Prospecting Efficacy of Native Bacterial Bioagents against Blast Disease and their Potential for Plant Growth Promotion in Finger Millet

Thirty-seven isolates of pseudomonas and bacillus were isolated from the phylloplane of healthy finger millet leaves. Two of the bacterial isolates showing maximum inhibition against the blast pathogen under invitro conditions were characterized by biochemical test and molecular characterization using 16SrRNA sequencing and also evaluated for hydrolytic enzyme activity under growth promotion activity. The isolates were identified to be Pseudomonas fluorescens (P-9) and Bacillus subtilis (B-10) showing 100% nucleotide similarity with reported strains. Field evaluation with microbial consortium (P-9 & B-10) as talc formulation resulted in significant reduction in leaf blast severity (55.15%), neck blast (44.44 %) and finger blast (46.02 % ) along with a 35.17 % increase in grain yield over control and highest cost benefit ratio of 1: 1.53 over control.