Idukki Gold
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| Kind of name | Trade name |
|---|---|
| Also called | Kerala Gold Neela Chadayan Neelachadayan Chadayan Neelam Mahadevan |
| Refers to | Ganja from the hills of Idukki; also ganja from Odisha and Andhra Pradesh sold in Kerala under the name |
Idukki Gold, also Kerala Gold, is a trade name for ganja from the hills of Idukki District in Kerala, India. Locally the plant is called neela chadayan.[1] By 2016 ganja grown in Odisha and Andhra Pradesh was also being repackaged in Idukki and sold under the name.[2][1] In 2005 Outlook called neela chadayan "the best Kerala strain".[3] In 2016 Onmanorama wrote that the hills had given the district "one of the best weeds around the planet".[2]
Name
Bobins Abraham, writing in Indiatimes in 2016, said that the name comes from the place where the ganja is grown and had been in circulation abroad for some time before the Malayalam film Idukki Gold (2013), which had, in Abraham's word, "glamorised" it.[1] A column in the Malayalam daily Kerala Kaumudi in 2021 said that the name became familiar to many Malayalis only after the film, directed by Aashiq Abu, although it had been famous in the world drug market for years before. In Malayalam script the name is ഇടുക്കി ഗോൾഡ്.[4]
Abraham calls the plant Neela Chadayan or simply Chadayan, "which means blue curly".[1] Outlook wrote neela chadayan, "or the blue plant".[3] GQ India wrote Neelachadayan, "blue locks", and gave a second name, Neelam.[5] Onmanorama said in 2017 that the variety grown in the high ranges had earlier been known as Neelachadayan and had another name, Mahadevan.[6] In Malayalam script it is നീല ചടയൻ.[4]
Ganja from Idukki
The plantations in Idukki lay on the border with Tamil Nadu and were raided from both sides.[1] Abraham reported the view of the district's old-timers that chadayan came into circulation in the 1980s, when settlers began moving into the parts of Idukki that became the High Range. Abraham also reported a belief that it was a hybrid, "80 per cent India and 20 per cent foreign, probably Amsterdam"; the growers Abraham asked did not know what it was made of and did not think it mattered.[1] The Kerala Kaumudi columnist wrote that cannabis was grown widely in the folds of the High Range hills until India banned it as a narcotic in 1985; people came to Idukki looking for it, foreigners among them.[4]
Migrant growers from Idukki also grew neela chadayan in Attappadi, in Palakkad District, which like Idukki lies in the Western Ghats. Outlook reported in 2005 that over the previous ten years the migrants had made Attappadi "a haven for hemp growers". They cleared ground in the forest by burning large trees and planted it there. Forest officials had photographed nurseries deep in the forest where seed was raised in polythene bags. Officials of the Narcotics Control Bureau believed that most of the high-end ganja grown in the Attappadi hills left the country by sea as oil.[3]
Onmanorama put the potency of the Idukki ganja down to "the rich soil and climatic conditions of the Western Ghats" and said that it was hard to grow anywhere else. It reported that ganja grown in Idukki had up to 8 per cent THC, while ganja from Odisha, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana had less than 5 per cent.[2]
By July 2016 receding forests and an Excise Department crackdown had cut the plantations. Onmanorama wrote that "Famed varieties such as 'Idukki Gold' are hard to come by these days".[2] Abraham put the decline down to a growing population, the loss of forest and stricter policing, and wrote that growers who planted the original seed on the Andhra–Odisha border got a crop of poor quality.[1]
Ganja sold under the name
In 2016 Onmanorama reported that ganja grown in Odisha was smuggled into Idukki, repackaged as "Idukki Gold" and sent on to customers, some of them outside Kerala, who paid a premium "for 'Idukki Gold' that was not". The ganja came from Odisha and Andhra Pradesh through Salem, Theni and Cumbum in Tamil Nadu. According to the Excise Department, a kilogram that cost Rs 1,500 in Odisha at the December harvest fetched Rs 35,000 in Kochi and Rs 30,000 in Thiruvananthapuram. It fetched more when it was sold as Idukki Gold.[2]
The ganja grown on the Andhra–Odisha border, in the Eastern Ghats, had names of its own. Onmanorama named Seelavathi, Rajahamsa and Kalapathri among the Andhra Pradesh varieties and called Seelavathi "a hybrid of the Idukki variety".[2] Abraham called it Sheelavathi, "a local variant" better suited to the climate there, and wrote that it was "still sold as 'Idukki Gold' in the market": it was smuggled to Idukki and sold from there, in India and abroad, "as the premium brand". By then most of the crop was made into hashish in the fields; only the finished product reached Idukki.[1]
In 2017 Onmanorama wrote that rackets were bringing ganja from other states into Kerala and selling it as Idukki Gold "because the Kerala variety fetches double the price compared to those in states like Andhra and Odisha".[6] The Kerala Kaumudi column of 2021 said that growers from Idukki had set up plantations in the Naxalite-affected areas of Andhra and Odisha. The ganja grown there, known as Sheelavathi, was brought into Kerala through Tamil Nadu and by other routes and sold as Idukki Gold.[4]
See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 Abraham, Bobins (2016). "Asia's Best Marijuana Is Grown In India And Its In Kerala. Here's The Full Story Of Idukki Gold". Indiatimes. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 "Psychedelic 'Idukki Gold', made in Andhra & Orissa". Onmanorama. 27 July 2016. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Ramachandran, Rajesh (26 September 2005). "Stone Age". Outlook. Retrieved 19 October 2026.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 അഖിൽ സഹായി (8 October 2021). ഇടുക്കി ഗോൾഡ് ചമഞ്ഞ 'ശീലാവതി' ['Sheelavathi' posing as Idukki Gold]. Kerala Kaumudi (in മലയാളം). Retrieved 21 October 2026.
- ↑ GQ Staff (28 October 2016). "India's best marijuana is disappearing". GQ India. Retrieved 21 October 2026.
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Puthezhath, Jijo John (28 August 2017). "Which royal brought Gurmeet Ram Rahim to Kerala?". Onmanorama. Retrieved 21 October 2026.