~ 716 ~ The Pharma Innovation Journal 2021; 10(11): 716-722 ISSN (E): 2277- 7695 ISSN (P): 2349-8242 NAAS Rating: 5.23 TPI 2021; 10(11): 716-722 © 2021 TPI www.thepharmajournal.com Received: 03-08-2021 Accepted: 09-09-2021 Kanushree Nandedkar Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, College of Agriculture, IGKV, Raipur, Chhattisgarh, India Ritu R Saxena Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, College of Agriculture, IGKV, Raipur, Chhattisgarh, India GP Dixit Project Coordinator, AICRP on Chickpea, ICAR-IIPR, Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh, India Suman Rawte Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, College of Agriculture, IGKV, Raipur, Chhattisgarh, India Ravi R Saxena Department of Agricultural Statistics, College of Agriculture, IGKV, Raipur, Chhattisgarh, India Corresponding Author: Kanushree Nandedkar Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, College of Agriculture, IGKV, Raipur, Chhattisgarh, India DUS based Agro-morphological characterization and classification of desi chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) Kanushree Nandedkar, Ritu R Saxena, GP Dixit, Suman Rawte and Ravi R Saxena Abstract Modern plant breeding and agricultural systems have narrowed the base for the genetic diversity of cultivated chickpea and to explore new sources of variation that might be used in plant breeding programmes. The current investigation was carried out to morphologically characterize and classify desi chickpea genotypes on the basis of DUS descriptors suggested by PPV& FRA, GOI, 2007. Among 20 DUS traits observed; 5 traits were monomorphic, 9 traits were dimorphic, 4 traits were trimorphic and rest 2 traits were found to be polymorphic among all chickpea genotypes revealing the presence of a significant amount of genetic variability with the potential to assign various morphological profiles for varietal identification and characterization. Keywords: Characterization, DUS, Morphological, Shannon-weaver index, Diversity Introduction The cultivated chickpea is one of the most important pulse crops of India. In India, area of chickpea cultivation is recorded to be 11.89 M ha with production and productivity of 11.38 million tons and 956 kg/ ha in 2018 (Source: FAOSTAT, 2018). In Chhattisgarh, chickpea was grown in about 2.93 lakh ha which constitutes about 2.77% of the total area cultivated for chickpea. The state produced about 2.23 lakh tons of chickpea which amounts to about 1.82% of the total production (Source: Success report 2018-19, Farmer portal). Chickpea is tremendously diverse with respect to growth habit and morphology. Large genetic variations also exist for contents of protein and micronutrients in chickpea presenting a viable opportunity for genetic biofortification. Therefore, there is an expeditious need to characterise genotypes and determine varietal purity. In any crop improvement programme, the identification and characterization of new cultivars is crucial for their efficient utilisation and germplasm conservation. Traditionally, morphological trait characterization has been used as a foundation for germplasm classification, visual identification, differentiation, and cataloguing. It could reveal their phylogeny, which would be extremely beneficial to a plant breeder in using these germplasm in a frontier area of chickpea research. Morphological characterization studies are carried out by employing morphological markers, which are highly heritable traits. They are cheap, simple, does not necessitate the use of sophisticated laboratory techniques and quick to score. Since, a variety attains acceptance only when farmers get genetically pure seeds of high standards. Characterization of varieties is crucial for IPR (intellectual property rights) protection, as well as quality seed production and certification. The measurement of the descriptor is used to assess diversity, but the environmental effect on these traits renders this measure relatively insensitive, particularly where differences are small. Therefore, it is important to define morphological descriptors for different genotypes of chickpea and to analyze their consistency over the years using various genetic tools (Singh et al., 2018) [22] . Plant morphological characteristics have long been acknowledged as the unquestionable descriptors for DUS testing and varietal classification of crop varieties (Joshi et al., 2018) [13] . Thus, every morphological characteristic that is linked to and contributes significantly to increased seed yield would be beneficial in increasing yield. According to aforesaid facts, this investigation was carried out to characterize 98 chickpea genotypes on the basis of qualitative DUS descriptors which facilitate to identify and distinguish genotypes, further it would be used in chickpea improvement program.