The Meiteis are the largest ethnic community of Manipur, a hilly state in the remote north-eastern corner of India. Besides the Meiteis, Manipur is also inhabited by Manipuri Muslims, 29 tribal communities, 7 scheduled caste communities and people from other parts of India. The Meiteis extensively used plants as medicine since time immemorial. Elder members of each and every Meitei household do possess some knowledge about the use of plants as medicines. This paper describes the culture and environment of the Meiteis and their use of medicinal plants. In all 29 ultivated and wild monocotyledonous plants and their medicinal uses are described in this paper. Local names are also provided for all the species. Efforts have also been made to find out the correct names in accordance with the latest International Code of Botanical Nomenclature.

Investigations have been done on edible, economic and medicinal values of the higher plants, especially the angiosperms but pteridophytes have been unfortunately ignored. Pteridophytes are a dominant component of many plant communities being the second largest group of vascular plants. Pteridophytes are used in Homoeopathic, Ayurvedic, Unani and Tribal medicine. They also provide insecticides, antibiotics, food and ornamentation. Present paper highlights the list of plants (alphabetically) with latest nomenclature, distribution and uses.

The paper deals with 26 exotic plants species used by the tribals inhabited in Purulia district of West Bengal. These plants belong to 24 genera and 17 families.The ethnobotanical uses recorded in this paper are unknown or less known to the outside world. So, it may be useful for further investigation.

The paper highlights the diversity of ethnomedicinal uses of 41 species among tribals of two adjacent districts of Kheri and Bahraich. The study is based on comparision of uses of the same plant or the plant parts in different diseases, ailments and other complaints by the Tharus (tribals) and local people of these two districts. They use these species to cure several other problems with their traiditional and indigenous recipes.