Evaluation of Pigeonpea Genotypes against Sterility Mosaic Disease

Pigeonpea (Cajanus cajan L.) belonging to family Leguminosae is an important leguminous pulse crop of semi-arid tropic and subtropic regions (Asia and Africa). It is also known as red gram, arhar, tur dal. The crop is affected by several phytopathogens, of which, pigeonpea sterility mosaic disease/virus, and transmissible by eriophyid mites (Aceria cajani) has been a major bottleneck. Yield losses up to 95 per cent or even 100 per cent in severe Sterility Mosaic Disease incidence were reported. Therefore, present investigation on screening of pigeon pea genotypes against the sterility mosaic disease was carried out during Kharif, 2018 at the Department of Plant Pathology, College of Agriculture, Latur.

In present study, about 27 entries of pigeonpea were screened under natural epiphytotic against pigeonpea sterility mosaic disease. Of these GRG-152, ICP-2376, BRG-5, BRG-4, ICPL-15048, BSMR853, BSMR-736, BRG-1and BRG-3 were resistant; MPV-106, RVSA-16-1, IPA-16-8 and BRG-2 were moderately resistant, whereas, PUSA-2017-01, TDRG-58, ICP-8863, PUSA-2018, PUSA-2018-1, PUSA-2018-2, PUSA-2018-3 ,PUSA-2018-5, AKTE-12-04, KRG-244, PADT-16, RKPV-912, JKM-189 and TJT-501 were susceptible to Sterility Mosaic disease.