Hareetaki (కరక్కాయ)

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Hareetaki (కరక్కాయ)

Terminalia chebula

COMBRETACEAE

Vernacular names

Telugu - Karakkaya

English - Chebulic Myrobalan

Hindi - Harad

Kannada - Alale

How to dentify

Bark


Bark 6 mm. thick, dark brown with many generally shallow vertical cracks. Wood very hard, brownish grey with a greenish or yellowish tinge, with an irregular small dark purple heartwood.

Leaves

 
Leaves - 7-20 cm. by 4-8 cm., glabrous or nearly so when mature, not clustered, distant, alternate or subopposite, elliptic-oblong, acute, rounded or cordate at base, penninerved, secondary nerves 6-8 pairs, arching, prominent; petioles 2-5 cm. long, pubescent, usually with 2 glands near the top.

Fruits


Fresh fruits


Dry fruit
Fruits - Drupе pendulous, 2-4 cm. long, ellipsoid or obovoid from a broad base, glabrous, more or less 5-ribbed, when dry yellowish green

Flowers
 

Flowers all hermaphrodite, 4 mm. across, sessile, dull-white or yellow, with an offensive smell/pungent odour.


Uses :-

  1. The fruit is dry and warming in nature, and acts as a stomachic (improves appetite and digestion), tonic, carminative (relieves gas), expectorant, anthelmintic, antidysenteric, and alterative. It is considered beneficial for asthma, sore throat, excessive thirst, vomiting, hiccups, eye disorders, and conditions affecting the heart and bladder. It helps in cases of strangury (painful, frequent urination with incomplete emptying), bladder stones, urinary discharges, ascites, biliousness (digestive disturbance linked to liver or gallbladder issues and irritability), inflammation, tumors, bleeding piles, typhoid fever, leucoderma, shortness of breath, itching, pain, constipation, anemia, gout, elephantiasis, and delirium 
  2. The unripe fruit is astringent and aperient (Relieve constipation), useful in dysentery and diarrhoea. 
  3. The ripe fruit is purgative, tonic, carminative; enriches the blood; good in ophthalmia, diseases of the spleen, piles, cold in the head; strengthens the brain, the eye, the gums; used in paralysis  
  4. The fruits are used as a medicine for sore-throat, by the Paharias (a place)in Sikkim.
  5. The finely powdered fruit is used as a dentifrice and is traditionally regarded as helpful for decayed teeth, gum bleeding, and gum ulcerations.
  6. When the fruit is coarsely powdered and smoked in a pipe, it is traditionally believed to provide relief during an asthma attack. A decoction made from the fruit is used as an astringent wash. A smooth paste prepared by grinding the fruit on a rough stone with a small amount of water—when mixed with Pharmacopœial carron oil and applied to burns or scalds—is said to promote faster healing than using carron oil alone..
  7. Triphala (as haritaki as one of the ingredient) water/ Triphala wash can also be used as Vaginal wash for Urinary tract infections
  8. Haritaki powder can also be used as face pack for Detanning of face.



- Dr. Srikanth posa B.A.M.S., MD (Ayu-DG)
Department of Dravyaguna
Reg. No.1584/A/2021.

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