Lac Resin (Lakh): The Insect Gum on Your Apple, Pills and in Unani
Lac resin (lakh, or luk in Unani texts) is the hard reddish gum that a tiny scale insect, Kerria lacca, secretes around itself on the twigs of certain trees. It is the only “gond” in the pansari’s shop that comes from an animal rather than a plant. Hakeems washed it and put it into liver and weight formulas, bangle makers melted it, and in its refined form, shellac (E904), it is probably on the shiny apple in your fruit bowl and the coated tablet in your drawer. This page explains what lakh is, what the washing step is for, what Unani claimed against what is actually known, and the vegetarian and halal question the apple raises.
Lac at a glance
- English: lac, lac resin; refined form shellac, food additive E904
- Urdu/Hindi: lakh, laakh, lakh dana (seed lac), chapda lakh (flake shellac), laksha in Ayurveda
- Arabic/Persian/Unani: luk; luk maghsool means washed lac
- Source: secretion of the lac insect Kerria lacca (older name Laccifer lacca), farmed on ber, palash and kusum trees in India and Thailand
- Forms: sticklac (raw twigs), seed lac, shellac flakes, lac dye
- Main uses: glaze on fruit, sweets and tablets; polish and varnish; bangles; a minor Unani ingredient
- Safety flag: animal origin; crude lac carries insect debris and dye; the refined coating is approved at trace levels
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What exactly is lakh, and why is it not a tree gum?
Every other resin a hakeem buys oozes from a plant. Lac is different. The female lac insect settles on a soft twig, pushes in her mouthparts and sucks sap for the rest of her short life, secreting a resin that hardens over her body and the bodies of thousands of neighbours until the twig looks dipped in dark red toffee. That crust is lac.
Farmers cut the encrusted twigs (sticklac). Crushing and washing them removes twig fragments, dead insects and the water soluble red dye, leaving grainy seed lac, the lakh dana of the trade. Melting seed lac, straining it through cloth and spreading it into thin sheets gives shellac, sold as flakes or buttons. Europe’s food safety assessment of E904 describes the same stages, and adds that shellac is refined either by dissolving in alcohol and filtering through charcoal or by chemical bleaching. The red wash water is lac dye, which coloured silk, wool and bridal alta for centuries.
The pansari’s check: lakh dana is not chapda
Ask which one you are being sold. Seed lac is a coarse, dull, orange to brown grain that still holds wax, insect fragments and dye. Shellac (chapda lakh) is glassy, thin and translucent, snaps cleanly and leaves far less residue when melted. Unani preparations call for luk maghsool, washed lac, precisely because the insect bodies and dye are what washing removes. Powdered “lakh” sold loose with no sign of whether it was washed is the grade to walk away from. A quick tell: a pinch of unwashed seed lac stirred in warm water throws a strong red brown stain; properly washed lac gives much less.
What Unani tradition says about luk maghsool
Classical Unani texts give lac a hot and dry temperament and describe it as drying and astringent. The uses recorded are for the liver and spleen, for stopping bleeding, for a weak stomach and for “melting” fat, which is why washed lac is one ingredient of Safoof-e-Muhazzil, the well known anti-obesity powder that also contains rose petals, marzanjosh and other herbs. The books insist on washing. Raw lac from the market was known to be full of dirt, insect remains and twig, and repeated washing with warm water was meant to remove them and soften the drug’s harshness.
Ayurveda has a parallel tradition under the name laksha, in oils and powders for bones and bleeding. Both systems treat lac as a supporting ingredient, never a star.
What does the evidence actually say?
Reasonably well established: refined shellac is a safe food coating at the amounts used. The European Food Safety Authority re-evaluated E904 in 2024 and set an acceptable daily intake of 4 mg per kilogram of body weight for wax free shellac made by physical decolouring, while asking for more data on chlorinated impurities in the chemically bleached grade. The film on an apple or a sweet is far below that.
Preliminary only: laboratory work on lac dye and on lac resin as a film former and dental additive, plus a 2022 animal toxicity profile of lac dye as a colourant. None of it says what swallowing lac powder does to a human liver or waistline.
Tradition only: the liver, bleeding and fat reduction claims. Safoof-e-Muhazzil is a mixture of a dozen ingredients taken alongside diet advice, and no good trial separates what lac contributes. Read “lakh ke fayde” lists as a record of what hakeems believed.
Unsupported and unwise: eating crude seed lac, chewing bangle lac, or buying lakh as a slimming powder on its own.
Where you meet shellac today
As a glazing agent it is allowed in the European Union on the surface of citrus, melons, apples, pears, peaches, pineapples, mangoes, avocados and papayas, and as a glaze on chocolate products, confectionery, chewing gum and biscuits. Glossy coated chocolate beans, jelly beans and the hard “confectioner’s glaze” on sprinkles are typical places to meet it; the label reads shellac, E904, confectioner’s glaze or resinous glaze.
Shellac has coated pills for over a century. It does not dissolve in water but does in alkali, so it can delay a tablet’s breakup until the gut, and some enteric coatings and food supplements still use it. If a coated product matters to you for dietary or religious reasons, the leaflet or the maker holds the answer, not the colour of the pill.
In the bazaar, lac bangles, sealing wax and French polish are all the same resin. In Unani compounds, washed lac appears in a few powders and majoons, most famously Safoof-e-Muhazzil; the practitioner or the pack sets the amount, and our explainer on jawarish, majoon, khameera, arq and sharbat covers how these dosage forms differ.
The kitchen test: is the shine on your apple shellac or wax?
Shellac dissolves in alcohol; carnauba wax, the other common fruit coating, hardly does. Dampen a cotton pad with plain surgical spirit, rub one patch of a very shiny apple for ten seconds, and look. If the coating turns dull, smeary or slightly sticky and some lifts onto the pad, that is shellac behaviour; a pure wax coating barely changes. Wash the apple afterwards. The test only tells you which coating is there. It says nothing about pesticide residue, which needs a lab, and in Pakistan and India most domestic fruit is sold uncoated anyway.
Is shellac vegetarian? Is it halal?
The honest answer to both is “it depends who you ask”.
Vegetarian and vegan: shellac is an insect secretion and insects die in its harvest, so vegan groups class it as non vegan and most strict vegetarians avoid it. Some lacto vegetarians accept it as a secretion rather than flesh, much as some accept honey. Western fruit sellers sometimes label “vegan coating” when carnauba or plant waxes are used instead.
Halal: scholars differ. One line of reasoning says insects other than locusts are not permitted food and that the alcohol used in refining is a further problem, so shellac should be avoided. Another, including a fatwa from Darul Uloom Karachi endorsed by Mufti Muhammad Taqi Usmani that several halal food guides adopted in 2012, holds that the resin is a secretion rather than part of the insect’s body, is consumed only in trace amounts, and carries no remaining alcohol, so it is permissible; South Africa’s SANHA took the same view. We are not qualified to rule. If it matters to you, ask your own scholar, and remember that a certification stamp reflects the body that issued it.
Safety: who should think twice?
- Not a slimming drug. Lac on its own has no human evidence for weight loss. Anyone with diabetes who eats less on a new regime should know that insulin and sulfonylurea tablets then carry a hypo risk, so the prescribing doctor needs to be told.
- Crude lac is not food. Unwashed seed lac, bangle lac and furniture shellac carry dye, wax, insect fragments and, in craft products, solvents and fillers. Never eat them.
- Purity checks apply to any traditional compound bought loose. Our guide to heavy metals in herbal, Ayurvedic and Unani medicine explains what to look for on a label.
- Pregnancy, breastfeeding and children: no safety data exist for lac taken as a medicine, so skip Unani lac preparations unless a qualified practitioner who knows you are pregnant has chosen them. Shellac on fruit and sweets is a trace coating and is considered safe for everyone.
- Allergy: contact reactions to shellac in mascaras, hair sprays and nail products are recorded. Itchy eyelids after a new mascara: check for shellac.
- Stop and ask if a compound containing lac brings on stomach pain, unusual bruising or bleeding, yellowing of the eyes or dark urine. Bring the pack.
For other resins and the words on their packets, see Unani & Herbal, Decoded.
Lac, lakh and shellac: questions people ask
Lakh kya hai aur kahan se aata hai?
Lakh is a hard resin made by the lac insect, Kerria lacca, on twigs of trees such as palash, ber and kusum. It comes mainly from the forests of eastern and central India and from Thailand. Farmers harvest the crusted twigs, wash and crush them into seed lac, and melt that into shellac.
What is lac resin in English?
Lac or lac resin. The refined, melted and filtered form is shellac, which appears on food labels as shellac, E904, confectioner’s glaze or resinous glaze.
Is lac resin safe to eat?
Refined shellac used as a glaze is considered safe at the thin coating levels on fruit, sweets and pills; European regulators set an acceptable daily intake of 4 mg per kilogram of body weight in 2024. Crude seed lac, bangle lac and furniture shellac are not food.
What is E904?
E904 is the European additive number for shellac, the purified resin of the lac insect, used as a glazing agent on fruit, confectionery, chewing gum, biscuits and coated pills.
Lakh chapda ke fayde kya hain?
Chapda lakh is shellac flake. Unani tradition credits washed lac with drying and astringent actions and uses it in a few compounds for the liver and for weight, but no human evidence shows lac itself delivers those benefits. Its proven uses are as a coating, polish and craft material.
Luk maghsool kya hai in Unani?
Washed lac. Classical texts require crude lac to be washed repeatedly with warm water to remove twig, insect remains and much of the red dye before it goes into a formulation such as Safoof-e-Muhazzil.
Is shellac vegetarian?
Not by strict standards. It is an insect secretion and insects die during harvest, so vegan groups class it as non vegan and most vegetarians avoid it. Some lacto vegetarians accept it as a secretion, as some accept honey.
Is shellac halal?
Scholars disagree. Some rule it impermissible because insects are not food and alcohol is used in refining. Others, including a Darul Uloom Karachi fatwa endorsed by Mufti Taqi Usmani and SANHA in South Africa, consider it permissible as a trace secretion with no remaining alcohol. Ask your own scholar.
Does lakh help you lose weight?
No evidence shows that lac on its own reduces weight. It is one of many ingredients in Safoof-e-Muhazzil, which is given with diet changes, and no trial isolates its contribution.
Bottom line
Lac is an insect resin with an honest, useful life as a coating and a craft material. Unani tradition gave the washed form a minor role in liver, bleeding and weight compounds, and the washing instruction was sound, because crude lac is full of things nobody should swallow; the medical claims themselves remain unproven in people. The fact worth carrying away is that the shine on coated fruit, sweets and pills is often this same insect resin, which makes the vegetarian and halal questions real ones, with answers that depend on the authority you follow.
Sources
- EFSA Panel on Food Additives and Flavourings. Re-evaluation of shellac (E 904) as a food additive and a new application on the extension of use of shellac (E 904) in dietary foods for special medical purposes. EFSA Journal 2024;22(8):e8897
- Park JS et al. Nonclinical safety evaluation of food colorant lac dye via toxicity profiling. Frontiers in Pharmacology, 2022 (PubMed)
- Foodguide (UK): Shellac, halaal ruling note citing Darul Uloom Karachi and Mufti Taqi Usmani, updated 24 December 2012