The Department of Botany at the Union Christian College is one of the leading departments dedicated to teaching and research with specialization in plant and fungal biology. The department consists of 8 faculty and 5 Ph. D scholars supported by 4 administrative staff including a gardener and herbarium keeper. The Department offers undergraduate programme in Botany with Horticulture and Nursery management as elective. The dept also offers a diploma course in Industrial floriculture. The post graduate programmes offered are in Botany and Bioinformatics.

For MSc. course in Botany, the major electives is Mycology and Plant Pathology and the minor being Plant Genetic resources management. The MSc. Bioinformatics course is equipped with a wet lab and wifi internet computer lab with broad band facility. In addition to the Central library we have a small Library, with a large collection of current periodicals and over 200 books and DVDs, internet and multimedia presentation facilities. . The department also houses a herbarium with about 3500 specimens and has close links with the T. C. Joseph Botanic Garden and Arboratum.

The Department is an approved research centre of Mahatma Gandhi University and there are eight research supervisors. The major areas of research are Mycology, Plant Pathology, Ecology, Systematics, Ethnobotany and Histotaxonomy.
Established in 1953 – University of Travancore.
 Post Graduate course -1965.
The Department recognized as a
research centre by
 University of Kerala -1979
 Mahatma Gandhi University -1983