Morpho-biochemical Characterization of Brinjal (Solanum melongena L.) Genotypes during Kharif Season

Background: Brinjal is one of the most popular and important vegetable crops grown throughout the year in India and other parts of the world. Though a large number of brinjal genotypes are available in India, only a few have good quality and yield during kharif. Therefore, the current study was carried out to identify and/or superior varieties with high yield and better quality brinjal during kharif, 2017-2018 consisted of thirty brinjal genotypes obtained from different places of India. Methods: All the genotypes were evaluated for fifteen morphological and six biochemical characters viz., plant height (cm), plant spread (cm), number of primary branches per plant, leaf blade length (cm), leaf blade width (cm), number of leaf prickles, days to first flowering (days), days to 50% flowering (days), fruit pedicel length (cm), fruit length (cm), fruit circumference (cm), number of fruits per plant, fruit weight (g), fruit yield per plant (kg), fruit yield per hectare (t), moisture content (%, FW), crude fiber content (%, DW), crude protein content (%, DW), ascorbic acid (mg/100g FW), solasodine content (mg/100g DW) and total phenol content (mg GAE/g FW). Result: Mean performance of brinjal genotypes revealed significant variation for morpho-biochemical characters. This variation may be due to the effect of genotype, environment or their interaction. Morphological characters of brinjal genotypes revealed that among the thirty genotypes, eighteen genotypes viz., Kuchia, Brinjal-3, Khoruah-1, Brinjal-6, Brinjal-8, Brinjal-4, Seujia Bengena, Brinjal-1, Brinjal-9, Brinjal-2, Brinjal Long, Green Long, Boga Bengena, Kajala, Sagolishingia, Long Khoruah, Brinjal-7 and Koni Bengena were found to be the superior performers for fruits/plant, primary branches per plant, days to first flowering, days to 50% flowering and fruit yield during kharif. The mean performance for biochemical characters also revealed wide variability among the genotypes in respect to quality performance.