The Hero Botanical
A golden, honeyed, green-floral fragrance from one stretch of Odisha’s coast — admired in royal courts, offered in ritual, and still distilled by hand today.
Kewda (Ketaki in Sanskrit) is the fragrant male flower of the screwpine, a tall, thorny coastal plant that grows in salty, sandy soil. Its pale, spiky blossoms release one of India’s most distinctive natural aromas: sweet, floral and softly fruity, with a green freshness that has been compared to a gentler, “moist” musk.
Today most of India’s commercial kewda comes from Odisha, and above all from the coastal belt of Ganjam district, around Brahmapur and the Rushikulya river. Ganjam Kewda has been recognised under India’s Geographical Indications (GI) system, which protects it as a product tied to this place.
Kewda is distilled using the traditional deg-bhapka method. Flower spikes are cut by hand at first light, when their fragrance is at its fullest. They are loaded into copper vessels (degs) sealed with clay, then heated over a wood fire for hours. The fragrant steam travels through a bamboo pipe into a receiving vessel. Overnight, the precious oil — rooh — settles above the fragrant water and is skimmed off by hand.
It takes a vast number of blossoms to yield a very small amount of pure rooh, which is why the real thing is so rare.
Kewda has a long place in Indian life. In Sanskrit tradition the plant is known as Ketaki, and it appears in folklore and ritual — most famously in the old story of why the Ketaki flower is traditionally left out of offerings to Lord Shiva. In parts of eastern India its flowers and leaves are also used in worship of the goddess Manasa.
It also won the admiration of kings and emperors. The accounts below are drawn from secondary sources and we share them in that spirit.
Emperor Babur, 1525
Babur, the first Mughal emperor, is reported to have described the kewda he met in Hindustan as having a very agreeable perfume, calling it a kind of “moist musk”.
Attributed to the Baburnama, as cited by perfumery historians.The Mughal courts
The Mughal courts were devoted to rose, jasmine and kewda waters and essences — used in perfumes, sherbets, sweets and royal feasts. Kewda was one of the flowers that gave Indian perfumery its signature range.
General historical context; no single ruler is claimed here.Ketaki in tradition
Long before the courts, Ketaki lived in Sanskrit lore and temple tradition — a flower so fragrant that its very place in worship became the subject of legend.
Folk and scriptural tradition; retellings vary.We chose Ganjam Kewda because it is unmistakably Odishan — a fragrance you cannot mistake for any other, made by hands that have practised the same craft for generations. It is the heart of every fragrance in Collection Kalinga, and the reason our house exists: to carry a piece of Odisha, close.
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