Nature and magnitude of genetic variability and diversity studies in okra (Abelmoschus esculentus L. Moench)

In the present investigation, an attempt has been made to evaluate the genetic variability of yield contributing characters, and the genetic diversity in forty-four genotypes of okra collected from the IIHR, Bangalore, India. Analysis of variance indicated significant differences among the genotypes for different morphological characters. High GCV and PCV were observed for plant height, inter-nodal length, first flowering node, first fruit producing node, height of first flowering node, average fruit weight and number of seeds per fruit. On the basis of D2 analysis, the 44 genotypes were grouped into twelve clusters. The cluster III was the largest with eight genotypes followed by cluster I and VIII with seven, cluster II with five, cluster XII with three while, clusters IV, V, VI, IX, X and XI included only two genotype in each. The intra-cluster distance was maximum in cluster XII (28.14), while inter-cluster distance was maximum between cluster VI and VIII (35.57) followed by I and IX (35.31), thus being a good source for attempting hybridization. Among the 44 genotypes, IIHR-238, IIHR-241 showed maximum number of fruits per plant and total yield per plant (g). The characters namely days to 50% flowering (35.62%), 100 seed weight (28.44%), number of seeds per fruit (17.23%) and average fruit weight (8.14%) directly contributed towards maximum divergence and, therefore, selection of divergent parents based on these characters is recommended for getting good hybrids or segregants in okra.