Divergence Studies for Yield and Quality Traits in Foxtail Millet (Setaria italica (L.) Beauv.)

Field experiment was conducted using 64 genotypes of foxtail millet to assess the genetic divergence for 24 metric traits in Kharif 2020. The ANOVA revealed existence of highly significant variation for all the traits examined. Principal component analysis identified nine principal components with eigen value more than one and 76.59% of cumulative variance. The 2D and 3D plots indicated that genotypes SiA 60, SiA 3570, SiA 3914, SiA 3222, SiA 3629, SiA 4089, SiA 3561 and SiA 2681 were divergent for yield and quality traits. Ward’s minimum variance method were grouped 64 genotypes into five clusters. The inter cluster distance between cluster I and cluster III (34.00) was maximum followed by cluster III and cluster V (31.13), therefore these genotypes from these clusters can be suggested for future crop improvement programmes.