Perennial herb with a thick somewhat fleshy rootstock. Stems erect or ascending, unbranched or with few branches, 20-30 (-60) cm, quadrangular, somewhat sturdy, with long multicellular eglandular hairs and short glandular hairs, and with or without red oil globules. Leaves ovate, crenulate to serrrulate, thickish in texture, 4-8 x 2-4.5 cm, cuneate, pubescent on both surfaces, red-gland-dotted below; petiole up to 1.5 cm, somewhat winged. Verticillasters c. 8-flowered, forming spike-like racemes, c. 10-20 cm; inflorescence axis glandular villous. Bracts large, ovate-acuminate, c. 10 cm, deciduous. Pedicels c. 5 mm, erect in flower and fruit. Calyx c.5 mm in flower, often dark coloured, spreading; fruiting calyx deflexed, curved, 8-10 mm, densely white-villous in throat, 10-ribbed, upper lip entire ovate, lower with 4 triangular teeth, acuminate, mucronate. Corolla bluish-purple or white, to c. 2 cm, often red-gland-dotted; tube deflexed, without an annulus; upper lip short, with 2-4 lobules; lower lip boat-shaped much narrowed at base. Staminal filaments connate below. Nutlets dark brown, smooth ovoid-spherical c. 1.5 x 1.5 mm, not mucilaginous on wetting.

Described on cultivated specimens of E. African Abyssinian provenance.

Distribution: E. tropical Africa, Arabian peninsula, India, Sri Lanka, Himalayas from Kashmir, Kumaon to Nepal.

The Kashmir record needs confirmation; I have not seen the specimen cited or any material from our area.