Desmodium triflorum

Scientific name: Desmodium triflorum (L.) DC.

Family: Fabaceae

Synonym: Hedysarum triflorum L.

Bengali/Vernacular name: Kalaliya, Kodaliya, Kulaliya modi, Tre-potrishak.

Tribal name: Ya re sur sah (Murang), Baa-thaw-shaw (Rakhaing), Bormajal (Marma).

English name: Creeping tick trefoil, Three-flower beggarweed.

Description of the plant: A much branched, mat-forming creeping herb, with clover-like leaves. Leaves are divided into 3 leaflets, the lower leaves sometimes undivided. Leaflets are inverted-egg shaped, to inverted-heart shaped, rounded, and notched at the tip, less than 1 cm long, up to 9 mm wide. The flowers are purplish, about 6 mm long, axillary, solitary or 2 to 3 together, with slender pedicels. Pods 5-12 mm long, with 2 to 6 joints.

Plant parts used: Leaf, root.

Ethnomedicinal uses: The fresh juice is extracted from the roots of the plant is taken thrice a day (10 ml amount each time) until the stomachache is cured.

Decoction made with the leaves of the plant is given for diarrhoea and dysentery.

Leaves of the plant are used in children for indigestion and also for convulsion.

Paste prepared from the leaves of the plant is used for skin eruptions, wounds, and abscesses.

Cottonseed-sized pills are made with the leaves and roots of the plant are taken orally thrice a day (one pill each time) until the tuberculosis is cured.

The leaves of the plant are used in blindness, and eye diseases.

Decoction prepared from the leaves of the plant is taken for the treatmnent of cough and asthma.

Distribution: The species commonly occurs throughout the country.

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