There is a plant that grows in the mountains of southern India which the Tamils call the Neelakurinji. It blossoms just once every 12 years, an event so rare that the locals use it to measure their…

The year you disappeared, I turned twelve. I blew a candle out in the middle of the night and Achan made me wish for normalcy. What I really wished for was something simple. I asked for a sign. After ...

The year you disappeared, I turned twelve. I blew a candle out in the middle of the night and Achan made me wish for normalcy. What I really wished for was something simple. I asked for a sign. After ...

Let’s start with the title which plays a significant role in the timeline of the story. Did you choose the flower “Neelakurinji” because of a personal association, a memory, or the cycle of its ...

Photo of one of the young man posing with Neelakurinji flowers is now widely circulated on social media. For many visitors, seeing the hills of Munnar covered in blue-violet Neelakurinji flowers is the kind of travel memory worth photographing. But for two youths, an attempt to turn the rare bloom into an Instagram moment has resulted in a case by the Forest Department.The two youths are facing legal action after allegedly plucking Neelakurinji flowers and posting photographs of themselves with the blooms on Instagram.

Nature is endowed with a huge variety of plants, each of which is special in itself, but there's something poetic about a flower that only blooms once every twelve years.

Neelakurinji flowers- Photo via Canva Nature is endowed with a huge variety of plants, each of which is special in itself, but there's something poetic about a flower that only blooms once every twelve years.It doesn't rush, and when it finally blooms, the entire hillsides turn a shade of blue-violet you don't really see anywhere else in nature.Such is the story of Munnar's famous Neelakurinji blooms that happen in Kerala, just once in 12 years.Munnar stands amid the full bloom of the Neelakurinji flowers this year, but it is speculated that the blooms that were supposed to happen in 2030 have surprisingly happened this year itself.So, is all of it true, or is there more to the story?

Though considered threatened, the shrub was not evaluated against IUCN global standards until recently. The mass blooming of the flower in the Western Ghats, once in 12 years, attracts tourists in hordes

The sanctuary in the Western Ghats now holds the highest concentration of Nilgiri tahr in the world and sees vast spreads of Neelakurinji bloom every 12 years.

There is a plant that grows in the mountains of southern India which the Tamils call the Neelakurinji. It blossoms just once every 12 years, an event so rare that the locals use it to measure their…

Half a century after it was declared Kerala’s first national park, Eravikulam National Park remains one of the least dramatic yet most consequential conservation stories in India. Created to protect the highly endangered Nilgiri tahr and the rare Neelakurinji, the flowering spectacle that occurs once every 12 years, Eravikulam stands quietly above the famed hill station of Munnar as a reminder that ecological protection in India did not always begin with protest, marches or public campaigns. Sometimes, it began with persuasion, paperwork and political timing. Advertisement In many ways, Eravikulam was the country’s first successful ecological intervention, achieved years before the celebrated struggle to save Silent Valley National Park brought environmentalism into the public arena as a popular movement. Advertisement Until the early 1970s, Eravikulam’s high-altitude grasslands were officially classified as “wastelands”. Under Kerala’s ambitious land reform programme, these slopes were proposed for redistribution to the landless and for cattle grazing. From the desks of administrators in distant offices, the plateau appeared empty and underutilised. On the ground, forest officers and naturalists saw something very different — the last intact montane grassland system in southern India and the most critical refuge of the endangered Nilgiri tahr. Advertisement By then, the...

The Neelakurinji Biodiversity classroom festival for schoolchildren will start at the Neelakurinji Biodiversity Knowledge Center on Friday at the Government Secondary School in Adimal, Idukki. The festival begins with a friendly drawing of nature. According to officials, there are 60-law participants in the winner of the quiz competitions at the level of districts organized by Harith Keralam Mission. The learning festival will be held in Adimals in connection with the International Day for Biodiversity.