GENETICAL STUDIES ON ZIMIKAND (Amorphophallus campanulatus Blume.)

Phenotypic and genotypic coefficient of variation, heritability, correlation coefficient and path analysis were estimated for plant height, length of leaf, stem diameter, equatorial diameter and corm yield per plant in zimikand (Amorphophallus campanulatus Blume). The experiment comprising 18 diverse genotypes have been sown in RBD with 3 replications during 2002-03 and 2003-04 at VegetableReaserch Farm of C.S.Azad Uni. of Agr. & Tech.Kalyanpur, Kanpur. The analysis of variance revealed highly significant differences among genotypes for all the characters. High heritability accompanied with moderate genetic advance as per cent of mean for different characters suggested that improvement in corm yield may be made through selection. Phenotypic correlation coefficients of all characters with yield were found positive and highly significant. Yield per plant had strong positive correlation with equatorial diameter and stem diameter at genotypic level. The path coefficient revealed maximum direct effect of equatorial diameter on yield followed by length of leaf in both the years while plant height showed negative direct effect on yield. Thus, the characters like equatorial diameter and leaf length may be considered while making selection for the improvement of yield in zimikand.