Hyderabad, June 7: Deborah Wheeler’s favourite dishes have never included live fish. But the young lawyer has come all the way from Sydney to swallow one.

Something fishy there? No, plain desperation.

If swallowing a live sardine, a yellow paste stuffed in its mouth, cures her of chronic bronchitis, why not? Even the crush of the crowd is bearable if the remedy works.

Deborah is one of the thousands of “believers” who have travelled miles, by road, across oceans, to the Andhra capital for a dose of fish prasadam — or chapa mandu — that promises a cure for asthma and bronchitis.

She also made her two children taste the prasadam.

“I am a chronic bronchitis patient. After years of treatment, I have come to try this medicine,” says the 35-year-old.

For Deborah, it may be medicine, but atheists and rationalists resent the term.

After sustained campaigns by these groups, the high court in Andhra Pradesh ordered the Bathini family, the possessors of the secret behind the promised “free” cure, to label the dose fish prasadam, and not fish medicine.

Vijaya Kumar, of the Jana Vinjana Vedika, a CPM affiliate, said their “campaign” has yielded results. “The number of visitors are less this year,” he said.

But name change or campaigns hasn’t stopped devotees from flocking to the exhibition grounds in the heart of the city where the state government has arranged shelters for the visitors, some of whom have come from America, Britain, Kuwait, Iraq, Qatar, Japan, Singapore and Malaysia.

Some, like Meera Nair, are on their second visit. “We are not convinced of its (the prasadam’s medicinal values,” says the 38-year-old from Thiruvananthapuram. “But we have found that it helps asthma patients.”

District collector Naveen Mittal said the administration had taken “all precautions” to ensure there were no stampedes.

The rush is because the fish cure is served only for 24 hours in a year after the Mrigashir Karthi star is sighted on June 7 or 8.

Bathini Harinath Goud, whose ancestors learnt the secret recipe 163 years ago from sages in the Himalayas on the condition that they would serve society “free” of charge, says the “efficacy” of the fish cure is evident from the number of visitors.

“Nearly six lakh people came to Hyderabad in 2007,” says the 62-year-old.