Exploitation of heterosis in aromatic rices for different physico-chemical traits

Abstract

Hybrid technology has successfully been used to increase the yields. Many high yielding rice hybrids have been developed in India but in most cases quality is not to the desirable extent and therefore, lacked acceptability by consumers and millers. The increasing demand of quality rices in the local and international markets has paid attention on quality breeding. Improving rice quality has now become prime objective of most of breeding programmes. The quality characteristics of rice includes the total head rice recovery, physical attributes of kernel like size, shape and appearance, cooking and eating quality, and aroma. In rice, heterosis for grain yield and its components have been reported by various workers, but little information is available on quality characters. Therefore, it is essential to develop quality rice hybrids by using CMS lines and aromatic restorers that will be expected to aromatic if aroma is governed by a dominant gene as reported Bijral and Gupta [1]. In view of above considerations, the present study has been planned to develop basmati rice hybrids as well as non-aromatic ones with better quality, and to estimate the heterosis for various quality characters and yield.