Indian Journal of Agricultural Research

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Research Article

Indian Journal of Agricultural Research, volume 55 issue 6 (december 2021) : 702-708

Ethno-Botanical Study of Medicinal Plants from Unexplored Area of District Ramban (J&K) India

Munit Sharma1, Arvind Kumar Sharma2, Munish Sharma3,*
1Department of Botany and Microbiology, Gurukula Kangri Vishwavidyalaya, Haridwar-249 404, Uttarakhand, India.
2Department of Zoology and Environmental Science, Gurukula Kangri Vishwavidyalaya, Haridwar-249 404, Uttarakhand, India.
3Department of Plant Sciences, Central University of Himachal Pradesh, Shahpur, Kangra-176 206, Himachal Pradesh, India.
Cite article:- Sharma Munit, Sharma Kumar Arvind, Sharma Munish (2021). Ethno-Botanical Study of Medicinal Plants from Unexplored Area of District Ramban (J&K) India . Indian Journal of Agricultural Research. 55(6): 702-708. doi: 10.18805/IJARe.A-5561.

ABSTRACT

Background: Medicinal plants are used for different purposes and in diverse uses of human beings. Medicinal plants have played key roles in the lives of local peoples living in these biodiversity rich regions by providing products for both food and medicine. A study was conducted in hill station of District Ramban (J&K) in order to check the present status of medicinal plants diversity their abundance and for suggested utilization measures for residential peoples of the area. The current ethnobotanical study aimed to survey and collect the medicinal plants in order to document the traditional knowledge from the local peoples.  

Methods: In this field-laboratory investigation during 2019-2020, Three large sampling zones of Ramban District were surveyed and selected based on varied local data, altitude and latitude. In the laboratory, the collected medicinal plants were identified morphologically based on the valid Taxonomic keys and Herbaria

Result: During the field survey, medicinal plants used by the local community were ranged from 68 to 79 plant species, which were 46 to 55 herbs, 13 to 15 trees, and 08 to 09 shrubs from selected sampling zones for treating various diseases and disorders. These medicinal plants are distributed in 38 families with diversity of Asteraceae family was dominant in all sampling zones.

INTRODUCTION

Ethno-medicine plays very significant role in human health care since time immemorial. According to WHO, about 80% of the people in developing countries still depend on local medicinal plants to fulfil their primary health needs. Ethnobotanical surveys have been found to be one of the reliable approaches to drug discovery (Fabricant and Fornsworth, 2001; Kalaichelvi and Swaminathan, 2009; Verma, 2006). India is fortunate to have tremendous and varied medicinal plants resources distributed broadly in the vivid forest ecosystem. According to WHO approximately 80% of world population in developing countries depends on traditional medicines for primary health care (Uniyal, 2005; Verma, 2010). The Indian Himalayan region spreads across Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, West Bengal and Arunachal Pradesh. Jammu and Kashmir are a treasure of floral and faunal diversity. At least 500 million people in India directly or indirectly depend on medicinal plants derived drugs for their health care needs (Noorjahan and Saranya, 2018). Many studies have been carried out from time to time to document the ethno-medicinal information from different districts of Jammu and Kashmir, India (Sharma et al., 2012; Sharma et al., 2019; Khan et al., 2004) except unexplored area of District Ramban.
        
Therefore, in the present study, an effort has been made to document some locally available medicinal plants used by the local community of district Ramban, for curing various diseases. The present data has its importance because it is recorded for the first time.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Description about study area
 
The study area was divided into three sampling zones and every zone has further three stations for the collection of medicinal plants.
 
Zone 1
 
• Pogal Valley (Sarvadhar to Omnagar).
• Sarvadhar (33021’16.99 N longitude, 75020’04.08 E latitude).
• Omnagar (33020’01.96 N longitude, 75025’51.41 E latitude).
 
Zone 2
 
• Omnagar Valley (Omnagar to Neel).
• Neel (33025’20.03 N longitude, 75025’30.08 E latitude).
 
Zone 3
 
• Sanasar Valley (Sanasar to Nathatop)
• Sanasar (34008’36.56 N longitude, 74079’73.71 E latitude).
• Nathatop (33007’77.78 N longitude, 75019’36.88 E latitude).

Sampling strategy
 
The study was conducted on monthly basis on all the three-sampling station of district Ramban for the period of one year during 2019-2020. The sampling process was completed in three days every month and two sites were covered in one day.
 
Collection of medicinal plants
 
The collection and identification of specimen has been done by flowering/fruiting to facilitate the process of identification covering all the sampling month. In case of trees and shrubs, branches of suitable size in flowering or fruiting stages were taken. Field number for each collected sample was assigned. Larger specimens were folded in shape of V, N, or M. The specimens were pressed in blotting sheets with the help of wooden and iron presses in the field. Flowers of the Himalaya, Flora Britannica and other local floras for confirmation of identity. The technique for collection of plants was the same as suggested by (Jain and Rao, 1978).
 
Identification of medicinal plants
 
The plants were identified with the help of flora (Raizada and Saxena, 1978). The identified medicinal plants were confirmed by consulting the herbaria of different standards keys in Department of Plant Sciences, Central University of Himachal Pradesh and Department of Botany and Microbiology, Gurukula Kangri Vishwavidyalaya, Haridwar.
 
Documentation of local traditional knowledge
 
Local uses of medicinal plants of the sampling area, their local names, parts used, purpose for which it is used, method of administration were recorded through talks and conversation with elderly persons and rural women in villages.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The results pertaining to the present research work based on ethno-botanical study of medicinal plants from unexplored area of District Ramban (J&K) India, emphasis on survey of medicinal plants in which a total number of 79 medicinal plant species belonging to 38 families had been collected and identified from the selected sampling zones. The results related to this data have been described in Table 1 to Table 3. Total 35 families of medicinal plants were recorded from sampling zone 1 in which Asteraceae family was most dominant family (10 species) followed by Lamiaceae (6 species), Rosaceae (5 species), Ranunculaceae (3 species), Polygonaceae (4 species), Apiaceae (3 species), Berberidaceae (3 species) etc. Pinus wallichiana was recorded as dominant species (7%) followed by Juglans regia (6%), Cedrus deodara (5%), Plantago lanceolate (5%), Valeriana jatamansi (4%), Ocimum basilicum (3%) as in Fig 1, due to the uniform sunlight exposure and low human interferences. Total 3 types of medicinal plant were collected in which Herb (50 number) followed by Tree (13 number) and Shrub (9 number) as in Table 1 and Fig 2. Ethnomedicinal uses of 10 species belonging to 7 families from Pulwama District was reported by (Chak et al., 2009). Total 38 families were recorded from sampling zone 2 in which Asteraceae family was most dominant family (13 species) followed by Lamiaceae (6 species), Rosaceae (5 species), Ranunculaceae (4 species), Polygonaceae (4 species), Apiaceae (3 species), Berberidaceae (3 species) etc. Higher number of plant species may be due to the lower elevation which imply the climate adaption by plant species. Pinus wallichiana was recorded as dominant species (6%) followed by Juglans regia (5%), Cedrus deodara (4%), Plantago lanceolate (4%), Capsella bursapastoris (3%), Valeriana jatamansi (3%), Taxus baccata (2%), Ocimum basilicum (2%) Fig 1. Total 3 type of medicinal plant was collected in which Herb (55 number) followed by Tree (15 number) and Shrub (9 number) Table 1 and Fig 2. (Singh, 1997) conveyed 58 ethno-medicinal plants from Dehradun. (Uniyal, 2003) documented 24 medicinal plant from Wildlife Sanctuary. (Singh, 2004) counted 90 medicinal plant of Western Himalayas. (Singh and Chauhan, 2005) recorded the medicinal plant habit of 43 plant belonging to 25 families. 35 families were recorded from sampling zone 3 in which Asteraceae (11 species) followed by Lamiaceae (6 species), Rosaceae (5 species), Ranunculaceae (3 species), Polygonaceae (3 species), Apiaceae (2 species), Berberidaceae (3 species) etc. Juglans regia was recorded as dominant species (7%) followed by Capsella bursapastoris (5%), Cedrus deodara (5%), Pinus wallichiana (5%), Tagetes minuta (4%), Anaphalis contorta (3%), Ocimum basilicum (3%), Plantago lanceolata (3%), Ranunculus laetus (3%) Fig 2. Juglans regia was recorded as dominant species because of prolonged winter season, which is more significant climate factor for sustainable establishment of various types of medicinal plants. There is evidence that primarily climatic factors are responsible for spread of J. regia. Climatic change in the environment causes huge impacts on plant species their communities and also on forest ecosystems. (Bisht and Pundir, 2008) reported 67 medicinal plants from Western Himalayas, Uttarakhand. 65 medicinal plants were identified by (Srivastav et al., 2009) in different areas of Manipur. Total 3 type of medicinal plant was collected in the form of Tree, Herb and Shrub in which Herb (46 number) was recorded as dominant followed by Tree (14 number) and Shrub (8 number) as in Table 1 and Fig 1.
 

Fig 1: Line diagram showing the abundance (%age) of medicinal plants collected from selected sampling zones.


 

Fig 2: Number of medicinal plant recorded along habit type.


 

Table 1: Medicinal plant recorded from selected sampling zone along with family and habit.


 

Table 2: Habit type of medicinal plant and their number recorded from selected sampling zones.


 

Table 3: List of medicinal plant with common name, part used and various uses.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The authors are highly thankful to Dr. Amit Kumar Sharma for their guidance and constant supervision as well as for providing necessary information regarding the research.

REFERENCES


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