'Indians Having This Since Centuries': Australian Firm’s Himalayan Shilajit Has Everyone Talking

Ayurveda is an Indian medicinal system that dates back thousands of years, and shilajit is just one of several blends of herbs and minerals mentioned in it. In traditional herbal medicine, shilajit has been used to treat a wide range of ailments. The Sushrut Samhita mentions that around May and June, the intense heat of the sun causes the plant’s sap, or latex juice, to erupt as a sticky secretion from the rocks of mountains. It seems the West is now turning its focus to what this side of the globe learnt centuries ago.

An Australian company’s sale of Himalayan shilajit for Rs 3,700 per 15 grams piqued Indian Instagram users’ interest. Himalayan Power Shilajit, an Australian firm, has gained popularity for bottling and selling the resin in Australia. On its website, the business states that it sources premium resin from partners in Gilgit Baltistan, Pakistan, which is then filtered and cleansed to get rid of dust and heavy metals.

Himalayan Power Shilajit’s Instagram reel states that it has 87 of the 102 nutrients that are necessary for human health. The business adds that eating it for a week can result in a significant increase in metabolism, a reduction in stress and anxiety, and a lowering of cortisol levels.

In the comments section, a user said, “Omg the west found Shilajit.”

Another user said, “Indians have been having this since centuries.”

“Western people act like they discovered something new which Indians have known for so long,” read a comment.

Shilajit is a powder or exudate that is blackish-brown in colour and is obtained from high mountain rocks. It is mostly found in the Himalayan Mountains between India and Nepal, but it has also been found in Afghanistan, Tibet, Russia and recently, the north of Chile.

There are now three main theories — geological, biological, and bio-mineralogical — that attempt to explain the genesis of shilajit. Thus, shilajit’s biological theory describes it as the result of a biological conversion that takes place in dead plant remnants, animal excrements, or both, under certain physicochemical circumstances.

The geological theory, in contrast, views shilajit as a byproduct of geological processes.

Last but not least, the bio-mineralogical conjecture is predicated on the idea that shilajit is a tertiary product, meaning that the mineral components originate from a variety of migrations, such as mechanical contamination of a liquid shilajit precursor.