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Abstract

A field experiment was conducted to evaluate the agronomic performance of 23 chickpea genotypes at the University of Agriculture, Peshawar, during 2020-21. The study utilized a RCBD with three replicates, examining genotype-by-sowing date interactions across three planting times: early (October 3), normal (October 22), and late (December 5). Combined analysis of variance (ANOVA) across three environments revealed significant (P < 0.05) main effects for genotypes, environments, and genotype-by-environment (G × E) interactions for the majority of evaluated traits. Notably, G × E interactions were non-significant only for secondary branches per plant, seeds per pod, and 100-grain weight. On the average across the three environments there exist high estimates of the maximum primary branches for genotype NDC-122, pod plant-1 for NDC-15-4 and seed pod-1, seed yield for NDC-15-4. The G × E interaction means revealed maximum primary branches plant -1 for genotypes, NDC-122, pods plant-1 for NDC-15-4, seeds pod-1 for NDC-15-4 and seed yield for NDC-15-4. High heritability was estimated for seed yield in three environments, early (0. 94) normal (0. 94) and late (0. 91). Similarly to the results with seed yield based on broad sense heritability values, they were high for bio-yield under early (0. 80) normal (0. 97) and late (0. 69) sowing environments, respectively. Seed yield showed strong substantial positive genotypic and phenotypic associations with plant height, secondary branches, pods plant-1, seeds pod-1 and biological yield at all the sowing times. Due to independent environment, maximum seed yield was recorded under early sowing with NIFA-2005, under normal sowing with NDC-15-4 and under late sowing with EG1. Consistently across environments, genotypes NDC-15-4, IG3, and MG5 demonstrated superior yield performance and potential incorporation into future breeding programs as elite genetic materials. Key words: Genetic Variability, Genotype × environment interaction, Genotypic and phenotypic correlation, Heritability

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