The present study was carried out to estimate the growth rate of area, production and yield and to measure the contribution of different components to the growth rate of millets in India during the last six decades i.e. from 1950-51 to 2011-12. Area under sorghum, pearl millet, finger millet and total millets registered positive growth during 1950-51 to 1980-81 and negative growth subsequently. The production of total millets registered significant growth during overall study period due to increase in yield. Increase in production of sorghum, pearl millet, finger millet and total millets were contributed by their yields, whereas area and its interaction with yield have adversely affected the production. Decline in production of small millets was due to area effect and interaction effect. The main source of growth in production of millets has been the growth in yield per hectare during the period from 1950-51 to 2011-12.

The prevalence of Vibrio cholerae in drinking water, lakes and sewage outfalls during July and August 1996 in Vellore, India was determined. Drinking water samples were collected on single occasions from 12 sites in different geographic areas of the town where cholera had been reported. Samples of water, plankton and sediment were collected from fixed sites at three lakes on three occasions separated by at least 3 days during the course of the study. Samples from open sewers were taken from two representative sites in four areas of the town. Bacteria isolated from samples were identified by standard biochemical tests and isolated strains of V. cholerae tested for their ability to agglutinate O1 and O139 antisera. Water samples from lakes were also tested for the presence of V. cholerae O1 and O139 by fluorescent antibody staining. Non-O1, non-O139 strains of V. cholerae were detected in 41% of drinking water samples and 100% of water, sediment and plankton samples from the test lakes. Eighty-seven per cent of open sewers sampled contained viable non-O1, non-O139 V. cholerae. Fluorescent antibody staining gave positive results for V. cholerae O1 and O139 for all water samples from the three lake sites. Strains of Aeromonas spp. were isolated from 58% of drinking water samples and from 66% of sediment, 77% of plankton and 55% of water samples from lakes. All open sewers sampled contained Aeromonas spp. PCR amplification employing specific primers demonstrated that none of the non-agglutinating V. cholerae isolates contained the ctx operon. The non-O1, non-O139 V. cholerae isolates showed different patterns of antibiotic resistance to ampicillin, ciprofloxacin, chloramphenicol, tetracycline and trimethoprim.

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Frontline demonstrations resulted in a yield of 80.83 q ha-1 with 14.01 per cent increase over farmer’s practice of 70.90 q ha-1which was much more than the district average yield of 47.33 q ha-1and increased net returns of Rs. 18,106 per hectare (53.16 %) over farmers practice. During the study period extension gap of 9.93 q ha-1 was found to be more than technology gap of 6.17 q ha-1 which emphasized the need to educate the farmers through various means for the adoption of this resource conservation technology for improved maize production with reduced cost of cultivation. Technology index of 18.51 per cent, indices of realized potential yield of 81.49 per cent and potential farm yield of 87.71 per cent had shown the feasibility of the demonstrated technology at the farmers’ fields.