“…Due to the absence of any effective natural enemies and due to its allelopathic nature, large seed bank, and fast growth rate, parthenium grows luxuriantly all through the year, infesting millions of hectares of land masses including agricultural fields, parks, orchards, railway tracks, and other open areas (Wiesner et al 2007; Nigatu et al 2010; Qureshi et al 2014). This proves disastrous in terms of monopolizing of space and nutrients by parthenium at the expense of other vegetation, consequent loss of biodiversity, and associated ecological imbalances (Hussain et al 2016a, b). Parthenium’s dominance over other vegetation is fostered by the presence of allelopathic compounds in parthenium, especially parthenin, hysterin, ambrosin, and flavonoids (Maishi et al 1998; Khan and Abbasi 1998; Knox et al 2011; Patel 2011; Kaur et al 2014).…”