Moduga chettu, flame-of-the-forest, palash and bastard teak
Flame-of-the-forest is otherwise known as bastard teak, parrot tree (Eng.), chichra tesu, desuka jhad, dhaak, palash, chalcha, kankrei, chheula (छेउला) (Hindi), paḷas (पळस) (Marathi), kesudo (કેસુુડો) (Gujarati), palashpapra (Urdu), Muthuga (ಮುತ್ತುಗ) (Kannada), kinshuk, polash (পলাশ) Bengali, pauk (Burmese), polāx (পলাশ) in Assamese, porasum, parasu (Tamil ), muriku, shamata (Mal.), moduga (మోదుగ) (Telugu), khakda (Guj.), kela (Sinh.),[5] ploso (Javanese), palash ପଳାଶ (Odia), semarkat api (Malay), Palay (Pushto). (Source wikipedia)
Most of us Indians could relate to using leaf disposable plates before the market was flooded with plastic disposables.
My grandmother used to keep this is as a regular yearly activity to stitch leaf disposable plates to serve food to deities, outsiders, takeaways, cows, birds etc. After usage, it would simply get into compost and add richness to soil nutrition.
Moduga leaves carry medicinal benefits and can help cure lot of stomach ailments because of its antibacterial nature.
Flowers of the palash tree are used to worship Lord Shiva on Shivaratri. Its bark is used to treat cuts and wounds.
This tree is very dear to our culture and is brought into various day to day activities of life.
Inspired with this traditional wisdom, we have taken this step to pack roli chawal, kumkum chandan in these auspicious leaves. Temple colors red and turmeric yellow threads are used to give the extra binding for the leaves.
These leaf packs can be left in your worship place if they still have kumkum and can stay very long. Not to mention about the positive energy they add when they are saved in a place of worship! After the contents are totally used, these leaves can be added to compost bin.
Leaves used for packing were taken from the trees around forest area of Ananthagiri Hills, Vikarabad, Telangana, India.
Happy Rakhi!
Happy Sustainable Living!
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