Author(s): S. KUMAR, A. K. SINGH, R. DAS, S. DATTA AND K. ARYA

Abstract: An experiment was carried out with twelve parental lines of okra viz. Larm -1, IC -282280, IC – 282337, IC -128891, IC -111527, EC – 329380, IC – 282279, VRO -5, IC – 329422, IC – 18537, Hisar Unnat and IC – 43132 along with 66 F1hybrids based on half- diallel cross excluding reciprocals to the study of combining ability of okra [Abelmoschus esculentus (L.) Moench] with respect to seventeen characters, at Vegetable Research Farm, Department of Horticulture, Institute of Agriculture Sciences, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi. This place is situated in South East part of Varanasi city at 25º15\' North latitude and 83º03\' East longitudes at an elevation of 129.23 m above the mean sea level. The area is characterized by humid subtropical climate with extreme hot weather in summer and cold in winter. The average annual rainfall is about 1110 mm. The major portion of precipitation (about 85 to 90%) is received during July to September. All parental lines and F1combinations were grown in Randomized Block Design (RBD) with three replications during rainy season, 2012. The mean square due to gca and sca were significant for all seventeen characters under study indicating the importance of both additive and non-additive genetic components for the characters under study. None of parents were good general combiner for all characters whereas, Hisar Unnat, IC- 128891 and VRO-5 showed significant gca for yield, earliness and different pod characters respectively, which signifies their suitability to be used for further breeding and crop improvement programme. Among the crosses, Larm -1 x IC -111527, IC - 282280 × IC -111527 and IC -282280 x EC – 329380 were most promising combinations for earliness and other desirable characters including yield per plant. The results indicated the importance of heterosis breeding for effective utilization of non-additive genetic variance in okra.

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