
Three new chickpea varieties, with enhanced drought tolerance, disease resistance and increased yield, are set to become available to the Indian farmers. These have been notified to be available for cultivation by the Central Varietal Release Committee. Calling for the deployment of ‘fast-forward breeding’, a newly conceived framework that promises faster delivery of varieties to farmers, Dr Rajeev Varshney, Research Program Director – Accelerated Crop Improvement, ICRISAT, who coordinated the integration of genomics-assisted breeding activities for developing these varieties