Randomly amplified polymorphic DNA markers were used to assess the genetic diversity among thirty three maize inbred lines and seven Quality Protein maize lines of maize. A total of 40 operon decamer primers were screened in duplicate and 14 of these primers were selected for further testing. A total of 112 markers were amplified with 14 primers with an average of 8.0 DNA bands per primer. Among the 112 markers, 94 were found to be polymorphic and the percentage of polymorphism was 83.92 per cent. A total of 12 fragments were amplified with primer OPAW 20 and a minimum number of 3 bands were amplified with primer OPAL-10. The approximate size of the largest fragment amplified was in the range 3.0 to 3.5 kb the smallest easily recognizable fragment amplified was approximately 0.3 kb. Maximum d value of 0.96 was observed between UMI 814 and CML 118, and the least distance was observed between UMI 889 and UMI 57. The nature of relationships among the genotypes as revealed by their genetic distances largely involved similarities with the exception of some pairs, which displayed divergence. The most plausible explanation for the comparatively low genetic distances between the populations is that they might probably have descended from a common ancestral population.
