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VARIATION AND INTER-RELATIONSHIPS OF QUANTITATIVE TRAITS IN CHICKPEA (CICER ARIETINUM L.)

BABAR MANZOOR ATTA, MUHAMMAD AHSANUL HAQ AND TARIQ MAHMUD SHAH

Abstract: Thirty two chickpea genotypes were evaluated for days to flowering, days to maturity, plant height, primary branches, secondary branches, pods per plant, 100 seed weight and grain yield per plant. Genetic parameters, correlations, path coefficients and partial regressions were estimated for all the traits. Analysis of variance revealed significant differences among the genotypes for all the characters. Broad sense heritability estimates for various traits ranged from 39 – 97%. Grain yield per plant showed highly significant positive correlation with days to maturity, primary branches, secondary branches and 100 seed weight and significant positive correlation with pods per plant. Path coefficient analysis revealed that pods per plant and 100 seed weight had the highest direct effect on grain yield per plant followed by secondary branches. The total variability calculated through multiple correlation in the population for yield improvement accounted by secondary branches, pods per plant and 100 seed weight was 88.6% compared to 89.4% accounted by the all characters. The pods per plant and 100 seed weight showed highly significant and secondary branches showed significant partial regression coefficients with grain yield per plant. Results revealed that more number of secondary branches, pods per plant and bold seed size are major yield contributing factors in selecting high yielding chickpea cultivars.

Mutation Breeding Division, Nuclear Institute for Agriculture and Biology (NIAB), P.O. Box 128, Jhang Road, Faisalabad, Pakistan.