Standardisation of Ayurvedic fermented product Kanji

Sharangdhara explained Panchavidha Kashyaya Kalpana 1 , which are guru subsequently from Swarasa to Phanta. But Panchavidha Kashaya kalpana lack the ability of fast action and potency for longer duration. To compensate the above stated lacuna ‘Sandhana Kalpana’ were developed. Sandhan Kalpana 1 depends on the concept of biochemical fermentation, and one of the best dosage forms of Ayurveda in practice since thousands of years. In order to prepare these medicaments, certain sets of conditions are pre-arranged which leads to fermentation. Thus, products with selfgenerated ethyl alcohol, which potentiate these preparations. ’Kanji’ 1 is one of the Sandhan Kalpana. After consulting with many eminent personalities in Ayurveda a final procedure of preparation of Kanji is adopted. But Siddhi lakshanas (Standard tests) of Kanji are not explained properly in ancient texts. So it has been found that very less work on standardisation of Kanji has been done over past few years. Thus, this paper deals with standardisation of Kanji. KeywordsKanji, Sandhan kalpana, Fermentation, Standardisation

Sharangdhara explained Panchavidha Kashyaya Kalpana 1 , which are guru subsequently from Swarasa to Phanta. But Panchavidha Kashaya kalpana lack the ability of fast action and potency for longer duration. To compensate the above stated lacuna 'Sandhana Kalpana' were developed. Sandhan Kalpana 1 depends on the concept of biochemical fermentation, and one of the best dosage forms of Ayurveda in practice since thousands of years. In order to prepare these medicaments, certain sets of conditions are pre-arranged which leads to fermentation. Thus, products with selfgenerated ethyl alcohol, which potentiate these preparations. 'Kanji' 1 is one of the Sandhan Kalpana. After consulting with many eminent personalities in Ayurveda a final procedure of preparation of Kanji is adopted. But Siddhi lakshanas (Standard tests) of Kanji are not explained properly in ancient texts. So it has been found that very less work on standardisation of Kanji has been done over past few years.
Thus, this paper deals with standardisation of Kanji.

Introduction:
To compensate the lacunas of Panchavidh Kashaya Kalpana 'Sandhan Kalpana' were developed by ancient texts which has ability of fast action and potency of working for longer duration. Ayurvedic herbal dosage forms are formulated through the transference of active ingredients by different manufacturing procedures. Among these Sandhan Kalpana is a unique dosage form in which acidic and alcoholic fermented formulations are prepared. In order to manufacture these medicines, drugs and liquids are kept for fermentation for certain period of time and which causes formation of ethyl alcohol by the use of in source material by pharmaceutical procedure.
Also, not only ethyl alcohol but many other organic components are yield out of these formulations and extraction of active principle of the drug is achieved with these formulations. Different uses of Kanji are given in text such as use of Kanji in Parada and Maharasa. Also, ashtasanskara of parada cannot be imagined without Kanji. Thus, all above explanation of Kanji is having longer shelf life, quick absorption and action with excellent therapeutic efficacy is available, but there is very less knowledge available of standardisation of the preparation procedure and the final product.
Siddhi Lakshana of Kanji is require more clarity instead of depending only upon the statement that " Kanji should be kept until the product become sour" as the feeling of sourness differs from person to person and hence it can not be marker test to decide the Quality of Kanji.
So in this research paper work has been done over standardisation of Kanji, which comprises physicochemical parameters like pH, percent acidity, refractive index, acetic acid percentage and specific gravity and spectrometric analysis. These parameters are used to decide the quality of Kanji which is done by preparing 30 sub batches of kanji in 3 different main batches and above stated parameters are studied to draw conclusion related to good quality of Kanji.

Ayurveda review:
Sharangdhara explained when one drug remain in contact with madhuradravya like guda or dhatki pushpa then the Sandhana (fermentation) process occurs. The dravyas should remain in contact with madhur dravya for several days 1 . The term fermentation (Latin ferment means to boil) formerly stood for decomposition of food stuff usually accompanied by evolution of gas. Fermentation of sugar to alcohol and carbon dioxide by yeast is one of the oldest example. The term fermentation is now applied to changes brought by microorganisms. Evolution of gas is not a essential criterion.

Historical background:
The scientific nature of the process was explored by Louise Pasteur (1822). For a considerable time it was considered that fermentation processes are the result of direct action of living organism on the fermentable material. The controversy ended in 1896 when E butchner, showed that in the production of alcohol from sugar, the fermentation is brought about not by the direct action of living organism, but by an extract, called as Zymase obtained by squeezing not by hydraulic press yeast cells in a mortar with quartz sand kieselghur, all dust dry, zymase, which is present into cell of yeast, and can be extracted from yeast cell, owes its origin to living natter but, is itself devoid of life 6 .

Conditions favorable for Fermentation:
The most important factors, which influence the process of fermentation are: 1) Temperature: The enzymes are destroyed at very high temperature, most of them become inactive above 80 0 C . Process is very slow below 20 0 C. Optimum temperature is 30 0 -50 0 C 2) Aeration: Fermentation processes usually proceed well only in presence of air. 3) Concentration: High concentration of solution renders an enzyme inactive. Thus solutions used for fermentation should be sufficiently dilute to favor the process. 4) Presence of other substances: certain inorganic salt solutions act as food for ferment cell. 5) Absence of preservatives: Preservatives are those substances which destroy the ferment and retard the fermentation reaction. So the substances should not be present 6 .

Methods:
Preparation of 30 sub batches of Kanji in 3 different batches is done and below stated parameters are studied.
Physiochemical parameters like pH, percent acidity, refractive index, acetic acid percentage and specific gravity and UV Spectro photometric analysis, these parameters are used to decide the quality of Kanji.

Observations: Analytical studies:
The Kanji was placed for 10 days in NTP condition after which Physicochemical tests were applied as:  pH  Percent acidity  Specific gravity  Acetic acid percentage  Refractive index  UV spectro photometric analysis Results are obtained as shown in Table 1  and Table 2   Microbial quality of Kanji was tested and following results were observed:  It was detected by MPN method that there were no coliform bacterias present in Kanji which means, Kanji prepared by this method is very safe for internal consumption.  Growth of Coliform bacteria on macConkey's agar was absent, which confirms above finding.  Pour plate method using Nutrient agar shows that viable count is 20,000/ml nonpathogenic bacteria.  Subculture of colony of Nutrient agar shows two different colony white and yellow which means that the bacteria belonging to bacilli and cocci groups respectively were present. This may be considered that these micro organism responsible for fermentation of Kanji 7 .

Discussion
The review of previous work on Kanji showed that no remarkable work has been carried out in this subject. In the study an attempt has been done to decide the parameters, which will be helpful to standardise the Kanji.
Many eminent personalities were concern and a process of Kanji preparation which is popularly used and described for various purposes. This method was used to prepare 30 sub batches at different time period and was kept for 10 days. The room temperature was noted.
After 10 days the product was collected with sterilized pipette and subjected to different analytical and microbial studies.
It was observed that,  pH of Kanji ranges from 3.55 -3.88.  percent acidity ranges from 103ml to 121ml of 0.1 N NaOH  specific gravity of