Chhattisgarh-based Ayurveda Health House wants to take medicines to tribal areas

The tribal population in India has been using its own herbal system of medicine for a long time now. While their knowledge of medicinal plants is widely recognised and celebrated, a few section of the tribal people still lack basic health resources.

With an aim to make Ayurvedic medicine more accessible to the people in the tribal areas of Chhattisgarh and to promote Ayurveda in the form of natural products, Ramavtar Agarwal (65) and his wife Sudha Agarwal (64) launched Ayurveda Health House in Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh in 1995.

They found the tribal areas around Bilaspur in Chhattisgarh lacked awareness about sanitation, healthcare and nutrition because of poverty and low literacy rate. However, the herbal medicines were still popular as the tribal communities believed in the use of medicinal plants and herbs for curing various elements. Banking on this belief, the husband-wife duo set up the company to provide a temporary relief to the tribal people for minor ailments.

Ayurveda Health House is currently led by their son Anirudha Agrawal. The products are marketed under the brand ‘Pawaan Herbals’ and the company has an annual turnover of more than Rs 50 lakh.

The brand caters to the local population throughout the state and has main markets in Delhi-NCR and few pockets of Madhya Pradesh, Odisha and Uttar Pradesh.

Family business

Ayurveda Health House was the dream project of Ramavtar Agarwal, who did his BE (Hons.) Mechanical from BITS Pilani and started the company in 1995. His wife Sudha Agrawal, a homemaker, took a courageous step and joined her husband.

Their son Anirudha Agarwal is an MBA graduate and his wife Jyoti Agrawal is currently looking after the company’s marketing and production.

Ayurveda Health House initially started by manufacturing a few herbal products, mainly comprising of herbal churnas (mixture of herbs).

The company later diversified its product portfolio to syrups, tablets and capsule section. It also follows FSSAI rules to manufacture its products and is now venturing into cosmetic products as well. Currently, there are around 25 people who are directly employed by the company. Talking about the business journey Anirudha says,

“The company was started 25 years ago by my father who had very less funds. But now, we have invested around Rs 50 lakh. We currently manufacture between 150-200 different types of OTC, ethical and classic products including 40 patent products and all these products are prepared in a completely hygienic environment under strict monitoring.”

He says, “We want our brand to be recognised globally as the essence of true Ayurveda. As the brand name suggests ‘Paawan’, meaning pure, we continue to advance the use of quality Ayurvedic products around the world and promote positive health through positive methods by making Ayurveda the ultimate solution for all health problems.”

Anirudha says, “Our products are unique from others as we make highly specialised products, which are cost-effective, weigh high on quality and ensure complete customer satisfaction.”

“Customers have given us a very positive feedback all these years and have praised our authentic methods used in the production of the medicines, where herbs are plucked directly from our farm and put into the composition.”

Challenging journey

According to Anirudha, sustaining the business growth was quite challenging and having a diverse product demand from the customers and stiff competition from other companies made the running even more difficult.

He says, “The government should support the industries instead of being a hindrance with abrupt policy changes. It should provide some relaxations to the local units in order to help them grow. The licensing procedure in Chhattisgarh is very complex and the policies are very strict when compared to other states such as Gujarat and Maharashtra, where diversification in products can be easily done, unlike here.”

“Our dream is to establish Ayurvedic Health House as the top Ayurvedic brand in India. We want to establish new pockets of distribution in different states and expand our marketing and distribution areas,” he adds. 

He says, young entrepreneurs who want to enter the business should explore the market and do a thorough research before starting the production.

(This story is published in partnership with the MSMEs Ministry to showcase success stories of SMEs)

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