Psyllium husk commonly known as isabgol is one of the most widely used and commercially available plant-derived polysaccharides in indian markets. major proportion of husk is composed of hemicellulose that includes a xylan backbone linked with arabinose, rhamnose and galacturonic acid units (arabinoxylans). 55-60% of the psyllium husk forms the gel-forming fraction that proves its suitability in various therapeutic applications and medical interventions. psyllium has been used extensively as an excipient in various pharmaceutical applications. it has been applied as a super disintegrant, as a binder and as a matrix former, as a flavour enhancer, as a mucoadhesive, as a suspending agent, to name a few. hence, when one material is able to manifest so many characters while fulfilling the functions of most of the forms of excipients, such kinds can be termed as “one solution to all problems”. we have fabricated a novel psyllium husk-based microporous scaffold for controlled drug release by employing the readily available psyllium husk powder without any further intensive processing. although psyllium is available in numerous forms such as powder, husk, mucilage, gel and soluble fibres, psyllium husk mucilage has received much attention from scientists and researchers for medicinal and pharmaceutical applications. howsoever, extraction and purification of mucilage from psyllium husk is a tedious and cumbersome job. therefore, to exclude the need of trivial and time-consuming process we have used psyllium husk powder that can be directly mixed in water to form a hydrogel followed by a simple cross-linking procedure which is then freeze-dried for final use. the fabricated scaffold is an example of a functional excipient that can produce cost-effective, finished pharmaceutical product for oral and subcutaneous drug delivery. this innovative approach in the designing of oral and subcutaneous dosage forms eliminates the need for container closure systems that are primarily required for the packaging of a finished drug product. this makes large scale production of the formula uncomplicated, thus significantly reducing the cost of the medication and fast-track the availability of it in the market. preliminary characterisation of the scaffold has been carried out to reveal its porous nature, mechanical strength, swelling and degradation capacity and its biocompatibility with animal fibroblast cells. psyllium husk is a natural polysaccharide with negligible risk of infection and does not raises any ethical and cultural issues; biodegradable and fda approved for worldwide consumer acceptance; an excipient that can be regarded as an all-purpose product which harbors the potential to replace other contemporary materials used as an excipient.