Evaluation of sesame germplasm against the phyllody disease

Sesame is one of the important oilseed crops of India and suffers from many diseases. Among them phyllody is one of the most important causing severe crop and yield losses. To identify resistant sources, a set of 1,477 germplasm lines were evaluated. The germplasm set was sown in 3 m row in two replications along with susceptible check in paired row after every fifth entry. To attract the insect vector, one of the rows of the susceptible check was given top cutting at full vegetative stage. Out of the total accessions sown, 949 accessions were observed free from phyllody disease and 55 genotypes proved to be resistant with 0.1-10% incidence of phyllody. Notably, 81 lines were found to be moderately resistant with 30.1-40% disease incidence and 29 lines were found to be susceptible to phyllody corresponding to 40.1-50% disease incidence. However, some germplasm demonstrated significant susceptibility, with 16 accessions categorized as highly susceptible (>50% disease incidence). This screening effort would provide valuable insights for breeding programs aiming to develop phyllody-resistant cultivars.