Turmeric is the boiled, dried, cleaned and polished rhizomes of Curcuma longa. The plant is a herbaceous perennial, 60-90 cm high, with a short stem and tufted leaf. There are 7 to 12 leaves, the leaf sheaths forms the pseudo stem. The lamina is green above and pale green below and has a length of 30-40 cm and width 8-12 cm. Inflorescence is a central spike of 10-15 cm length. 1-4 flowers are born in axil of the bract opening one at a time. About 30 flowers are produced in a spike. Seeds are produced in capsules and there will be one to numerous sunken capsules in an inflorescence. 
 
Indian name for Turmeric:
Hindi : Haldi Bengali : Halud, Pitras Gujarati : Haldhar, Haldi Kannada : Arishia Konkani : Halad Malayalam : Manjal Marathi : Halede, Halad Oriya : Haldil Punjabi : Haldar, Haldhar, Haldi Sanskrit : Haladi, Harita Tamil : Manjal Telugu : Pasupu Urdu : Haladi
Foreign name for Turmeric:
Spanish : Curcuma French : Curcuma German : Kurkuma Gelbwurzel Swedish : Gurkmeja Arabic : Kurkum Dutch : Geelwortel Italian : Curcuma Portuguese : Acafrao-da-India Russian : Zholty Imbir Japanese : Ukon Chinese : Yu.Chin