Terrestrial or epiphytic summer-green, perennial herbs with erect unbranched leafy stems from stout rhizomes. Leaves distichous, sessile or short-petioled, oblong to linear or lanceolate, acuminate; ligule small or large, a continuation of the membranous sheath-margins. Flowers large, in often dense, bracteate spikes, each bract subtending 2-3 flowers. Calyx-tube of 3 connate sepals, often hairy, slender; corolla-tube very slender, much > calyx; lobes long, narrow, reflexed. Staminodia petaloid, as long as corolla but wider than its lobes, white or coloured; labellum broader than other staminodia, ± deeply bilobed. Filament of fertile stamen elongate, ± = staminodia, much > anther. Capsule globose, 3-valved, loculicidal. Seeds with aril deeply divided into many long irregular lobes . Spp. c. 50, of India, East Asia, Malaysia and Madagascar. Adventive spp. 2.