GS: Hindi / English · Language questions stay in their original language.
150 questions · 150 marks · 2 hours 30 minutes
Choose one option per question.
Tap an option to check it, or open “See answer”.
Correct answer: (B) Aditi Swami
At the World Archery Championships at Berlin in August 2023 Aditi Swami won the individual compound gold and became the youngest ever senior world champion.
Correct answer: (B) Jayaprakash Narayan
During the Quit India Movement Jayaprakash Narayan, working underground, organised the ‘Azad Dasta’, which carried out secret actions against British rule.
Correct answer: (A) April 1930
The Salt Movement began in Bihar in April 1930, right after Gandhiji's Dandi march; Champaran and Saran were its main centres.
Correct answer: (C) Odisha
The ‘Mission Shakti Scooter Yojana’ was approved by the Government of Odisha for the women of self-help groups.
Correct answer: (B) Mercalli scale
The Richter scale measures the magnitude of an earthquake, while its intensity—how much damage was done where—is judged on the Mercalli scale.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
In leaching the rainwater carries the soluble minerals of the topsoil down with it. That ties the process both to regions of heavy rainfall and to minerals and soil, so more than one option is correct.
Correct answer: (E) None of the above
Pakistan's border touches Gujarat, Rajasthan, Punjab and Jammu & Kashmir, while Bangladesh's touches West Bengal, Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura and Mizoram. No state borders both countries, so none of the options given is correct.
Correct answer: (A) Rajasthan
Rajasthan stands first in the production of millets; bajra is grown there on a large scale because it does well even with little rain.
Correct answer: (C) Jaisalmer
The driest place in India is taken to be Jaisalmer, which gets only about 150–200 mm of rain a year. Bikaner gets somewhat more. Leh gets less still, but it is a cold desert and is not usually counted as the answer to this question.
Correct answer: (C) Watermelon
Zaid crops are grown in the hot months, March to June—watermelon, muskmelon and cucumber among them. Moong and urad are mainly kharif crops.
Correct answer: (B) Middle Ganga Valley
The Magadha and Anga plains lie in Bihar, which is part of the middle valley of the Ganga. The lower valley falls in West Bengal and the upper in Uttar Pradesh.
Correct answer: (A) rare species
The Himalayan brown bear, the wild Asiatic buffalo and the desert fox have grown very few in number but are not extinct, so they are counted among the rare species.
Correct answer: (E) None of the above
It was on Raj Kumar Shukla's repeated urging that Mahatma Gandhi came to Champaran in 1917. All three names given are wrong, so the answer is ‘None of the above’.
Correct answer: (B) Rajendra Prasad
‘India Divided’ was written by Dr Rajendra Prasad in 1946, in which he examined the question of the country's partition.
Correct answer: (E) None of the above
There were two Home Rule Leagues—Bal Gangadhar Tilak's, begun in April 1916, and Annie Besant's in September 1916. Neither was started in 1915, the year the question gives, so the answer is ‘None of the above’.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
Not one but several women were active in the Salt Satyagraha in Bihar, so more than one of the names given is correct.
Correct answer: (C) Dinabandhu Mitra
The play ‘Neel Darpan’ was written by Dinabandhu Mitra, showing the cruelty of the British planters towards the peasants who grew indigo.
Correct answer: (A) Sachindra Nath Sanyal
Sachindra Nath Sanyal set up the Patna branch of the Anushilan Samiti in 1913; he was later among the founders of the Hindustan Republican Association.
Correct answer: (A) 1922
The Gaya session of the Congress was held in 1922 under the presidency of Chittaranjan Das. The ground for the Swaraj Party was laid after it.
Correct answer: (B) 1931
The nationalist daily ‘The Indian Nation’ began publication from Patna in 1931.
Correct answer: (C) The whole world
The very first line of the passage says the whole world is passing through a period of rapid change in the knowledge landscape—it is not about one country.
Correct answer: (C) Knowledge
The passage puts the change in the ‘knowledge landscape’, within which both science and art fall.
Correct answer: (B) Big data, machine learning and artificial intelligence
The passage names big data, machine learning and artificial intelligence together as the fields of scientific and technological development, so the option giving the whole group is right.
Correct answer: (B) Unskilled workers
By the passage machines will take the place of unskilled workers—not of all human beings or all workers.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
The passage says the demand for skilled workers will rise in data science, computer science and mathematics alike, so more than one option is correct.
Correct answer: (B) energy, food, water and sanitation
The passage speaks of finding new ways to meet the needs for energy, food, water and sanitation—all four.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
Life sciences, chemistry, physics, agriculture, climate science and social sciences—the passage names all of these as needing new skilled workers, so more than one option is correct.
Correct answer: (B) Research cooperation in infectious-disease management and vaccine development
For dealing with pandemics the passage speaks of research cooperation in the management of infectious diseases and in vaccine development, not of medicine or management alone.
Correct answer: (A) Developed
By the passage India is moving towards becoming a developed country.
Correct answer: (A) India
The passage describes India as moving towards being one of the world's three largest economies.
Correct answer: (C) Social progress through literature
The passage says that in Bankim Chandra's time ‘Bangadarshan’ was a means of social progress through literature; speaking against political injustice came with Ravi Babu.
Correct answer: (A) When the Boers killed the Boer community in South Africa
By the passage Rabindranath wrote his articles in opposition when the people of the Boer community were killed in South Africa.
Correct answer: (B) Its genuine expression of patriotism
The reason the passage gives is that ‘Jana Gana Mana Adhinayaka’ holds a true feeling of patriotism—that is why it was accepted as the national anthem.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
By the passage the magazine had ceased after Bankim Chandra's death and Rabindranath brought it out again in 1901—both statements are true, so the answer is ‘more than one’.
Correct answer: (C) For people to abandon base tendencies and become useful members of society
The passage says the purpose of his works was that people should abandon base tendencies and become useful members of society.
Correct answer: (B) The soil of India
The passage says the body is made of the soil of this sacred land of India.
Correct answer: (C) The water of the Ganga
The passage speaks of having drunk the pure water of the Ganga.
Correct answer: (C) Saraswati
The passage asks us not to forget the second birth received from the lap of Saraswati—the life that learning gives.
Correct answer: (B) Mother Savitri
The passage says that while doing any work one should not turn away from the worship of Mother Savitri.
Correct answer: (A) Mother India
The author's hope is that the reader will make the glory of Mother India shine the brighter.
Correct answer: (C) Six
By usage pronouns fall into six kinds—personal, reflexive, demonstrative, indefinite, relative and interrogative.
Correct answer: (E) None of the above
Hindi pronouns do not inflect for gender—‘वह’ serves for a man and a woman alike. They change by person, number and case, so none of the options given is wholly right.
Correct answer: (B) Quality, number, quantity
Adjectives are classified by quality, number and quantity—giving the qualitative, numeral and quantitative kinds.
Correct answer: (A) Eight
Hindi is taken to have eight cases—nominative, accusative, instrumental, dative, ablative, genitive, locative and vocative.
Correct answer: (C) Dative
‘को’ and ‘के लिए’ mark the dative case, since they show to whom or for whom something is given.
Correct answer: (C) Dative case
The one for whom something is done, or to whom something is given, is in the dative case. The ablative shows separation and the locative place.
Correct answer: (B) Tense
The form of the verb that shows both when the action happens and whether it is complete is its tense.
Correct answer: (A) Future tense
Both verbs point to time still to come, so this is an example of the future tense.
Correct answer: (B) Bahuvrihi compound
When the whole compound turns into an adjective of some third word, it is a bahuvrihi compound—‘पीताम्बर’, for instance, means the one in yellow garments, that is, Krishna.
Correct answer: (C) महोत्सव
In guna sandhi an ‘अ/आ’ followed by ‘उ/ऊ’ becomes ‘ओ’—‘महा + उत्सव = महोत्सव’ is exactly that. ‘महौषधि’ is vriddhi sandhi and ‘अधीश्वर’ is dirgha sandhi.