| Description: |
In order to establish the selection criteria, seventy chickpea genotypes were assessed during the rabi season of 2023-24 across nine physiological traits. The selection of genotypes and traits relied on Principal Component Analysis. Results regarding PCA revealed that the first three PC’s showed eigenvalues greater than 1; therefore, these were considered for the dissection of variation. The initial four principal components accounted for 76.8% of the overall variation. PC1 contributed to 38.9% of the total diversity, whereas PC2, PC3, and PC4 accounted for 16.0%, 11.9%, and 10.0% of the variability, respectively. The first principal component, PC1, exhibited strong positive loadings for Seed Yield (0.516), Pods per plant (0.483), and secondary branches (0.442), along with negative loadings for wilting disease (-0.501). The second principal component, PC2, displayed a high positive loading for 100 seed weight (0.349) but showed negative contributions for days to maturity (-0.534) and Seeds per Pod (-0.475). Principal component three (PC3) established high positive loadings for Days to flowering(0.720) and 100-seed weight(0.668). The traits, viz., secondary branches, seed yield, pods per plant, and disease tolerance (wilting percentage), exhibited a valuable positive correlation. The genotypes 22ACK13, 22ACK15, 14FCK10, 15FCK14, 17FCK05, 17FCK41, 17FCK60, 18FCK27, 19FCK11, 19FCK17, 19FCK18, and 20KCC101 have good potential for these characters. These results may assist chickpea breeders in future hybridisation programs for improving yield and related traits. |