Vol. 9, Special Issue 9, Part E (2025)

The current study evaluated 55 rice genotypes during Kharif, 2024 for yield and its component traits at Rice Research unit Farm, Department of Genetics and Plant Breeding, IGKV, Raipur. The experiment was conducted in Randomized Block Design with two replications to study agro morphological characterization, genetic variability parameters and genetic divergence analysis. Morphological traits are primarily governed by genetic factors, making them less susceptible to environmental influences. Considerable variation was observed in 18 agro morphological characterization recoded in yield and yield attributing traits. The variance analysis revealed significant genotypic differences across all 16 traits studied. Most of the yield attributing parameters showed differences in both PCV (Phenotypic coefficient of variation) and GCV (Genotypic coefficient of variation) values. This allows for effective selection processes to be implemented, leveraging the genotypic diversity to drive desired trait improvements. Among the studied attributes, the traits like number of unfilled grains per panicle, grain yield per plant, harvest index, number of filled grains, and number of effective tillers per plant exhibited both high phenotypic (PCV) and genotypic coefficients of variation (GCV), indicating substantial genetic variability. These values indicate the extent of genetic variation and the potential for selection and improvement in these traits. High heritability together with high genetic advance as a mean percentage for quantitative characters was plant height, number of filled grains per panicle, grain yield per plant, harvest index, number of unfilled grains per panicle, paddy breadth, brown rice length to breadth ratio, brown rice breadth, and paddy length to breadth. indicating their potential for improvement through selection. This indicates the involvement of additive gene action in the expression of these traits. Therefore, these characteristics can be effectively enhanced through mass selection and hybridization strategies focused on progeny selection. 55 rice genotypes were classified into seven distinct clusters, ensuring that genotypes within the same cluster (intra cluster) had smaller average distances compared to those in different clusters (inter cluster). Among these, Cluster I contained the majority of the genotypes (30) followed by while clusters II with 16 genotypes, cluster III with 5 genotypes. The cluster IV, cluster V, cluster VI, cluster VII, had the least number of genotypes i.e. one.