Contribution of important traits of rainfed chickpea (Cicer arietinum) for improving seed yield

The present study was undertaken during rabi season of 200405 at Raipur using 16 genotypes of chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) grown under rainfed conditions. For yield and its attributes high genotypic coefficient variation was observed for 100-seed weight, pods plant⁻¹ and seeds pod⁻¹. Moreover, days to 50% flowering, plant height, seed yield and branches plant⁻¹ exhibited medium genotypic coefficient variation indicating existence of sufficient variability for the traits. High heritability coupled with high genetic advance as percentage of mean was observed for 100seed weight and days to 50% flowering indicating the role of additive genetic variance in the expression of these traits. Genotypic correlation coefficients studied in the present investigation were similar in nature and higher in magnitude than the corresponding phenotypic correlation coefficients. Findings of correlation analysis revealed that seed yield had significant positive correlation with number of pods plant⁻¹. Hence, direct selection for pods plant⁻¹ may result in the development of high yielding chickpea genotypes under rainfed condition.