Parliamentary Attention to Ayurveda and AYUSH in India: A Longitudinal Analysis of Questions in Parliament

Abstract

Political attention to Ayurveda in India’s Parliament has not previously been measured, despite a decade of institutional build-out around the AYUSH umbrella (Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy), including a dedicated Ministry created in 2014. This quantitative content analysis asks how much attention Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha members have given Ayurveda through parliamentary questions since 1995, and how that attention has changed in volume, vocabulary, partisanship and representation. All 3,953 Ayurveda- or AYUSH-related questions tabled between 1995 and 2026 were retrieved from the official Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha archives, screened to 3,533 relevant questions, and linked to member and party records current on each question’s own date; eight hypotheses were tested in Python (pandas, statsmodels, SciPy, scikit-learn, NetworkX) using exact-denominator rate ratios, an interrupted time series, chi-squared tests and regression models. Relevant questions rose five- to sixfold after the Ministry of AYUSH was created in 2014, concentrated in a single sharp step in 2015 and a sustained climb afterwards. Attention increasingly runs through the broader AYUSH umbrella rather than through Ayurveda by name and gives more weight to research and promotion. The ruling coalition’s share of askers tracked its own seat share in most Lok Sabha terms, departing substantially only in the two most recent terms once mid-term coalition changes are properly weighted. Representation was uneven: North-Eastern members specialise in the topic less than members from other regions, while Rajya Sabha women specialise in it more than men do. Political attention, clinical evidence and public use of Ayurveda are distinct quantities, and this study measures only the first.