Pedalium murex

• Botanical Name : Pedalium murex L.
• Common Name : Mota Gokhru, Ubha Gokhru
• Plant Family : Pedaliaceae
• Plant Form : Herb
• Occurrence (Sectors) : 27
• Occurrence (Special Areas) : Ayurvedic Udyan, Punit Van, Van Chetana Kendra

About Pedalium murex Plant :

• Habit : A diffuse annual, much branched herb with roots similar to turmeric in colour.
• Leaves : Simple, opposite, ovate or oblong-obovate, truncate or obtuse, irregularly and coarsely crenate-serrate, glabrous above, minutely scaly below, petiolate.
• Flowers :
  • Pedicellate, calyx teeth linear, scaly outside, persistent.
  • Petals connate into a broad tube, lobes obtuse. Stamens included, filaments dilated, glandular hairy at the base, anthers kidney-shaped.
• Fruit :
  • Indehiscent, abruptly narrowed at the base and with a patent spreading spine at each basal corner of the broader part, spine 2-4 mm long.
  • Sees 2 or 1 per locule, oblong.
• Flowering and Fruiting Time : During monsoon season.
• Significance :
  • An infusion of the plant is given in biles.
  • The plant is considered to be a tonic.
  • It is also given in diabetes.
  • The juice of the fruit is an emmenagogue, used in puerperal diseases and to promote lochial discharges.
  • The leaves are used as curry in splenic enlargement the decoction of the root is antibilious.