Microbial Seed Priming Enhances Chickpea Performance and Yield Potential Under Subtropical Conditions of India

The synthesis and application of inoculants containing microorganisms in crops are gaining more attention worldwide. Among inoculants, mostly crop-specific strains of Rhizobia are used for legume crops to enhance their production potential. There is, however, meagre research on the utilization of endomycorrhizae and signal molecules like lipo-chitooligosachharide to increase yield potential in legumes, notably in chickpea. Thus, this experiment was attempted at the Agricultural Research Farm of the Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, during the winter season of 2019–2020 with the objective of enhancing the production potential of chickpea through seed priming with microbial inoculants. The experiment consisted of eight treatments viz., T 1 (control), T 2 ( Rhizobium 20 g + Phosphate solubilizing bacteria 20 g), T 3 (endomycorrhizae 1 g), T 4 (endomycorrhizae 2 g), T 5 (endomycorrhizae 4 g), T 6 (endomycorrhizae 1 g + lipo-chitooligosaccharide 0.33 ml), T 7 (endomycorrhizae 2 g + lipo-chitooligosaccharide 0.33 ml) and T 8 (endomycorrhizae 4 g + lipo-chitooligosaccharide 0.33 ml). The experiment was laid out in a randomized block design and replicated four times. Seed priming significantly influenced plant height, dry weight, leaf area, root length, nodule number, pods per plant, grain and straw yield. Among treatments, seed priming with endomycorrhizae 4 g + lipo-chitooligosaccharide 0.33 ml (T 8 ) proved better in terms of plant height, dry matter, leaf area, nodule number, and root length. Furthermore, the endomycorrhizae (4 g) + lipo-chitooligosaccharide (0.33 ml) combination resulted in higher grain (2.60–48.34%) and straw (1.05–59.16%) yields than the other treatments. Based on the obtained results, seed priming of chickpea with endomycorrhizae + lipo-chitooligosaccharide is suggested for better performance and enhanced production potential.