Adulsa
listen about me
Justicia adhatoda L.
Classification:
Kingdom: Plantae
Division: Angiospermae
Class: Dicotyledonae
Order: Lamiales
Family: Acanthaceae
Genus: Justicia
Species: adhatoda
Scientific Name: Justicia adhatoda L.
Common Name-
English: English as Malabar Nut, Adulsa, Adhatoda, Vasa, Vasaka
Marathi: Adulsa.
Distribution: The plants native range is Afghanistan, the Indian
subcontinent (Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Nepal and Sri
Lanka), Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam).
Description:
Habit & Habitat: A stiff, evergreen, much-branched perennial shrub with a strong, unpleasant odour, 1.2-6 m tall.
Leaves: Leaves opposite, elliptic-lanceolate or ovate-lanceolate, margins entire, apex acute, 5-30 cm long, hairy, light green above, dark beneath, leathery.
Flowers: Flowers large, white with red or yellow-barred throats, borne in compact, axillary, pedunculate spikes with large bracts.
Fruits: Fruits (capsules) clavate, longitudinally channeled, 1.9-2.2 cm long and 0.8 cm wide, pubescent. Seeds globular.
Uses: The leaves, roots, flowers, and bark of this plant have been used in the treatments of cough, colds, asthma, to liquefy sputum, as a bronchodilator, bronchial catarrh, bronchitis, and tuberculosis. A number of parts of the plant are commonly used in the forms of
decoctions or powders.