Context:
As visitors keep pouring in to witness the blooming of neelakurinji on a vast area on the Kallippara hills at Santhanpara in Idukki, Kerala, an expert team has identified six varieties of the plant across the region.
Relevance:
Facts for Prelims
Dimensions of the Article:
- About Neelakurinji
- Threats
About Neelakurinji
- In the shola forests of the Western Ghats in South India, you can find the shrub known as Kurinji or Neelakurinji (Strobilanthes kunthianus).
- The name Nilgiri Hills, which means “blue mountains” in Sanskrit, derives from the lilac-blue blooms of Neelakurinji, which bloom only once every twelve years.
- With documented bloomings in 1838, 1850, 1862, 1874, 1886, 1898, 1910, 1922, 1934, 1946, 1958, 1970, 1982, 1994, 2006, and 2018, it is the most rigorously demonstrated.
- Once every seven years, certain Kurinji flowers blossom before passing away. Then, their seeds germinate, continuing the cycle of life and death.
- It served as a guide for the tribal Paliyan people of Tamil Nadu when figuring out their ages.
Threats
- About 1,000 ha of forestland, grantis and eucalyptus plantations and grasslands have been destroyed in the fire.
- These large-scale wildfires on the grasslands where Neelakurinji (Strobilanthes kunthiiana) blossomed widely last year after a period of 12 years could have wiped out all the seeds of the endemic flowers.
- There are allegations that the areas coming under the proposed Kurinji sanctuary were set on fire with a motive to destroy the germination of Neelakurinji seeds.
-Source: The Hindu
