Performance of Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) Sown on different Seed Bed Configurations in Malwa Region of Madhya Pradesh

The major concern of Furrow Irrigated Raised Bed System (FIRBS) is to enhance the productivity and save the irrigation water. In this system of planting chickpea crop is sown in paired rows on ridges or beds. The height of the beds is maintained at about 20 to 25 cm with a width of about 40 to 50 cm for the chickpea sowing. The field experiments were conducted at different villages of Dewas district of Madhya Pradesh viz. Narana, Nanadharakhedi and chidawad during the year 2013–14, 2014–15 and 2015–16 to evaluate the performance of chickpea under different land configurations. The trials involved three seed bed configurations i.e. flat sowing (T1), raised bed with pair row of crop at 20 cm spacing on one bed and 40 cm furrow width (T2) and raised bed with pair row of crop at 30 cm spacing on one bed with 50 cm furrow width (T3) with 10 replications. It was found that treatment T3 recorded 25.5 and 8.89 per cent more nodulation as compared to treatment T1 and T2, respectively. Number of pods/plant were also maximum with raised bed planting of treatment T3 (106.5) which was significantly higher than flat bed T1 (23%) and T2 (14%). Grain yield, straw yield and biological yield were also significantly influenced by the different sowing methods and it were found maximum (19.35, 30.45 and 49.80 q/ha respectively) by sowing of chick pea in raised bed with pair row of crop at 30 cm spacing on one bed with 50 cm furrow width (T3). Hence, it was concluded that treatment T3 (raised bed with pair row of crop at 30 cm spacing on one bed with 50 cm furrow width) was economically feasible as compared to other methods of sowing of chick pea.