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Tamarindus indica L.
Synonym
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:
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Tamarindus occidentalis
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Family
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Fabaceae
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Local name
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English- Indian
date
Malayalam- Puli
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Flowering and fruiting
period
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September-April
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Distribution
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Native
of Tropical Africa; introduced and widely grown in India and other parts of
tropics
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Distribution in Kerala
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All
Districts
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Habitat
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Cultivated
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Endemic/Exotic
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Exotic
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Uses
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Tamarindus
indica is
used to make different popular decoctions for health purposes especially as
an appetizer, laxative, antihelminthic, for the treatment of stomach
disorders, general body pain, jaundice, febrifuge (for fighting fever), blood
tonic and skin cleanser.
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Key botanical
characters:
Trees,
to 20 m high, bark brown to brownish-black, rough with vertical fissures;
branchlets warty, tomentose. Leaves paripinnate, alternate, leaflets 20-34,
opposite, sessile, , oblong, apex obtuse, base unequal, margin entire,
glabrous, chartaceous; stipules lateral, minute, cauducous; rachis 8-13 cm
long, slender, glabrous, pulvinate; lateral nerves 10-15 pairs, pinnate,
slender, obscure, looped at the margin forming intramarginal nerve;
intercostae reticulate, obscure. Flowers bisexual, 1 cm across, yellow with
reddish-pink dots, in lax terminal racemes; bracts and bracteoles ovate-oblong,
coloured, cauducous.. Calyx tube narrowly turbinate, lined by disc; lobes 4,
subequal, oblong, imbricate. Petals 3, outer one, rolled up, pink dotted,
lateral 2, , clawed, subequal, oblong-lanceolate, lower pair scaly. Stamens 9
monadelphous, only 3 fertile, others reduced to bristle, base pubescent; anthers
versatile; ovary half inferior, stipitate, adnate to the disc, ovules many;
style attenuate, tomentose; stigma globose. Fruit a pod oblong, fruit wall
crustaceous, mesocarp pulpy, endocarp septate, leathery, indehiscent; seeds
3-8 or more, obovoid-orbicular, compressed, brown.
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