India has foiled a British Company's bid to patent use of turmeric, pine bark and tea for treating hair loss and succeeded in protecting its traditional knowledge.The UK based company Pangaea Laboratories Limited had filed patent application at European Patent office in February, 2011 on a medicinal composition containing turmeric, pine bark and green tea for treating hair loss. An official release said in New Delhi that the Traditional Knowledge Digital Library (TKDL), a Unit of Council of Scientific and Industrial Research filed pre-grant opposition along with prior-art evidences. It proved that turmeric, pine bark and green tea, are being used as a treatment for hair loss, since long in Indian systems of medicine like Ayurveda and Unani.Recently, CSIR-TKDL has also foiled an attempt of Colgate-Palmolive Company to patent a mouthwash formula containing herb (Nutmeg- Jayaphal) extract used in Indian traditional systems of medicine to cure oral diseases.Till date CSIR-TKDL has achieved success in about 200 such cases without any cost.