Chirmati Patta is a plant commonly cultivated in gardens throughout India. This winter flowering plant begins to show off its soft red, festive colors in time for winters. A nice change from the traditional poinsettia, this Indian native continues to flower for months to come. Chirmati Patta makes an outstanding container plant for a sunny window.
Watch with fascination how the flowers keep emerging on the same flower spike from winter until spring. This is an erect or spreading, more or less branched, herbaceous or half-woody plant 1.5 meters or less in height. The Gunja Leaves are ovate to oblong-ovate, 8 to 13 centimeters long, branched from the base, with the stems drooping and sometimes rooting.
Slightly drooping, and smooth, with entire, undulate or wavy margins, pointed or blunt tip, and pointed base. The spikes are 15 to 30 centimeters long. The calyx is tubular, 8 to 10 millimeters long, and covered with stalked, sticky glands. The corolla is bright red, the tube is slender and about 2.5 centimeters long, and the limb, which spreads, is about 3 cm in diameter.
Chirmati Patta Benefits:
The root is acrid, vesicant, abortifacient and a stimulant. Applied in bland oil, it is used externally or internally in rheumatism and paralytic afflictions. The root is powerful sialogogue and a remedy for secondary syphilis, leprosy and leucoderma. The milky juice of the plant is used in ophthalmic and in scabies.
The root and bark of Chirmati is used in the form of powder and decoction to treat spruce, piles, diarrhea, oedema, cough, hoarseness of voice, diabetes, accumulation of gas in abdomen, as rejuvinative, skin diseases, vitiligo, coryza, anemia, filaria, abscess and obesity.
Piles, Anemia Obesity are cured by this leaves.
The plant is often grown in the backyard for personal use, it is cultivated for medicinal use in India and is also grown as an ornamental in various parts of the tropics, where it is valued for its white inflorescence.
Chirmati Patta possesses several pharmacological activities i.e. antimicrobial, anticancer, cardio tonic and ant fertility actions. It is also a powerful irritant. In small doses, the compound promotes sweating and stimulates the central nervous system; large doses may cause death from respiratory failure and paralysis.