The Photo shows a fruit called ‘’Naaval Pazham’’ (generally called as black plum in English) very commonly seen only in eastern coastal region of Vadamaradchi and Thenmaradchi of the Jaffna Peninsula and commonly seen eastern coastal region of Vanni area.
The ‘’Naaval Pazham’’ is called in different local names in different areas, in Srilanka it is being called as ‘’Naaval Pazham’’ only.
The local names given to Naval Pazham are as follows, Malaysia – Jambula, Indonesia – Jamblang, Hindi - Jamun, Udru and Panjabi – Jamun, Telugu – Neredu Pandu, Tamil and Malayyalam – Naaval Pazham, Bengali – Kalojam,Oriya – Kamukoli, Gujarat – Jambu, Philippines – Lomboy, Maldives – Dhanbu, Malagasy (Madagascar) – Rotra.
‘’Naaval Pazham’’ is from ‘’Syzygium cumini’’ family is about 10 to 15 mm diameter in size and tends to colour the tongue purple. ‘’Naaval Pazham’’ is known as medicines for urinary related issues and used for controlling blood pressure.
In Jaffna Peninsula, ‘’Naaval Pazham’’ is still seen in the eastern coastal region of Verrilakkeni, Nagar kovil, and Kaddikkadu etc, including in Naaval kadu, where they are seen densely, even though considerable amount of Naaval trees in these areas has been destroyed in the past.
The season of Naaval Paham in Srilanka is from October to December.
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