Perennial much branched herb. Stem 4-sided, angles scabrid or glabrous. Leaves 6-8 in a whorl, 10-25 (-30) x 2-5 mm, sessile or shortly petioled, narrowly linear-obovate or elliptic, acute or cuspidate, scabrous above especially on midrib and recurved margins, sometimes glabrous. Inflorescence many flowered, axillary and terminal cymes, branches stiff, divaricate, pedicels short 1-1.5 mm long, recurved and enlarged in fruit. Corolla white, c. 3.5 mm in diameter, lobes ovate, acuminate, c. 2 mm long. Ovary glabrous. Fruit glabrous or granulate, c. 2 mm in diameter.

In Himalayan mountains Galium asperifolium Wall. is quite wide spread and forms a highly polymorphic group along with related taxa. Previous workes like Hooker f., (l.c.) has treated this taxon as conspecific with Galium mollugo L. However, Galium asperifolium group is clearly segregated from Galium mollugo L. by its perennial habit, oblanceolate tolinear leaves and stipules in whorls of 6 or mote, leafy inflorescence and white to yellowish green corolla. Moreover Ehrendorfer & Schonbeck-Temesy (in Davis, Fl. Turkey 7: 767-849. 1982) and Nazimuddin & Ehrendorfer (in Pl. Syst. Evol. 155: 71-75. 1987) have demostrated that eastern most limit of Galium mollugo L. does not extend beyond W.N. Turkey and Transcaucasus.

In Pakistan two varieties can be recognized.

Lower Taxa

• Galium asperifolium var. asperifolium
• Galium asperifolium var. obovatum Nazim.