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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, Chiranjeeb × Start date: 2018 × Thesis Type: M.Sc ×
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    ThesisItemOpen Access
    Effect of household-waste-based vermicompost on carbon pool, functional-indicator microbes and plant growth
    (Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Pusa, Samastipur, 2019) Kumar, Chiranjeeb; Prasad, S. S.
    The destructive increment in population has led to generation of vast amount of solid and organic wastes, thus initiating the problems regarding soil and environmental pollution, soil health deterioration, disturbing soil -physical-chemical-biological equilibrium continuum. An advanced, scientific technique must be developed to mitigate the waste generation problems, providing proper nutrients for overall soil health improvement, creating adoptable micro environment for growth of microbes and enhancing soil nutrient conversion cycles leading to proper nutrient supply for plant growth. The mitigation of wastes generated will vastly affect the whole environment, creating a pollution free environment. Keeping the above aspects in view, a study was conducted during the Kharif season in 2018 at Vermicompost production unit, RPCAU, Pusa with an objective of proper mitigation of waste and scientifically converting it into some useful manure. Vermicomposting of household generated wastes with cow dung at different proportion was made and finally quality analysis of vermicompost was done. On the basis of nutrients contents, microbial growth, enzymatic activities, carbon pool variations and recovery percent, the vermicompost prepared from equal proportions of household waste and cow dung (50 :50) on weight basis was considered the best one and it was further utilized in an incubation experiment which was synchronized with pot culture rice experiment. In the incubation experiment four levels of vermicompost (0 t ha-1, 1.25 t ha-1, 2.5 t ha-1, 3.7 t ha-1) and three levels of fertilizer ( 0 %, 100 %, 50 % RDF) were taken for analyzing the effect on the carbon pools, functional indicator microbes growth, enzymatic activities in calcareous sandy loam soil at four stages of incubation (3 factors of variations) which matched with the critical rice crop growth stages, replicated thrice using Completely Randomized Design (CRD). In pot-culture experiment, the effect of vermicompost and fertilizer on carbon pools, functional indicator microbes growth, nutrient contents, uptakes, efficiencies and yields were conducted with rice crop (2 factors of variations) using Completely Randomized Design (CRD) statistical procedure. During incubation experiment, microbial biomass carbon (MBC), microbial biomass nitrogen, microbial biomass phosphorus, dehydrogenase activities, water soluble carbon, hot-water soluble carbon, available-N increased from 0th DAI to 115th DAI. The TOC, Organic carbon, available-P2O5 increased from 0th DAI to 65th DAI and then decreased up to 115th DAI. Increasing levels of vermicompost and fertilizer increased the functional-indicator microbes from 0th DAI to 65th DAI and then declined the rate of increase from 65th DAI to 115th DAI. The microbial biomass carbon, microbial biomass phosphorus and microbial biomass nitrogen increased 101.84 %, 40.63 %, 42.52 % over control at 115th DAI, respectively. The pot-culture experiment marked the increase in available-N, P, S nutrients content in post-harvest soil as well as increase in carbon pools, functional-indicator microbes growth from tillering stage of rice cropped soil up to post-harvest period soil in response to the increased dose of vermicompost and fertilizer. The increased dose of vermicompost (3.75 t ha-1) and full dose of fertilizer (100 % RDF) significantly increased available-N, MBC, azotobacter population count 25.55 % ,125.69 % and 62.71 % increase over control in post-harvest soil, respectively. In pot-culture experiment at tillering stage the carbon pools, nutrient contents as well as functional indicator microbes increased significantly over control. The increase in the microbial biomass carbon and microbial nitrogen significantly increased 116.85 % and 113.26 % over control. The bacillus count increased significantly by 89.09 % over control in soil at tillering stage. All other functional indicator microbes increased significantly over control but lower than post-harvest soil. The grain and straw yields were significantly superior in response to vermicompost (3.75 t ha-1) and RDF which was statistically at par with application of vermicompost level (2.5 t ha-1) and fertilizer (100 % RDF) and their values were 54.66 g pot-1 and 53.55 g pot-1 for grain , 60.40 g pot-1 and 58.05 g pot-1 for straw, respectively. The yield was equal in case of vermicompost (1.25 t ha-1) with RDF without affecting yield loss. Thus, it can be concluded that 50 % save over the cost of chemical fertilizer is achieved in the whole experiment and can be suggested to the farmers. The nutrients content in grain and straw and their uptakes, nutrient use efficiencies was found significantly superior in the combined application of high dose vermicompost ( 3.75 t ha-1) and fertilizer(100 % RDF) than their sole applications. The pot-culture experiment marked the increase in available-N, P, S nutrients content in post-harvest soil as well as increase in carbon pools, functional-indicator microbes growth in soil in response to the increased dose of vermicompost and fertilizer. The increased dose of vermicompost (3.75 t ha-1) and full dose of fertilizer (100 % RDF) significantly increased available-N, microbial biomass carbon, azotobacter population count 25.55 % ,125.69 % and 62.71 % increase over control in post-harvest soil, respectively.