A diagnostic key to identify multiple botanical sources for the Balaa group of Ayurvedic plant drugs

A conscious effort is certainly needed to provide pure and cleaned forms of plants based drugs for preparation of safe and efficacious herbal formulations. However, such genuine efforts are a rarity. Most often, botanical drugs traded come to users in the form of crude drugs /coarse-finely powdered materials /depilated/ dis-coloured/ mixed forms, which makes the identification of the raw materials, a challenging task with ambiguity. In order to have control on Quality Assurance in herbal industry, an integrated approach of pharmacognosy discipline plays a vital role in authentications and certification of genuine plant materials. To facilitate this process, various tools such as taxonomic evaluation to microscopic studies; gene sequencing to phyto-chemical studies are employed. In this article, an attempt has been made to develop a simple diagnostic key based on analysis of trichome characters for 14 botanical entities, which are recorded to be used as Balaa in various popular Ayurvedic formulations and traditional practices.