Taxonomical Identification of Maha Aratta (Alpinia galanga (L.) Sw.

Abstract

Alpinia galanga (L.). is one of the valuable rare plant amongst the important medicinal herbs used in traditional medicine. It is commonly known as ‘Maha Aratta’ in Sri Lanka, and has been recognized in different traditional system of medicines for the treatment of vario us diseases. Being a member of family Zingiberaceae, plant rhizomes are rich in volatile oils and other phytoconstituents. In Ayurveda, rhizome of this plant is used to prepare arishtas, asavas,

bronchitis, anti-fungal, anti-tumor, antihelmintic, anti-diuretic, anti-ulcerative, disease of heart, rheumatic pains, chest pain, dyspepsia, fever, diabetes, liver and kidney diseases etc. (Chudiwal et al., 2009). This plant is adulterated in Sri Lanka due to similar morphological features of some other species, lack of identification knowledge and rare availability. In Sri Lanka, the main problem of this plant is that there are other closely similar plants that are misidentified as A. galanga (L.). The correct botanical identification of plants is one of the steps that will guarantee success of herbal drug technology, herbal treatments and herbal products etc. The present studydet dnwc saw to identify the genuine Maha Aratta which can be prescribed as a traditional medicine by local physicians without any doubt by developing a descriptor for identification.

Methodology

This study was carried out in wet and intermediate agro ecological zones of Uva Province. Six different species: Alpinia galanga (L.) Sw., Alpinia calcarata Roscoe, Alpinia malaccensis (Burm.f.) Roscoe, Hedychium flavescens [Carey ex] Roscoe, Hedychium coronarium Koenig, Hedychium coccineum [Buch.-Ham. Ex] were collected and used to differentiate each other by observing morphological features. In order to distinguish Alpinia galanga (L.) Sw. from the other similar plants, openion taken from Ayurvedic medicinal practitioners in Badulla and Bandarawela area, and information collected from the National Herbarium of Sri Lanka, Peradeniya were used. The qualitative characters: leaf arrangement, vein arrangement, leaf shape, leaf color, leaf fragrance, leaf blade shape of base, leaf blade shape of apex, leaf angle, leaf apex habit, flower color, flower fragrance, rhizome color, fresh rhizome fragrance, dry rhizome fragrance and oil gland density were observed. The Quantitative characters: height, number of leaves per tiller, mature leaf length, mature leaf width, internode length, ratio between leaf length and width, number of flowers per inflorescence, number of petals per flower, flower length, inflorescence length and rhizome perimeter were observed. The characters shown high variability were used in development of the descriptor.

Results and Discussion

Sixty four plant samples having similar characteristics and mis identified as maha aratta were collected from twenty locations from the eleven agro ecological zones in Uva province (Table 1). From 64 plants collected only Alpinia galanga (L.) Sw. plant was recorded in National Research Medicinal Plants Garden Haldumulla. It reveals that A. galanga (L.) Sw. plant is very rarely available plant in Uva region. Traditional Ayurvedic medicinal practitioners pointed out that due to the rare availability and lack of plant identification knowledge in Sri Lankan traditional medicine system, both A. calcarata Roscoe and A. malaccensis (Burm.f.) Roscoe

plants are highly misidentified as A. galanga (L.) Sw. Also it showed that IU3c agro ecological zone hass favourable condition and therefore, all these species are well habitat in this area. Agro ecological zone IL2 does not have much favourable conditions for these plants.