On the fragrant kumkum and its legacy

While kumkum is an ubiquitous part of most Indian homes and festivals, its presence is magnified during Navaratri throughout India for pujas, to adorn deities and, for kumkumaarchana offerings. Usually created by mixing dried turmeric powder with slaked lime to turn the yellow spice into a deep red, in South India, a flower is added to make it a more auspicious offering.

The fragrant screw pine flower (thaale hoovu in Kannada, thazhampoo in Tamil and ketaki pushp in Sanskrit) grows wild in coastal and humid regions across South India and is used to make fragrant kumkum. Screw pine (Pandanus Odorifer or Pandanus Fascicularis) thrives along sandy beaches and ocean edges, river beds, backwaters and marshy water bodies where the soil is moist and tropical.

This small slender branching tree boasts of rosettes in a leathery screw-like arrangement of leaves with fragrant, white flowers. Attar for perfumes has long been extracted from this plant which also has tremendous medicinal properties.

Elaborating on why this flower is used in kumkum preparations, Hari Vishwas, a third-generation pooja products manufacturer in Malleswaram says, ”Apart from being aromatic, in Ayurveda it is considered an antiseptic for skin disorders. The combination of turmeric and screw pine for a heady mix of colour and fragrance is centuries old. The highly prized premium variety found in Karnataka is used instead of the regular blooms.”

While standard kumkum is prepared with turmeric powder and slaked lime, “Thale hoo kumkum infuses the flower’s essential oils into the mixture. This variant is native to Madurai, where it was developed as an offering to Goddess Madurai Meenakshi and is called ‘Thazhampoo Kumkum’,” adds Hari.

In the South, screw pine flowers were used as wardrobe refreshers and moth repellents, its leaves with their saw-like edges were used to make soft mats; while its fruit is favoured by elephants.

Dying legacy

Sadly, this centuries-old trade remains confined to the bylanes of the temple in Madurai and less than a thousand families distribute it through a few multinational kumkum companies worldwide. Family entrepreneur Shankar Narayanan of Shree Seetha Special Kumkum on Gopalakothan Street near the west gate towers of the temple says, “The preparation with measured ingredients is sacrosanct and the drying and grinding process is akin to work in a laboratory, although it may seem a simple procedure to the untrained eye.”

Shankar’s parents Meenakshi Sundaram and Lalitha SM established this family business six decades ago, and he is now taking it forward. He says the kumkum is made from gundu manjal, the round variety of the tuber, and not the elongated ones used in beauty care.

“We sun dry the turmeric for a week; this is the first step in creating in the creation of this holy powder,” says Shankar. After it is dried, the turmeric is ground and simultaneously mixed with slaked lime and alum, turning a deep scarlet or crimson within a few hours. “One kilo of turmeric powder requires approximately 50 grams of the flower’s natural extract (mostly in liquid form). A kilo of thazhampoo kumkum would require the bounty of the Sun God,” he adds.