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Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Pusa

In the imperial Gazetteer of India 1878, Pusa was recorded as a government estate of about 1350 acres in Darbhanba. It was acquired by East India Company for running a stud farm to supply better breed of horses mainly for the army. Frequent incidence of glanders disease (swelling of glands), mostly affecting the valuable imported bloodstock made the civil veterinary department to shift the entire stock out of Pusa. A British tobacco concern Beg Sutherland & co. got the estate on lease but it also left in 1897 abandoning the government estate of Pusa. Lord Mayo, The Viceroy and Governor General, had been repeatedly trying to get through his proposal for setting up a directorate general of Agriculture that would take care of the soil and its productivity, formulate newer techniques of cultivation, improve the quality of seeds and livestock and also arrange for imparting agricultural education. The government of India had invited a British expert. Dr. J. A. Voelcker who had submitted as report on the development of Indian agriculture. As a follow-up action, three experts in different fields were appointed for the first time during 1885 to 1895 namely, agricultural chemist (Dr. J. W. Leafer), cryptogamic botanist (Dr. R. A. Butler) and entomologist (Dr. H. Maxwell Lefroy) with headquarters at Dehradun (U.P.) in the forest Research Institute complex. Surprisingly, until now Pusa, which was destined to become the centre of agricultural revolution in the country, was lying as before an abandoned government estate. In 1898. Lord Curzon took over as the viceroy. A widely traveled person and an administrator, he salvaged out the earlier proposal and got London’s approval for the appointment of the inspector General of Agriculture to which the first incumbent Mr. J. Mollison (Dy. Director of Agriculture, Bombay) joined in 1901 with headquarters at Nagpur The then government of Bengal had mooted in 1902 a proposal to the centre for setting up a model cattle farm for improving the dilapidated condition of the livestock at Pusa estate where plenty of land, water and feed would be available, and with Mr. Mollison’s support this was accepted in principle. Around Pusa, there were many British planters and also an indigo research centre Dalsing Sarai (near Pusa). Mr. Mollison’s visits to this mini British kingdom and his strong recommendations. In favour of Pusa as the most ideal place for the Bengal government project obviously caught the attention for the viceroy.

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20221
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Subject: Plant Physiology × Author: Nandkishor, Ingle Rahul × Start date: 2021 × Type: Thesis ×
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    ThesisItemOpen Access
    STUDIES ON PHYSIO-BIOCHEMICAL RESPONSE OF BIOSTIMULANTS APPLICATION TO TERMINAL HEAT TOLERANCE IN LENTIL (Lens culinaris Medik.)
    (DRPCAU, PUSA, 2022) Nandkishor, Ingle Rahul; Kavita, Dr.
    Day by day temperature is increasing due to climate change and their adverse impact on crop cultivation and agricultural productions. According to IPCC report 2022, world is facing various climatic vulnerabilities such as heat wave, cyclones, drought, flood etc. Heat wave is one of the most important climatic vulnerability which is mainly affecting agriculture at global level. Temperature required for most crop plant generally ranges between 20-30 °C (min/max) but in case of high temperature (above 30 °C), plant growth may be stuck because of enzyme denaturation or inactivation resulting in early maturity thereby reducing crop yield. Heat stress mainly affects reproductive stage such as flower abortion and grain filling thereby causing drastic reduction in yield. Biostimulant application may prove useful in reducing the adverse effect.In this research, major focus is on terminal heat stress tolerance of lentil and their amelioration through humic acid and seaweed extract with the objectives i) to understand alterations in morpho-physio-biochemical characters by biostimulants application that leads to thermo tolerance in lentil and ii) to assess yield attributes and yield of lentil crop influenced by biostimulant application The experiment was conducted with two genotypes of lentil viz. IPL 220 and KLS 218 in pots with two different sowing dates i.e. normal (control) and late sown (to expose the plants to terminal heat stress) in CRD with three replications. Late sown crops were given different treatments viz. seed priming with humic acid (SPHA), seed priming with seaweed extract (SPSWE), foliar spray (40+60 DAS) with humic acid (FSHA), foliar spray(40+60 DAS) with seaweed extract (FSSWE), SPH+FSHA and SPSWE+FSSWE. It was observed that there was significant reduction in leaf area, specific leaf weight, relative water content, membrane stability index, total chlorophyll content, yield attributes (no. of flowers per plant, no. of pod per plant, no. of seed per pod) and seed yield per plant in lentil genotypes subjected to terminal heat stress condition over control but was improved by application of humic acid and seaweed extract. However, lipid peroxidation, proline content and activities of antioxidative enzymes (catalase, peroxidase and superoxide dismutase) increased during heat stress condition but application of humic acid and seaweed extract decreased it. Among all the treatments, SPSWE+FSSWE treatment was significantly superior in reducing the adverse effects of terminal heat stress in lentil. Hence, it can be concluded that application of humic acid and seaweed extract either as seed priming or foliar spray or their combination may be useful for ameliorating terminal heat stress in late sown lentil crop.