The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : New method to check disease

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Saturday, Mar 08, 2008
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

New method to check disease

M. Balaganessin

In green gram evolved by National Research Centre for Pulses

Better yields: Farmers being exposed to a new method researched on pulses at the National Pulse Research Centre in Vamban village in Pudukottai.

PUDUKOTTAI: The Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, National Research Centre for Pulses (NRCP) at Vamban village near here, has taken up a research programme on producing a green gram variety by adopting a special cross breeding technique so as to check the incidence of a disease, most commonly damaging the crop.

The green gram variety is more prone for attack by yellow mosaic virus which discolours the leaves from green to yellow, particularly during the flowering season of the variety.

The NRCP which took up a research a few years ago in preventing the incidence of the disease has now been registering a success through a technique, cross-breeding the green gram plants with a commonly available species.

The Professor and Head of the NRCP, N. Ramamoorthi, said that the species, Vigna umbellate, is a common wild species, grown along with the pulses in the fields and the cross-breeding is done during the flowering season.

A vital botanical clue at the research centre in Virinjipuram near Vellore prompted the NRCP to experiment on the cross-breeding technique.

In fact, the variety under research now had been christened ‘VRMGg1’, after the Virinjipuram green gram.

The Associate Professor M. Pandian said that green gram growers were hard hit due to the attack by the virus. Farmers go in for pulses cultivation, with duration of 65 to 70 days, during the ‘Adi’ or ‘Maasi pattam’ but incurred a heavy loss by the virus attack coinciding with the 35th day of the ‘pattam.’ The cross breeding has proved its efficacy in the sense that the green gram had become resistant to the attack. The research would continue for a couple of years or so with focus on other aspects including the yield, he added.

A number of pulses growers who have been incurring loss due to the attack by the yellow mosaic virus, have been visiting the NRCP of late to realise the efficacy of the cross-breeding technique.

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