A public interest litigation petition has been filed in the Madras High Court Bench here claiming that many doctors in the country were by mistake using the Greek symbol Caduceus, consisting of a staff entwined by two serpents and surmounted by wings, instead of the Rod of Asclepius, consisting of a wingless staff entwined by a single serpent, as a symbol of medicine.
A Division Bench of Justices V. Ramasubramanian and N. Kirubakaran on Friday ordered notice on the PIL petition filed by M. Rajendran, a yoga teacher from Ellis Nagar here, seeking a direction to the Union Health Ministry to issue a notification asking Medical Council of India as well as Tamil Nadu Medical Council to make sure that all medical practitioners use the right symbol of medicine.
In his affidavit, the petitioner claimed that Caduceus actually symbolises Kundalini Yoga.
Pointing out that even doctors in the United States were wrongly using Caduceus as a symbol of medicine for long, he said that the mistake had been corrected now.
However, the mistake was yet to be corrected in India despite several representations made to the authorities concerned, he contended.
“Make sure that
all medical practitioners use the right symbol
of medicine”
