Plants have been playing a significant role in maintaining human health and improving the quality of human life for thousands of years and are used as valuable components of medicines, seasonings, beverages, cosmetics and dyes. Many herbal remedies have been employed in various medical systems for the treatment and management of different diseases. Centella asiatica is a perennial herbaceous creeper, faintly aromatic and a valuable medicinal herb which has been used in myriad systems of traditional medication for the treatment of diseases and ailments of human beings. The present review attempts to encompass the up-to-date comprehensive literature analysi.

Herbal medicine is based on the promise that plants contain natural substances which promote health and alleviate illness. There are many herbs which are predominantly used to treat cardiovascular problems, liver disorders, central nervous system, digestive and metabolic disorders. Given their potential to produce significant therapeutic effect, they can be useful as drug or supplement in the treatment/management of various diseases. WHO estimated that 80% of the population of developing countries rely on traditional medicines, mostly plant drugs for their primary healthcare needs. The developed nations are also looking for ecofriendly treatment of various diseases through plant-based source.

In recent times, focus on plant research has increased all over the world, and a large body of evidence has been collected to show the immense potential of medicinal plants used in various traditional systems. Today, we are witnessing a great deal of public interest in the use of herbal remedies. Technology Information Forecasting and Assessment Council (TIFAC) has recommended 45 medicinal plant species, of which 7 plants are recommended specifically for immediate attention during this decade; they are as follows: Aloe vera (Ghrita Kumari), Bacopa monnieri L. (Brahmi), Centella asiatica (Mandukparni, Gotukola), Rauwolfia serpentina (Sarpagandha), Catharanthus roseus (Periwinkle), Taxus bacatal, T. wallichiana (Himalayan Yew) and Artemisia annua.

C. asiatica or Hydrocotyle asiatica, commonly known as Indian Pennywort, is a faintly aromatic and a valuable medicinal herb of both Old World and the New World and belongs to the family Apiaceae. This perennial herbaceous creeper flourishes abundantly in marshy and moist places, sandy or clayey soils, often in large clumps forming a dense green carpet or as a weed in crop fields and other waste places up to an altitude of 1,800 m. This plant is indigenous to India, Sri Lanka, China, Nepal, Indonesia, the Western South Sea Islands, Madagascar, South Africa, South-East US, Mexico, Venezuela, Columbia and Eastern South America (Subban et al., 2008). The preparations of C. asiatica are used in traditional and alternative medicine due to the wide spectrum of pharmacological activities associated with the biologically active chemicals present in this plant.

Phytoconstituents: Vallerin, camphor, cineole, n-dodecane, terpene acetate, tran-B farnesene, germacrene-D, B-caryophyllene, p-cymol, a-pinene, methanol, allyl mustard oil; flavonoids, kaempferol (Rastogi and Mehrotra, 1963), resin, alkaloid hydrocotylin (Chopra et al., 1956); asiatic, betulic, brahmic, centellinic, isobrahmic, and madecassic acid, madegascaric acid (Schaneberg et al., 2003); quercetin, tannins; asiaticoside (Aziz et al., 2007), oxyasiaticoside, brahmoside, braminoside, centelloside, madecassoside, thunkuniside, bitters, sterols, pectin, β-sitosterol, terminolic acid, asiaticoside-B, sceffoleoside A and saponins (centellasaponins B, C and D) with four ursane- and oleanane-type triterpene oligoglycosides; aspartic acid, lysine, serine, threonine, glycine, glutamic acid, histidine and α-alanine, phenylalanine (Malhotra et al., 1961) were reported from different plant parts; vit. B, vit. C (Tiwari et al., 2000), vit. G; carotenoids, polyacetylenes, sugars, oligosaccharide centellose, inorganic acids (Kapoor, 2005). The essential oil from C. asiatica grown in South Africa contains 11 monoterpenoid hydrocarbons (20.2%), 9 oxygenated monoterpenoids (5.46%), 14 sesquiterpenoid hydrocarbons (68.8%), 5 oxygenated sesquiterpenoid (3.9%) and 1 sulphide sesquiterpenoid (0.76%). The predominant constitutes were b-caryophyllene (19.08%), bicyclogermacrene (11.22%), germacrene B (6.29%) and myrcene (6.55%).

Biological Activities: Analgesic, anticonvulsant, antidiabetic, antidepressant (Chen et al., 2005), antifertility, antifilarial (Sarkar et al., 1998), antipsoriatic (Sampson et al., 2001), antiinflammatory (Guo et al., 2004), antioxidant (Jayashree et al., 2003; and Ganachari et al., 2004), antileprotic, antimicrobial (Marquart et al., 1998; and Minija and Thoppil, 2003), antitubercular, antiaging, antitumor (Babu et al., 1995; and Bunpo et al., 2004), antiulcer (Sairam et al., 2001), anaxiolytic (Lucia et al., 1997), antifertility (Asolkar et al., 1992), antipyretic, diuretic, antibacterial (Mamtha et al., 2004), antifungal, antiprotozoal (Dhar et al., 1968), sedative, cardioprotective (Pragada et al., 2004), neuroprotective (Lee et al., 2000), hepatoprotective (Hossain et al., 2005), radioprotective (Chen et al., 1999; and Sharma and Sharma, 2005), antispasmodic (Asolkar et al., 1992), adaptogen, tonic, digestive, vulnerary, alterative, antiviral (Yoosook et al., 2000), antibiotic, nervine, rejuvenate, blood purifier, adrenal strengthener, immunomodulatory (Jayathirtha and Misra, 2004), memory enhancing (Gupta et al., 2003; and Mohandas et al., 2005), venous tone and transquilizing effects (Aithal and Sirsi, 1970; and Sharma and Sharma, 2002), immunostimulant (Patil et al., 1998) and wound healing activities (Asolkar et al., 1992; Kumar et al., 1998; and Shukla et al., 1999), etc.

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