Back when I was staying at my cousin Ariful’s place, I used to come to Curzon Hall by way of Nilkhet, along the road that passes through the university’s arched gateway. All sorts of plants had been planted on the strip between the two roads, and meeting them made the walk a pleasure. I had practically memorised which one came after which. I did not know all their names then, but the plants themselves had become familiar.
Then one day I saw that in front of the gate of the Registrar Building, where the lawn between the two roads comes to an end, some very beautiful flowers had opened. White flowers, with a beauty all their own. The petals spread out around them in such a way that they looked like an octopus with its arms stretched in every direction, or a spider standing on its eight legs. And the yellow stamens poked out between those spread petals.
Octopus or spider
The plant holding these flowers up high looks a little like ghritakumari, the aloe vera (Aloe vera), though the two plants differ in many ways. Its leaves are striking too. I had seen leaves of this kind before, but never this big. They are like long, thick bamboo leaves, only enormous, smooth and a glossy, oily green. When I tried to measure one with my hand, the hand turned out to be the smaller of the two. After looking for a long while I took a photo and set off for class again. On the way I saw the same plant flowering in several other places, and it was lovely to see.
As I walked it occurred to me that I had seen a plant with leaves like these in front of the Zoology Department as well. I could go there and spend a little more time thinking about the flowers. When I got there I found the same kind of leaves, but the flowers had not fully come yet, only buds. And the buds were not white but a reddish, magenta colour. Now what? Were these two different coloured flowers of the same plant, or two different species? I was in real trouble now. I did not even know the name, and on top of that came this problem. I did not think about it any further at the time.
A name found in a book
Some days later, turning the pages of a book, I came across the flower’s identity. The name given was sukhdarshan, which roughly means a sight that brings happiness. Whether seeing the flower actually brings happiness I cannot say, but the name is a beautiful one. Another name is boro kanur. The scientific name is Crinum asiaticum. The English names matched my imagination, spider lily and giant crinum lily, but a third English name worried me a little. It was poison bulb. So was the body of this plant poisonous?
The day before, I had spent a long time handling the leaves, and I was a little frightened about what might happen now. The sap could have caused all kinds of burning and irritation on the skin, and had I eaten any it could have upset the stomach, brought on vomiting straight away, stomach pain, even diarrhoea. Thank goodness I had not tasted it, I thought, and breathed a sigh of relief. Someone who unknowingly uses too much of it can even end up paralysed. Shamim always says, if you see something you do not recognise, do not put it in your mouth. Well, listening to him saved me this time.
A lily that is not a lily
Seeing sukhdarshan listed as a member of the family Amaryllidaceae made me doubt things for a moment. Bulb plants are usually members of Liliaceae, so what family was this book talking about? I started searching through a lot of things to get the facts right. Later I learnt that although it is called a spider lily, it is not a true lily at all. It looks a little like a lily, so the name is a figurative one.
The pink beauty at TSC
Then one day I had gone to TSC for some errand or other. I was heading for the cafeteria, and as I came in through the main gate my eye fell on a flower to the right. For a moment I wondered whether this was the pink sukhdarshan I had been waiting on for so long in front of Zoology. Good, I thought, found it at last. I took a photo of the beauty. But I noticed something else: both its flowers and its leaves were bigger than the white one’s, the leaves three or four times longer than the body of the plant. Everything else, though, was exactly the same.
In the end I understood that these two are in fact separate species. This one is the red spider lily, lal sukhdarshan, with the scientific name Crinum × amabile. And yes, it is a hybrid. I have grown rather fond of both of them.
Poison and medicine
Anyway, sukhdarshan contains many important compounds. Its rhizome holds a number of alkaloids such as lycorine, crinine, crinamine and haemanthamine. The bulb contains hippeastrine, the leaves cherylline, and the seeds crinamine and lycorine.
The more surprising thing is that, poisonous as it is, sukhdarshan has many uses in folk medicine. I had often heard of using a thorn to remove a thorn, but this was the first time I had seen a poisonous plant used as medicine. In traditional practice the juice of its leaves is used for pain in the nose and ears. It is also traditionally used by people who pass too little urine, and the leaves are applied to infections at the base of the nails. But since it is poisonous, I for one would not take the risk of trying treatments like these without experience.
Apart from all that, I have come to like the scent of sukhdarshan. Let it keep a little of its poison; if I had a plant like this in a garden, I could raise new seedlings from the bulbs every year. And since sukhdarshan is a perennial, I hope that from one plant will come a great deal of happiness.
The traditional uses described here are for information only. Consult a doctor before using any plant to treat an illness.
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