It is endemic to the island of Sri Lanka and was formerly treated as a subspecies of Indian scimitar babbler.

[2] The nominate form is found in the western part of wet hill regions of Sri Lanka, while race holdsworthi is found in the dry lowlands and eastern hills.

[3] Most scimitar babbler species are referred as parandel kurulla[4] by the Sinhala-speaking community.

The vernacular name of the bird parandel kurulla roughly translates to English as 'dried-grass-colored bird'.

This bird appears in a 4.50 rupee Sri Lankan postal stamp.