Interrelationship and Cause - Effect of Morphological Traits with Grain Yield and Oil Content among Indian Mustard (Brassica juncea L. Czern & Coss) Genotypes under Non- irrigated and Irrigated Condition

Abstract

Water scarcity is a venomous upshot of climate change and is one of the sternest factors restraining global crop productivity. In order to study association and cause-effect of shortage in irrigation on some morphological and quality traits on yield, an experiment accommodating 20 genotypes of Indian  mustard (Brassica juncea L. Czern & Coss), was conducted in Randomised Complete Block Design (RBCD) from various Rapeseed & Mustard centres  located across country, randomly in three replications  during Rabi2016-17, one condition subjected to drought (devoid of irrigation) inside  the Rainout shelter under residual moisture condition and another situation with  normal irrigated field condition at research farm of Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Pusa, Samastipur. Genotypic correlations for grain yield and other characters were invariably higher than phenotypic correlations indicating indicated less influence of environment. Earliness in flowering (-0.010; -0.256) and maturity (-0.335; -0.185), Secondary branches per plant (0.267; 0.169), Siliqua on primary mother axis (0.162; 0.079), Length of primary axis (0.006; 0.275), Siliqua density (0.244; 0.189) and Biological yield (0.444*;0.411*) also had shown positive correlation with grain yield per plot at phenotypic level under both non- irrigated and irrigated condition indicated that improvement in these morphological parameters indicated genotypes with early flowering and maturity coupled with more secondary branches with  more siliqua accommodated by longer primary mother axis with increasing density of siliqua along with high biological yield and will ultimately enhance the grain yield.