Chenghi, the unique hair care lotion used by the Meitei Community of Manipur (India)

The Meitei Community of Manipur (India) belong to the Indo-Mongoloid Group speaking the Tibeto-Burman Language. The womenfolk of Meitei Community of Manipur (India) have an age old tradition of keeping their hairs well groomed, long and black and have been using a traditional hair care lotion known locally as Chenghi since time immemorial. The traditional use of hair care lotion (Chenghi) by the womenfolk of the Meitei community of Manipur was among the earliest information to be recorded and passed along from generation to generations till now. Chenghi is prepared locally which is a concoction of a wide variety of plant ingredients prepared with the milk of rice.  Different plant ingredients are used for specific hair problems like removal of dandruff, long black and silky hair, killing of lice, dizziness, prevention of hair fall, blood purification, cooling effect, untimely greying etc. During the present investigation 76 plant species belonging to 70 genera that are distributed over 40 families are found to be used by the womenfolk during the preparation of this unique hair lotion. Some of the species are Ageratum conyzoides L., Allium tuberosum Rottl. ex Sprengel, Alocasia macrorrhiza (L.) G.Don, Artemisia maritima L., Commelina benghalensis L., Cymbopogon nardus (L.) Rendl., Phyllanthus emblica L., Rhus hookerii Sahni & Bahadur and Vitex negundo L.

Key words: Meitei, Manipur, Chenghi