Dixita Rajkhowa, Gobin C. Bora, Palki Priya Khargharia, Reecha T. Das, Manisha Kachari, Kaushik Das and Kunal Kaushik
Abstract
The study evaluated fourteen okra genotypes under field conditions at the Assam Agricultural University Experimental Farm in 2022 to analyze variability, heritability, genetic advance, and correlations among traits. Multivariate analyses, including D2 and principal component analysis, were also performed to assess genetic diversity. Significant variation was found among genotypes, indicating genetic diversity. Genotypes Kashi Lalima, IC-27831, JOC-3, and IC-0620645 performed best in yield-related traits. High heritability and genetic advance were observed for traits like number of flowers and number of fruits per plant, plant height and yield per plant suggesting the role of additive gene action in the inheritance of these characters. Correlation studies revealed that number of flowers and number of fruits per plant has strong positive correlation with yield, making them ideal traits for selection. Genotypic path coefficient analysis indicated that the number of fruits per plant exerted the highest positive direct effect on yield. The genotypes were grouped into five clusters using Mahalanobis D2 analysis, with clusters V and II having the greatest inter cluster distance, which also had the highest means for key traits. Principal component analysis revealed that 83.61% of the variability was explained by three components.