Effect of integrated nutrient management on growth and development of Indian mustard (Brassica juncea L.) under irrigated condition

Introduction

Indian mustard (Brassica juncea L.), a major Rabi oilseed crop of the country, occupies a pivotal position among edible-oilseed crops of India and contributes nearly a quarter of the total oilseed production. Indian mustard is the third most important oil seed crops after groundnut and soyabean in India occupying 9.21 M ha acreage, 11.51 MT production and 1447 kg ha -1 productivity in 2024-25 (Sharma et al., 2026) [23] . It is grown extensively in Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana and West Bengal and continues to remain a source of quality cooking oil and cake meant for livestock feed. The contribution of Indian mustard to the total oilseed production in India is around 26 percentage. Domestic production of edible oils meets only 50 percent of the total requirements, while rest is imported. Sharma et al., 2026) [23] . Notwithstanding its acreage and production, national productivity of mustard continues to lag behind its potential, largely on account of an imbalanced and injudicious use of fertilizers, low organic matter status of soils and inadequate microbial activity in the rhizosphere. Growth and development of a crop, reflected through plant stand, plant height, branching pattern, leaf area index and dry matter accumulation, form the physiological foundation on which yield is subsequently built. A judicious and balanced supply of nutrients through combined use of inorganic fertilizer, organic manures (FYM, vermicompost) and liquid bio-inoculants (NPK consortia) not only improves nutrient-use efficiency but also enhances soil physical, chemical and biological health, thereby permitting a rational reduction in the recommended dose of costly chemical fertilizers without compromising crop performance (Nadeem et al., 2018) [16] . Integrated nutrient management (INM) is, therefore, being widely advocated as a sustainable strategy for boosting the growth attributes and, in turn, the productivity of Indian mustard (Meena et al., 2020; Kumar et al., 2019) [10,14] . Keeping this in view, the present investigation was undertaken to study, in isolation, the effect of different combinations of inorganic fertilizer, organic manures and NPK consortia on the growth and developmental attributes of Indian mustard under irrigated condition of the semi-arid agro-climate of Agra region.

Materials and Methods

A field experiment was conducted during two consecutive Rabi seasons of 2023-24 and 2024-25 at the Agricultural Research Farm of the Department of Agronomy, R.B.S. College, Bichpuri, Agra, situated at 27°02' N latitude, 77°09' E longitude and an altitude of 168.0 m above mean sea level, falling under agroclimatic sub-region 4.1 of western Uttar Pradesh. The soil of the experimental field was sandy loam in texture, weakly alkaline in reaction (pH 8.10-8.15), low in available nitrogen (166.45-168.82 kg ha⁻¹), medium in available phosphorus (30.0-30.5 kg P 2 O 5 ha⁻¹) and rich in available potassium (297.0-302.2 kg K 2 O ha⁻¹), with organic carbon content of 0.35-0.36%. The experiment comprised thirteen treatments, viz., T 1: 100% RDF (N120P60K60S40 kg ha⁻¹); T 2: 75% RDF; T 3: 75% RDF + FYM @ 5 t ha⁻¹; T 4: 75% RDF + vermicompost @ 1.0 t ha⁻¹; T 5: 75% RDF + NPK consortia @ 200 ml per 10 kg seed; T 6: 75% RDF + FYM @ 5 t ha⁻¹ + NPK consortia; T 7: 75% RDF + vermicompost @ 1.0 t ha⁻¹ + NPK consortia; T 8: 50% RDF; T 9: 50% RDF + FYM @ 7.5 t ha⁻¹; T 10: 50% RDF + vermicompost @ 2.0 t ha⁻¹; T 11: 50% RDF + NPK consortia; T 12: 50% RDF + FYM + NPK consortia; and T 13: 50% RDF + vermicompost + NPK consortia, laid out in a Randomized Block Design with three replications. Indian mustard cv. Giriraj (DRMRIJ-31) was sown at a spacing of 45 cm × 10 cm using a seed rate of 5 kg ha⁻¹. Growth and developmental observations, viz., germination count and crop stand, plant height (cm), number of primary and secondary branches plant⁻¹, leaf area index (LAI) and dry matter accumulation (g plant⁻¹) were recorded at 30, 60 and 90 days after sowing (DAS) and at harvest, from five randomly tagged plants in the net plot. Days taken to 75 per cent flowering and days to physiological maturity were also recorded treatment-wise. Leaf area index was computed as the ratio of leaf area per plant to the ground area occupied per plant. The data recorded for each character were subjected to analysis of variance appropriate for a Randomized Block Design (Gomez and Gomez, 1984) [7] and treatment means were compared at 5% level of significance.

Results and Discussion

Crop stand

Germination count recorded at 10 DAS did not differ significantly among the INM treatments during either year, indicating that seed emergence in mustard is governed mainly by seed viability and genetic make-up of the cultivar rather than by post-sowing nutrient management (Das et al., 2024) [5] . Crop stand at 30 DAS and at harvest, however, was significantly influenced by the treatments; T 7 (75% RDF + vermicompost + NPK consortia) maintained the maximum plant stand at harvest (27.33 and 27.80 plants, respectively, during 2023-24 and 2024-25), while the minimum stand was recorded under treatment T 8 (50% RDF). The favourable rhizosphere created by vermicompost, together with improved nutrient solubilization through the microbial consortia, appears to have promoted better root proliferation and seedling survival, corroborating the findings of Kumar et al. (2019) [10] in Indian mustard. Genotype-driven differences in early vigour and establishment, superimposed on nutrient management, have also been highlighted by Sharma et al. (2025) [22] , who reported cultivar PM-28 to be more responsive to improved nutrition than PM-29 and PDZ-31.

Plant height

Plant height increased progressively from 30 DAS to harvest under all the treatments and was significantly influenced by INM practices at every growth stage during both years of experimentation (Table 1). Treatment T 7 recorded the tallest plants at harvest (209.00 and 211.42 cm during 2023-24 and 2024-25, respectively), remaining statistically at par with treatment T 6 (75% RDF + FYM + NPK consortia), but significantly superior to the rest of the treatments, showing an increase of 5.91 to 17.20 per cent over the significantly inferior treatments. The shortest plants were recorded under treatment T 8 (50% RDF; 178.33 and 180.83 cm), followed by treatment T 11 (50% RDF + NPK consortia). The taller plants under integrated treatments may be ascribed to a steady and synchronized nutrient release from combined organic-inorganic-biological sources, promoting sustained cell elongation and internodal growth, a trend also reported by Kumar and Meena (2020) [12,14] and Singh (2024) in Indian mustard. A balanced and adequate nutrient supply enhancing plant height of mustard cultivars has similarly been documented by Sharma et al. (2026) [23] , who recorded significantly taller plants (up to 200 cm) under a combined foliar nutrition schedule as against a lower nutrient level.

Number of primary and secondary branches plant⁻¹

The number of primary and secondary branches plant⁻¹ increased steadily with the advancement of crop growth stage and was significantly affected by the INM treatments (Table 2). Treatment T 7 recorded the maximum primary branches (9.25 and 11.75 at 60 DAS) and secondary branches (18.50 and 20.92 at 90 DAS) during 2023-24 and 2024-25, respectively, and was statistically comparable with treatment T 6 and, at certain stages, with treatment T 1 . The lowest branching was recorded under treatment T 8 , followed by treatments T 11 and T 5 . Superior branching under the integrated treatments is attributable to enhanced availability of nitrogen and micronutrients from the biofertilizer consortia, which favours auxiliary bud initiation and cell division, in agreement with the observations of Yadav et al. (2018) and Jadhav and Chavan (2024) [9] in mustard. Sharma et al. (2026) [23] also recorded a marked increase in the number of primary and secondary branches plant⁻¹ of mustard cultivars under an integrated/combined nutrient schedule as compared with a singlenutrient or lower-level application, supporting the present findings.

Leaf area index (LAI)

Leaf area index increased from 30 to 60 DAS and thereafter declined at 90 DAS under all treatments, reflecting rapid canopy build-up during vegetative growth followed by senescence of lower leaves at later stages. LAI did not differ significantly among treatments at 30 DAS, but at 60 and 90 DAS the differences were significant (Table 2), with treatment T 7 recording the highest LAI (3.13 and 3.84 at 60 DAS during 2023-24 and 2024-25), remaining at par with treatments T 6 , T 1 and T 4 , and significantly superior to treatment T 8 , which recorded the lowest LAI throughout the growth period. Improved leaf expansion under the integrated nutrient sources may be linked to greater nitrogen availability promoting chlorophyll synthesis and leaf-area development, similar to the findings of Kumar and Meena (2020) [10] and Patel et al. (2024) [18] . Better canopy development and vegetative vigour of mustard under enriched nutrient regimes have also been reported by Sharma et al. (2025 and 2026) [22,23] , who attributed the improvement to the synergistic role of balanced nutrition in enhancing photosynthetic surface area. [17] and Dey et al. (2024) in mustard. Enhanced fresh and dry biomass accumulation of mustard under balanced/combined nutrient management, relative to an inadequate nutrient supply, has also been reported by Sharma et al. (2026) [23] . (2024) [4] and Das et al. (2024) [5] in Indian mustard. Sharma et al.

(2026) [23] also observed a slight but favourable delay in days to 75% flowering and pod formation of mustard under a combined nutrient schedule, attributing it to prolonged vegetative growth prior to the reproductive switch.

Conclusion

The result revelead that application of 75% RDF + vermicompost @ 1.0 t ha⁻¹ + NPK consortia @ 200 ml per 10 kg seed (T 7 ), being statistically at par with 75% RDF + FYM @ 5 t ha⁻¹ + NPK consortia (T 6 ), 100% RDF (T 1 ) and 75% RDF + vermicompost (T 4 ), consistently recorded superior growth and developmental attributes, viz., crop stand, plant height, primary and secondary branches, leaf area index and dry matter accumulation of Indian mustard over both years of study. The integration of organic manures and microbial (NPK) consortia with 75% RDF may, therefore, be recommended as an effective and sustainable nutrient management strategy that permits a 25 per cent reduction in the recommended dose of chemical fertilizer without compromising the growth performance of Indian mustard under irrigated conditions of the semi-arid agro-climate of western Uttar Pradesh.

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