Genetic diversity studies in finger millet: Eleusine coracana L. Gaertn

The present investigation was conducted to examine the genetic diversity among 34 genotypes of finger millet, during Kharif-2019 in Randomized Block Design with three replications. The data were recorded on fifteen quantitative characters to study variability, heritability, genetic advance and genetic divergence. Analysis of Variance showed significant differences among 34 finger millet genotypes for all the characters under study at 1% level of significance. Thus, indicating that a good amount of variability thus revealed that these genotypes have been developed from different genetic background. On the basis of per se performance for different quantitative traits, genotype IE3473 was found to be the best genotype in Prayagraj agro-climatic conditions. High estimates of GCV and PCV were observed for harvest index. High heritability coupled with high genetic advance was recorded for harvest index, followed by biological yield per plant, test weight, days to 50% flowering, indicating the predominance of additive gene effects and the possibilities of effective selection for the improvement of these characters. Based on the relative magnitude of D2 value, the genotypes were grouped into seven clusters by Euclidean method of divergence study. Cluster I constituted maximum number genotypes with 18 genotypes. Maximum inter- cluster distance (D2) was observed between cluster VII and VI, suggesting that the genotypes from these clusters can be selected to yield superior segregants and further genetic improvement. Grain yield appeared to be the most important trait contributing maximum towards genetic divergence. This indicated that this attributes should form the criteria for selection of parents for hybridization programme.