditional asanas are nothing more than natural human positions, they may as well go ahead and patent sitting. All these fancy-shmancy backbends and so-called ‘standing poses’ have nothing to do with the tradition. They’re thoroughly modern additions to the practice, most of them actually have their roots in Western exercise routines. My goodness, did any of these people actually LOOK at any of the old books? Half the time, because of the cryptic way in which they were written, you have no idea what the old teachers were talking about. A true asana is a seat, my boy, nothing more, nothing less, and it matters not a whit what kind of seat I assume, it’s what I DO in that seat that counts. I could sit in Lotus till the cows come home, and if all I’m doing is thinking about what to have for lunch, all I’ll get out of it is bad knees. This is what you get when you have ‘scientists’ involved in areas where they have no business meddling, like that Broad fellow from the Times, and hide-bound ‘gurus’ whose idea of the tradition is woefully skewed and so a complete fantasy. You know what I’m talking about, the one where yoga is 5000 years old (guffaw from Ratanjali, whose little pointy nose, as usual, was buried in a thick book, the title of which was written in some strange Cyrillic-looking script I couldn’t identify).
But the real question here is, does ‘India’ have the right to do this patenting in the first place? The assumption is that the Indians somehow ‘own’ the asanas because yoga was first developed in India. But your admired teacher, what’s his name again?” (“Iyengar? I suggestd). Yes, Iyengar, what did he say about this ... ‘Nowhere in the ancient texts is it said that yoga is to be practiced only by the Hindus. On the contrary ... Yoga is a universal culture.’ (I later checked the accuracy of this quote, and sure enough, it’s right there on page 13 of the ‘Tree of Yoga,’ how the Svami knew it off the top of his head is a mystery to me). In other words, yoga EMERGED in India, like a baby emerges from its mother. But when that child grows up and is ready to leave home, does that mother ‘own’ the child? Can the mother patent the grown child’s behavior? Or let me ask you this: that horribly boring game called baseball was ‘born’ in the equally boring US. Do Americans own baseball? Even though it seems the Yankees believe they do, the game has moved beyond the borders of its origin and now belongs to the world at large. Why is it any different with the asanas? Because they’re ‘spiritual,’ that supposed to make them somehow ‘special’? As my dear departed grandmother from three lives ago was fond of saying, ‘It’s all narishkayt.’
But finally consider this, and I quote from one of the oldest and most basic ‘traditional texts’: chaturashityasanani shivena kathani. Do you know what that means?” he said, fixing me with his blackest look. “Even you with your kindergarten Sanskrit should know.” I stared back, determined to prove my Sanskrit mettle. “Shiva taught 84 asanas,” I translated triumphantly. “Ah, yes,” the Svami smiled. “SHIVA taught them, which means naturally that SHIVA, not the Indian government, owns them. Did anyone think to consult with Shiva on how he feels about this issue?” We all laughed. “Here’s a dollar,” said the Svami to me, “go get me my usual breakfast, and ask Ratty if he wants something too.”
