Includes bibliographical references.

A field experiment was conducted at the research farm of the College of Agriculture, CAU (Imphal), Kyrdemkulai, Ri-Bhoi, Meghalaya, during the Kharif season of 2023-24 to investigate the “Comparison of Application Methods of Phosphorus and Silicon in Finger Millet (Eleusine coracana).” The experiment was designed in a factorial randomized block design (FRBD) with three (3) replications. Factor-A (phosphorus) consisted of three application methods: broadcasting (BC), band placement (BP), and seedling root dip (SRD). Similarly, Factor-B (silicon) included three application methods: broadcasting (BC), band placement (BP), and seedling root dip (SRD). The results revealed that the different application methods of phosphorus and silicon have significantly influenced the growth parameters such as plant height (cm), dry weight (g), leaves per plant, leaf length (cm), and yield-attributing characters like finger length (cm), number of ears per head, and ear head weight of finger millet (g). Yield parameters, including biological yield, grain yield, and stover yield, were significantly highest in the A2B2 treatment (phosphorus-band placement and silicon-band placement) at 7632, 2967, and 4665 kg ha-1 respectively, and lowest in A3B1 (phosphorus-seedling root dip and silicon-broadcasting) at 4797, 1789, and 3008 kg ha-1 respectively. Soil parameters such as soil organic carbon (SOC), available nitrogen (N), available phosphorus (P2O5), exchangeable acidity, and exchangeable aluminium (Al) were significantly highest in A3B3 (phosphorus-seedling root dip and silicon-seedling root dip) at 1.8%, 344 kg ha-1, 59.07 kg ha-1, 1.9 mEq 100 g-1 soil, and 1.117 mEq 100 g-1 soil, respectively. Total phosphorus and silicon uptake were significantly highest in A2B2 (phosphorus-band placement and silicon-band placement) at 8.14 kg ha-1 and 108.9 kg ha-1 respectively. The results of this experiment indicated that the band placement method for both phosphorus and silicon (phosphorus-band placement and silicon-band placement) was superior in terms of improvement in the yield of finger millet. In contrast, the seedling root dip method (phosphorus-seedling root dip and silicon- seedling root dip) was more effective in improving the fertility of acidic soil in the mid-hills of Meghalaya.