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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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Author: Kumar, Anil × Start date: 1985 ×
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    Combining ability and heterosis studies in mungbean (Vigna radiataL.Wilczek).
    (Rajendra Agricultural University, Pusa (Samastipur), 2015) Kumar, Anil; Kant, Ravi
    The present investigation was undertaken to obtain information on combining ability and heterotic response for yield and some important quantitative traits. The experiments were carried out at Breeder Seed Production Unit Farm, Directorate of Seed and Farms, Tirhut College of Agriculture, Dholi, Muzaffarpur, Bihar during 2014-15. Eight lines and four testers were crosses in Line x Tester mating design during Kharif 2014. Total 32 crosses along with 12 parents and one standard check i.e. HUM-16 were evaluated in RBD with three replications during Kharif 2014. The observations were made for 11 yield and yield attributing traits viz., days to 50% flowering, plant height, number of clusters per plant, number of pods per cluster, pod length, seeds per pod, number of root-nodules per plant, 100 seed weight, biological yield per plant, harvest index and seed yield per plant based on the five randomly selected plants of each treatment. The crosses namely HUM-12 x TMV-37, HUM-6 x SML-668, IPM-02-14 x SAMRAT, HUM-6 x TMB-37, IPM-02-3 x PUSA VISHAL, IPM-02-3 x SAMRAT, MEHA x SML-668, NDM-09-18 x PUSA VISHAL, PDM-11 x SAMRAT, PUSA-9531 x SML-668 for days to 50% flowering; HUM-12 x TMB-37, IPM-02-3 x PUSA VISHAL, NDM-09-18 x TMB-37 for number of cluster per plant; HUM-12 x TMB-37, PM-125 x PUSA VISHAL, MEHA x PUSA VISHAL, NDM-09-18 x SML-668, PUSA-9531 x SAMRAT for number of pods per cluster; NDM-09-18 x TMB-37, PUSA-9531 x PUSA VISHAL for Pod length; HUM-12 x SML-668, IPM-02-3 x TMB-37, PDM-11 x PUSA VISHAL, PUSA-9531 x SAMRAT, PUSA-9531 x SML-668 for seeds per pod; HUM-6 x SML-668, PDM-11 x PUSA VISHAL, PDM-11 x SAMRAT, PUSA - 9531 x SML-668 for number of root-nodules per plant; HUM-12 x SML-668, HUM-12 x TMB-37, HUM-6 x TMB-37 for 100-Seeds weight; HUM-12 x TMB-37, HUM-6 x SML-668, IPM-02-14 x SAMRAT, IPM-02-3 x PUSA VISHAL, MEHA x PUSA VISHAL, NDM-09-18 x PUSA VISHAL, PDM-11 x SML-668, PUSA-9531 x SAMRAT for biological yield per plant; HUM-12 x TMB-37, HUM-6 x SML-668, MEHA x PUSA VISHAL, PDM-11 x TMB-37 for harvest index and HUM-12 x TMB-37, HUM-6 x SML-668, IPM-02-14 x SAMRAT, IPM-02-14 x SML-668, IPM-02-3 x PUSA VISHAL, IPM-02-3 x SAMRAT, MEHA x PUSA VISHAL, NDM-09-18 x PUSA VISHAL, NDM-09-18 x TMB-37 for Seed yield per plant was found superior over check HUM-16. Based on positive and significant GCA effects along with high per se performance NDM-09-18, SML-668, HUM-12, HUM-6 and IPM-02-14 were identified as a best general combiner for yield. These parental lines may be used in hybridization programme to have the superior cross combinations for yieid. Based on per se performance, SCA and standard heterosis among all crosses, only one cross namely HUM-12 x TMB-37 was found common for seven yield and yield attributing traits except number of root-nodules per plant, seeds per pod, pod length and plant height and other cross namely HUM-6 x SML-668 also found common for five traits Viz. days to 50% flowering, number of root nodules per plant, biological yield per plant, harvest index and seed yield per plant. These two crosses may be exploited in Mungbean improvement programme to enhance the yield.