• First phase - blight on young seedlings
• Stem - girdled slightly above the soil line, plant topples and dies
• Stem lesion - dark brown, becoming grey in the centre as pycnidia develops
• Leaf - irregular brown spots
• Fruits – soft, watery & decays
• Finally black, mummified as pycnidia develop abundantly over the surface

• Pycnidia - with or without beak, brown to black
• Conidiophores - hyaline, simple or branched,
• Conidia - hyaline, one celled and subcylindrical
• Stylophores - filiform, curved, hyaline, septate

• Seed borne
• Spread by rain splashes, implements and insects
• Survives in infected plant debris in soil

Epidemiology

• Temp - 29 ° C (fungal growth)
• Storage rot of fruits is maximum at 25 ° C

• Seed treatment - hot water @ 50oC for 30 min
• Nursery - 0.2 % difolatan or captan 0.2% @ weekly interval
• Field - Zineb 0.2 %, Bordeaux mixture 0.8%