MANIFESTATION OF HETEROBELTIOSIS AND STANDARD HETEROSIS FOR YIELD AND YIELD CONTRIBUTING CHARACTERS IN SOLANUM MELONGENA L.

Brinjal is one of the most demanding and majorly cultivating solanaceous crops throughout India.In order to fulfil the yield targets and meet diverse preferences of locals based on different color, shape, size, taste and presence or absence of spines etc., the plant breeders are focusing on producing such highyielding hybrids of eggplant.Therefore, the main importance needs to be laid on breeding programme in order to create variability and to identify the desirable segregants between the parents.Exploitation of heterosis has become a potential tool for improvement of brinjal.The aim of present investigation is to estimate the nature and magnitude of heterobeltiosis and standard heterosis for yield and yield contributing characters.The material comprised of eight genotypes viz., Ruchira, Puna Selection, RHRBR-1, RHRBR-196, RHRBR-54, RHRBR-74, RHRBR-34 and RHRBR-2.The data recorded on parameters viz., plant height, number of primary branches per plant, number of flowers per inflorescence, days to 50 % flowering, plant spread (S-N), plant spread (E-W), length of fruit, fruit diameter, number of fruits per plant, average fruit weight, yield per plant and yield per hectare.The estimates of heterosis revealed that Ruchira x RHRBR-54, Ruchira x RHRBR-74, Puna Selection x RHRBR-1, Puna Selection x RHRBR-54, x RHRBR-74, RHRBR-54 x RHRBR-74, RHRBR-54 x RHRBR-34, RHRBR-54 x RHRBR-2 and RHRBR-74 x RHRBR-2 exhibited high heterobeltiosis and standard heterosis for yield per plant and yield per hectare during both the seasons.These superior crosses can be exploited commercially as hybrids.