Growing Pigeonpea (Tur/Arhar) in Telangana

Updated 2026-07-13 · Region guide

Telangana sits in the Southern Plateau (Deccan) with semi-arid, hot and red sandy soil, black soil. Deccan plateau — a leading paddy, cotton, chilli and maize state. Here's how pigeonpea (tur/arhar) — a Kharif crop — fits, and how to grow it well here.

Is Telangana good for growing pigeonpea (tur/arhar)?

When to sow pigeonpea (tur/arhar) in Telangana

Sow in Jun–Jul and harvest around Dec–Jan. The crop takes about 150–270 days. In Telangana's semi-arid, hot, the window matters more than anything else you do: ~900 mm rainfall and tanks, borewells + Godavari/Krishna lift schemes mean a late Kharif sowing runs pigeonpea (tur/arhar) into the wrong weather at its most sensitive stage.

Where pigeonpea (tur/arhar) actually grows in Telangana

Redgram in Telangana holds on in the rainfed uplands — Adilabad, Nirmal, Kumram Bheem Asifabad, Mancherial, Nizamabad, Kamareddy and Jagtial in the north; Vikarabad, Tandur, Mahabubnagar, Nagarkurnool and Wanaparthy in the south-west — on red chalka and medium black soils. Wherever Kaleshwaram water or a good borewell arrived, the land went to paddy, so tur is now farmed on the plots the water did not reach.

Where it is sold: Tandur (Vikarabad) is the redgram market that matters, and Tandur Redgram carries a GI tag earned on genuine cooking quality; Adilabad, Nizamabad, Jagtial, Mahabubnagar and Warangal handle the rest. MSP procurement runs through the state marketing federation as NAFED's agency and the Tandur and Adilabad centres fill fast — if you farm in the Tandur tract, selling on the GI identity through the yard or an FPO beats mixing into a generic lot.

The local risk to plan for: Telangana's tur has been pushed onto the poorest, driest land by paddy, so it starts at a disadvantage and gets the least investment. In Adilabad the specific trap is different: tur sitting inside a cotton field gets caught in the cotton spray calendar, which wipes out the natural enemies that were quietly holding the pod borer down.

Best pigeonpea (tur/arhar) varieties for Telangana

Grown in Telangana:

• PRG-176 and PRG-158 — Palem-bred by PJTSAU for the Telangana rainfed tracts
• WRG-27 and WRG-65 — the Warangal Redgram series
• Asha (ICPL-87119) — for a long-duration rainfed sole crop
• Maruti (ICP-8863) — on old redgram land with a wilt history

Confirm the variety is notified for Telangana — on red sandy soil, black soil under tanks, borewells + Godavari/Krishna lift schemes, a variety bred for a different zone will underperform whatever the seed packet claims. Your Telangana KVK or agriculture officer holds the current shortlist.

Typical yield & price

Typical yield here is around 4–7 quintal/acre. The government MSP is ₹7,000/quintal; local mandi rates vary, so check YieldAI for today's live Telangana price.

Common problems in Telangana

The pests and diseases to scout for:

• pod borer at flowering in October-November — and in Adilabad, tur inside a cotton field gets caught in the cotton spray schedule, which removes the natural enemies holding it back
• wilt and sterility mosaic on the older redgram land of Adilabad and Nagarkurnool
• pod fly, whose damage only shows once the grain is split at the mill
• Maruca (spotted pod borer) webbing flowers together in a wet October

semi-arid conditions shape which of these bite hardest each season — scout early and act while a problem is small. YieldAI can identify a pest or disease from a photo of your crop.

Key practices

• If you are in the Vikarabad-Tandur tract, sell on the GI identity through the Tandur yard or an FPO — Tandur Redgram has a real cooking-quality reputation that a generic lot throws away
• Where tur is a cotton intercrop in Adilabad, scout the tur separately at flowering; do not let the cotton spray calendar decide what happens to your pulse
• Sow by mid-to-late June with the monsoon onset — the crop must set pods before the northeast monsoon leaves the uplands
• Register for MSP procurement early through the state marketing federation; the Tandur and Adilabad centres fill quickly and there is no second window