Genetic Characterization and Variability Analysis of Chickpea (Cicer arietinum) Elite Germplasm under Different Cropping Conditions

In current study 113 diverse genotypes of chickpea has been evaluated during rabi 2019-20 and 2020-21 under timely sown (TS), late sown (LS) and very late sown (VLS) cropping environment in augmented block design at research farm of ICAR-IIPR, Kanpur for genetic characterization to access the presence of variability among the major grain yield attributing traits under changing cropping conditions. Variation due to block were insignificant and error variance was significant for all three different trials (ie., TS, LS and VLS) conducted during rabi 2019-20 and 2020-21(Table 5) In the present study highest genotypic and phenotypic coefficient of variation was observed for UFP, SYP (g), PB, Y (kg/ha), PY (g), HI (%), BMP (g), HSW (g) and FP (Table 5) While the traits viz., DFI, DFF, DPI, DFP, DMI, DM and PHT (cm), BY (g) and NSP exhibited the moderate to low range of GVC and PCV value under TS, LS and VLS cropping conditions During rabi 2019-20 and 2020-21. Highest value of heritability (%) >60% have been observe for the traits DFI, DFF, DMI, DM, PB, Y (kg/ha), HSW (g), SYP (g), BMP (g) and FP in all three different cropping environments (Table 6 in the current study correlation coefficient analysis have been estimated for the Correlation values (Table 6) for all three different trials viz Timely sown (TS), Late sown (LS) and Very Late sown (VLS) conducted in Rabi 2019-20 and 2020-2021. The Pearson correlation coefficients of pooled data were calculated for Eighteen morphological traits The major yield contributing traits such as DFF, PHT (cm), PB, SYP (g), PY (g), Y (g), HSW (g), BY (g) and HI (%) have significantly correlated with all the traits except UFP and NSP (Table 6) The PY (g) exhibited strong positive correlation with Y (Kg/ha) (0.857** and 0.964**); HSW (g) (0.544* and 0.412*); BY (g) (517* and 0.856**); SYP (g) (0.628**and 0.506*); BMP (g) (0.553* and 0.494*); HI (%) (0.459* and 0.706**). Similarly, another chief yield contributing traits like SPY (g) is also positively correlated BMP (g) (0.536* and 0.682**); HI (%) (0.678** and 0.779**); FP (0.774** and 0.964**) and NSP (0.456* and 0.503*) except UFP (Table 7 maximum percentage of variance for all 113 diverse chickpea genotypes has been recorded for PC1(26.83, 26.63 & 31.46 in 2019-20; 29.87, 35.15 & 30.2 in 2020-21) and PC2 (24.19, 22.81 & 12.66 in 2019-20; 18.96, 15.43 & 17.4 in 2020-21) for all three separate trials i.e., TS, LS and VLS (Table 7).