Annual. Culms decumbent at base, branching and rooting at lower nodes, 30–100 cm tall, nodes thinly hispid. Leaf sheaths glabrous or hispid; leaf blades linear-lanceolate, 5–20 × 0.3–1 cm, papillose-hispid on both surfaces or adaxial surface glabrous, margins thickened, undulate, scabrous; ligule 1–2.5 mm. Inflorescence subdigitate, axis 1–5 cm; racemes 5–8, 3–15 cm; spikelets paired, imbricate; rachis winged, ca. 1 mm broad, midrib triquetrous, margins scabrous. Spikelets plumply elliptic-oblong, 2.5–3 mm; lower glume minute, veinless; upper glume broadly ovate, 1/3 as long as spikelet, 3-veined, subglabrous, margins membranous, apex broadly obtuse; lower lemma slightly shorter than upper lemma, 7-veined with intervein spaces nearly equidistant, glabrous or margins pilose; upper lemma pale purplish gray at maturity, apex abruptly apiculate, exserted from spikelet. Fl. and fr. Jun–Oct. 2n = 18, 36, 72.
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A millet grass. It grows each year from seed. Plants often lie along the ground. Plants form tillers. Plants can root at the nodes. Stems can be 130 cm long. The leaf blade is narrow and 21 cm long by 1 cm wide. It has a rough surface. The flowering shoots consist of 2-10 stalked flowers being produced up the stem. These flower stalks can be 15 cm long. The fruit is dry, one seeded and very small. It the cultivated form the grain does not shatter easily.
A tropical plant. It grows on poor shallow soils with more than 400 mm of rain each year. It grows in the wet tropics of NE India. It is grown by the Khasi people of Assam and the hill tribes of Vietnam. In China it grows in upland grasslands between 1,000-2,70 above sea level.
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