IPA 15-2 (Sharada): A high yielding, wilt and sterility mosaic disease resistant pigeonpea cultivar for North East Plain Zone

Abstract

Development of improved cultivars with enhanced resistance/tolerance is an indispensable process to improve the productivity in pigeonpea. Newly released long duration pigeonpea variety IPA 15-2 (Sharada) was developed by crossing diverse parents’ viz., NDA 1 and MAL 13. The generation advancement was monitored through pedigree breeding method. The female parent NDA 1 is compact in growth habit with resistant reaction to sterility mosaic disease (SMD). While, the male parent MAL 13 is spreading and resistant to wilt disease. The variety IPA 15-2 (Sharada) was subjected to three years rigorous testing for yield stability and disease resistance under All India Coordinated Research Project on pigeonpea during 2017-18 to 2019-20. The results revealed that the weighted mean of three years grain yield over six test location was 2266 kg/ha. However, the centre Varanasi recorded highest yield of 2998 kg/ha. The variety IPA 15-2 (Sharada) offers 23.47% higher yield superiority over the national check variety Bahar and 24.38% over zonal check IPA 203 (Prakash). It is resistant to wilt (15.11%) and sterility mosaic disease (15.62%). Keeping this in view the committee on Release of Crop Variety to Central Sub-Committee on Crop Standards Notification and Release of Varieties has recommended IPA 15-2 (Sharada) for cultivation in North East Plain Zone comprising the states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal.