While Ayurveda accepts the efficacy of Western treatments, Western medicine prohibits the use of other systems. The Society began to focus on indigenous medicine after Donald Obeysekere, a member of the Ceylon Legislative Council became president. It argued that most general ailments were treated by Ayurveda, while people still accepted Western medicine for diseases like malaria. Interestingly, the desire to develop indigenous medicine as a separate practice from Western medicine, resulted in it being regulated and formalised into modern institutions very similar to those of Western medicine. Despite the formalisation and regulation of indigenous medicine along western lines, it remains a subordinate system in practice.
