‘Neelakurinji’ Bloom

In  News 

• The Neelakurinji flowers have turned the green patches of Bababudangiri range of the Western Ghats (Chandradrona Mountains) into purple-blue.
  • Bathukamma flower festival is celebrated in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh as per Satavahana Calendar during the Navratri festival.

About Neelakurinji Flower

• It is a shrub of the Acanthaceae family that famously blooms once every 12 years. 
• It is endemic to Western Ghats, covering the slopes of Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.
• Their scientific name is ‘strobilanthes kunthiana‘, 
  • Strobilanthes is a genus of about 350 species of flowering plants in the family Acanthaceae, mostly native to tropical Asia and Madagascar.
  • The Topli Karvy (Strobilanthes sessilis), the Karvy (Strobilanthes callosa) and the Kurinji (Strobilanthes kunthiana), all belong to the Strobilanthes genus.
  • The Topli Karvy is found more in the northern section of the Western Ghats in Maharashtra. 
  • The Karvy grows on the steepest cliffs where trees can’t grow.
• They are seen mostly on the Nilgiri hills, which even got its name from the flowers — ‘neela’, meaning blue and ‘kurinji’, referring to the flowers. 

. Source:TH