The department is using Dr Chopra's savoir faire to tailor specific mind-and-body well-being programmes for our desi alternative set.

Speaking at the inauguration (attended fleetingly by chief guest Lt Governor Vijai Kapoor) at Hotel Le Meridien this morning, Dr Chopra said, ``We know everything about the human body, but nothing about the human soul.

Therefore, there is a need for holistic healing. To have true healing, one has to heal the body, mind, soul and the environment (extended body).'' And the 900-odd listeners, their collective mood already swinging to the strains of Vedic chants and invocations filtering through the speakers, fell deeper in love with the debonair doc.

``Simple scientific research has shown that spiritual awareness can alleviate suffering and it's a problem that medicine doesn't even address,'' pointed out Dr Chopra, who trained in physiology at AIIMS, but now sells integrative allopathic and ayurvedic healing techniques from his California pad. But as he skipped lightly between esoteric (and eminently marketable, going by the 23 sellouts he's authored so far) spiritual and scientific planes, a few members of the otherwise attentive audience couldn't resist some shut-eye.

Chopra, believing his first huge Indian audience to be more skeptical about spiritual healing than Americans, also tried to pull patriotic strings: ``India's gift to the world is Vedanta and it should export its wisdom to the world instead of sacrificing it for knowledge, information and now, data.'' And then, to a huge rush of applause, he added, ``India has the wisdom to save humanity.'' It's probably the mix of India-thumping, Vedic goulash and Americanisms that Chopra is that made Apollo chief Dr Prathap C Reddy call him the ``pride of India'' and better still ``a gift to humanity''. A round of applause was in order for Dr Chopra's father, Dr Krishan Chopra, too as he turns eighty today. The senior Chopra has recently authored a self-help book on life and happiness.

The morning took an interesting turn when one haughty scribe attacked Chopra for quoting Joseph Campbell on ``history is just journalism and we don't believe journalists''. To which a sheepish Chopra replied: ``I apologise, but I don't take myself seriously, so I don't take you seriously.'' And then shifted gear to take up the main theme in his latest book The Path To Love: joy, lightheartedness, laughter and love open your eyes to the world.

He did concede, though, that it's not all clouds and sunshine because ``unfortunately, the practical expression of most religions is in the fight-or-flight mode, which is why we have communal riots and war. We have not really evolved from a tribal mindset''. And dig this: As far as environmental awareness in this country goes, until recently we were living ``in Dickensonian times''.