Medicinal plants have always been on the forefront whether regarding the treatment of a number of ailments or even the treatment of cancer. For centuries plants have been prized for their medicinal properties and used empirically as drugs, initially as traditional preparations and then as pure active principles, with this knowledge and practice being passed from generation to generation (Taylor et al., 2001).It has been suggested that the use of antimutagens and anticarcinogens in everyday life can be the most effective procedure for preventing human cancer and genetic diseases (Ferguson, 1994). The bioactive compounds of the medicinal plants act as a strategy to block or reverse carcinogenesis at early stages (Lippman et al., 1994). Moreover, they are considered to be an inexpensive, effective and easily applicable approach to control cancer (Wattemberg, 1985). Herbal medicines remain an important component of the health care system. Medicinal plants are the food supplements which have not only nutritional value but therapeutic value as well. The medicinal value of plants is due to the presence of secondary metabolites which includes alkaloids, saponins, terpenoids, flavonoids, tannins, sterols and phenolic compounds. Hence the importance of any plant lies in its biologically active principles. The antimutagens have been reported almost four decades ago. There have been many reports showing the rising trends of antimutagenic studies with the plant extracts. (Khader et al., 2010; Chen et al., 2011; El-Sayed and Hussin, 2013).

Medicinal plants and their extracts have been used by man from prehistoric times to cure various diseases and this has resulted in the discovery of some very important drugs. It is now been well established that the traditional herbal therapies contain a diverse array of chemopreventive agents as well (Aruoma, 2003).

Equisetum arvense, commonly known as the field horsetail or common horsetail (Sehetband or Brahmgund locally in Kashmir), is a very common, bushy perennial herb native to the northern hemisphere. It is a member of a very primitive family of plants. It is distributed throughout Canada and the USA except the southeast (Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee), throughout Europe and Asia south to Turkey, Iran, the Himalayas and across China (except the southeastern part), Korea and Japan (Gleason and Cronquist, 1991). Equisetum is the only living genus of the order Equisetales and the class Sphenopsida. The plant mostly occurs in marshes, swamps, ditches, river banks, open fields, open woods, and fill areas, such as road sides, and railroad embankments.

Horsetail is a strange looking sort of plant with creeping, string like rootstock and roots at the nodes that produce numerous hollow stems. Phytochemically, the plant is found to have a wide array of secondary metabolites which contribute to the medicinal properties of the plant.

The plant Equisetum arvense is a folk medicine and its extract is used locally to treat tuberculosis, edema, kidney and bladder stones, urinary tract infections, incontinence, acidity and dyspepsia, ulcers and wounds, bleeding etc. Reports are available regarding its anti-inflammatory, antinociceptive (Monte Do et al., 2004), antioxidant and antiproliferative (Dragana et al., 2010), antimicrobial (Fathi et al., 2004), hepatoprotective (Oh et al., 2004), antidiabetic (Safiyeh et al., 2007), coagulant and astringent properties (Clute, 1928).