Genetic variability and agro-morphological diversity analysis in aromatic rice genotypes of North Eastern India

The research work on variability and genetic diversity was conducted in thirty-two landraces of aromatic rice from various states of north eastern along with two national variety PD-1503 and Basmati 370 in the experimental field of Genetics and Plant Breeding, College of Agriculture, CAU, Imphal, during Kharif, 2021. Agro-morphological characters showed significant variations, starch content and crude protein content were non-significant. Phenotypic variance was higher than the corresponding genotypic variance. High genotypic and phenotypic coefficient of variation was observed for the characters such as grain yield per plant, number of grains per panicle, number of panicles per plant and length of leaf blade. Among quality parameters, crude fat content and crude protein content exhibit high genotypic and phenotypic coefficient of variation. High heritability coupled with high genetic advance was observed in number of panicles per plant, number of grains per panicle and crude fat content. The genotypes were grouped into four clusters following Tocher’s method of clustering. Maximum genotypes viz., 27 genotypes fall in cluster I, while four genotypes fall in cluster II, cluster III has 2 genotypes whereas cluster IV has solitary genotype. Significant amount of variability and genetic diversity observed in the present investigation could be helpful in further improvement of the reported superior genotypes or selection of parents for further hybridization program.