A scandent or scrambling shrub, branches hairy, armed with straight prickles. Stipules large, foilaceous and lobed. Leaves 30-45 cm long, rachis with 1-2 recurved stipellate spines at the base of each pinna and scattered straight or recurved prickles between the pinnae, pinnae 6-8 pairs, opposite, 5-15 cm long. Leaflets 6-10 pairs on each pinna, opposite, 1.7-4.0 cm long, elliptic-oblong, obtuse, mucronate, more or less hairy, subsessile. Inflorescence axillary and terminal pedunculate raceme, 15-30 cm long. Pedicel 5 mm long, bracts and pedicel hairy with brown tomentum, bracts exceeding the buds. Calyx 5-7.5 mm long. Petals 1-1.5 cm long, oblanceolate, the upper smaller and sometimes spotted with red. Filaments flattened and hairy in the lower half. Pods 5-7.5 cm long, 3-5 cm broad, shortly stalked, densely covered with prickles. Seeds 1-2.

Fl. Per. : April-September.

Type: Herb. Hermann Vol. 2. fol. 17 & vol. 3 fol. 350 (BM). (Brenan, l.c.; Dandy & Exell, J. Bot. 76: 175-180. 1938).

Distribution: W. Pakistan (Punjab, Sind, escape?); widely distributed in the Tropics of the old and the New World.

The seeds and leaves are used to relieve colic, fever, hydrocele, diarrhoea and rheumatism. (Bor & Raizada, Some Beaut. Ind. Cl. Shrubs, 58. 1954). The leaves are astringent, febrifuge, anthelmintic, emmenagogue deobstruent. Seeds are used in asthma, chronic fever. Root is anthelmintic, febrifuge and astringent, used in leucorrhoea and blennorrhagia.