Khiroli - Strawberry of Thar By Mr. Parth Jagani and Dr. Sumit Dookia Many of you have not heard this name and to many it will bring surprise and excitement. Yes! There is a small, tender sweet, fruit that grows on and around the rocky, graveled surfaces of the Thar Desert during the monsoon season and is very famous within the local communities. Locally the plant is called Dodha डोडा and fruits are called खिरोली या खीरडी (Khiroli or Khirdi), it belongs to the family Apocynaceae of plants, which includes many species from North Africa to North West India. The botanical name of Dodha plant is Glossonema Varians which is native to the rocky areas of Thar Desert. Glossonema varians (Stocks) Benth. ex Hook.f., locally, known as dudho/dudha/dodha belongs to the family Apocynaceae earlier known as Asclepiadaceae (milkweed family). A medicinally important, rare, endemic and edible plant species of Thar Desert is a perennial herb and well adapted to the arid and semi-arid region of the Indian Desert. The plant is used as famine food at the time of food scarcity and local people also used it as fodder. The plant is under rare category due to its large scale harvesting from wild as it is used extensively by the industries and the local population as energy tonic and other medicinal uses. Due to habitat destruction and increased anthropogenic activities, the natural propagation of plant is limited (Paliwal et al., 2018) and now found only in the some pockets of Jaisalmer District, Rajasthan. It is a threatened plant confined to semiarid region of Rajasthan. G. varians regenerates from the parenting rootstock after rain (Parihar and Dwivedi, 2020). Plants usually flower once a year (Ali and Ali 1996). Flowering occurs during the month of August-October. The fruits of G. varians are edible, locally known as ‘khiroli’ and consumed raw by the native people (Bhandari 1990; Singh 2004). These were used as famine food by the local people in deficiency time. They used the immature tender fruits as vegetable. Fruits (follicles) of G. varians are 2.5-5 cm long, ellipsoid and beaked. Fruits are covered with spine like structures. Fruits can be seen in the month of November-February. These are highly nutritious and contain carbohydrates, flavonoids, amino acids and fatty acids (Rizk et al. 1983, 1990). The loss of habitat after irrigation canals, overgrazing of reducing desert and consumption of fruits collected from wild has made it one of the critically endangered plants species. Now found around few places around Desert National Park and in few sacred Oran pasture lands in Jaisalmer district, the plants needs conservation efforts. The small greyish green plants have culinary cum medicinal values, its fruits which are rich in essential and non-essential amino acids, carbohydrates, fatty acids & flavonoids are eaten raw or cooked as sabji or with milk as sweet pudding. Local shepherds consider these sweet fruits as energetic bites while grazing. The thick leaves of the plant are also cooked and eaten. Thus this plant is a very much essential part of Desert life, with each passing day it is becoming rare to find these, which made Mr. Jugatdan a farmer from Bonada village of Jaisalmer to cultivate and sell only the fruits. In 2018 he collected few plants growing wild around his farm and saved the seeds for next season, in 2019 he was able to harvest around 70 kg of fruits which he sold in the Jaisalmer city in Rs. 150/- per kg and all was pre-booked to be purchased. This year many farmers approached him for these plants, which was very inspiring for him. Soon we are able to have more and more farmer to grow these forgotten rare and edible plants of Thar Desert. Reference
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