GS: Hindi / English · Language questions stay in their original language.
120 questions · 120 marks · 2 hours
Choose one option per question.
Tap an option to check it, or open “See answer”.
Correct answer: (A) According to the 2011 Census, Sikkim has a population of 6 lakhs.
By the 2011 Census, Sikkim is India's least populous state, with about 6·1 lakh people. Uttar Pradesh is the most populous state, not the largest in area—that is Rajasthan.
Correct answer: (B) 33
By the National Forest Policy of 1952, 33% of the country's total geographical area should be under forest—60% in the hills and 20% in the plains.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
Jhumming, that is shifting cultivation, goes by different names in India—bewar and dahiya in Madhya Pradesh and podu in Andhra Pradesh. All three are its local names.
Correct answer: (B) Maloca
A large communal house with a steeply slanting roof in the Amazon basin is called a maloca. Manioc and cassava are names of a crop grown there.
Correct answer: (A) Vindhyachal range and Krishna River
The historical Dakshinapath was the region between the Vindhyachal range and the Krishna river, and the ancient trade route that joined northern and southern India.
Correct answer: (B) Delhi Ridge, Aravalli Range, Sahyadri and Amarkantak Hills
The water divide between the rivers falling into the Arabian Sea and those falling into the Bay of Bengal is made by the Delhi Ridge, the Aravalli range and the Sahyadri, that is the Western Ghats.
Correct answer: (C) Mediterranean coastal area of Western Asia
The western disturbances that bring the winter rain to north-west India come from the Mediterranean coastal area, towards western Asia.
Correct answer: (B) Western Ghats
In Trewartha's classification Am means the tropical monsoon climate, with very heavy rain. In India it is found on the western slope of the Western Ghats.
Correct answer: (B) Aman, Sali and Aghani
The winter rice of northern India is called aman, sali and aghani. ‘Aus’ is the name of the summer rice.
Correct answer: (B) It extends across more than two States.
The middle Gangetic plain agroclimatic region spreads over the eastern part of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar—two states only. So extending over more than two states is not a feature of it.
Correct answer: (B) Annie Besant
The newspaper ‘New India’ was brought out by Annie Besant, through which she carried on the propaganda of the Home Rule movement.
Correct answer: (A) Ashwini Kumar Dutta
The ‘Swadesh Bandhav Samiti’ was founded by Ashwini Kumar Dutta at Barisal, and became a leading body of constructive work in the time of the Swadeshi movement.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
In the Champaran indigo movement many helpers stood with Gandhiji—Narhari Parikh, Mahadev Desai and Maulana Abdul Bari among them—so more than one option is correct.
Correct answer: (B) 15 August
During the August revolution the order to fire on the crowd gathered before the Patna secretariat was given on 15 August 1942, and seven students were killed.
Correct answer: (C) 1929
The Bihar Prantiya Kisan Sabha was founded in 1929 by Swami Sahajanand Saraswati, and became the base of the All India Kisan Sabha.
Correct answer: (A) Faraizi
The Faraizi movement was led in Bengal by Haji Shariatullah. It broke out against the many unjust taxes laid on by the zamindars, among them a tax for keeping a beard.
Correct answer: (C) Meerut Conspiracy Case
In the Meerut Conspiracy Case of 1929 three Englishmen—Philip Spratt, Ben Bradley and Lester Hutchinson—were detained along with the labour leaders.
Correct answer: (C) Political representation of the depressed class
The Poona Pact of 1932, between Gandhiji and Dr Ambedkar, replaced separate electorates with seats reserved for the depressed classes within a joint electorate.
Correct answer: (A) Patna
The first All India Congress Socialist Conference was held at Patna in 1934, where the Congress Socialist Party was founded.
Correct answer: (B) Kalikinkar Datta
‘Biography of Kunwar Singh and Amar Singh’ was written by the historian Kalikinkar Datta, who wrote at length on the 1857 revolt in Bihar.
Correct answer: (A) Pattabhi Sitaramayya
At the Tripuri session of 1939 Subhas Chandra Bose won the Congress presidency by defeating Pattabhi Sitaramayya, whom Gandhiji had supported.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
Dr Ambedkar brought out the paper ‘Mooknayak’, founded the ‘Bahishkrit Hitakarini Sabha’, and died in 1956—all three statements are correct.
Correct answer: (C) a-2, b-3, c-1, d-4
Matching the movements with their centres gives the order a-2, b-3, c-1, d-4: indigo planters at Champaran, the peasant satyagraha at Kheda, the cotton-mill workers at Ahmedabad, and the calling off of Non-Cooperation after Chauri Chaura.
Correct answer: (C) It is implied in the Right to Freedom of Expression.
The Constitution does not mention the freedom of the press separately; it is held to be implied in the freedom of speech and expression under Article 19(1)(a).
Correct answer: (B) a-1, b-2, c-3, d-4
Matching the resources given with their classes gives the order a-1, b-2, c-3, d-4.
Correct answer: (A) Himachal Pradesh and Arunachal Pradesh
The medicinal plant Himalayan yew is found in Himachal Pradesh and Arunachal Pradesh; the anti-cancer drug taxol is made from it.
Correct answer: (A) The Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2003
The Overseas Citizen of India scheme was brought in by the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, 2003.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
The loosening of the rigid caste system had not one cause but several—the Constitution and its provisions, social reform and economic change, and the spread of literacy. So more than one option is correct.
Correct answer: (B) 2004
The Ministry of Panchayati Raj was created in the central government in 2004, to watch over the working of the 73rd amendment.
Correct answer: (A) Karl Marx
Karl Marx held that after the class struggle a communist society would be the natural society of the future, with no private ownership of the means of production.
Correct answer: (C) Jean-Jacques Rousseau
‘The Social Contract’ was written by Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Hobbes wrote ‘Leviathan’ and Locke the ‘Two Treatises of Government’.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
Both the Narmada Bachao Andolan and the Tehri Dam movement were launched against multipurpose projects. The Chipko movement was against the felling of trees. So more than one option is correct.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
Article 51A lists many Fundamental Duties—to uphold the unity and integrity of India, to protect the natural environment, and to give one's child the opportunity of education. All three are Fundamental Duties.
Correct answer: (C) Dr. Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar
‘Pakistan or the Partition of India’ is the work of Dr Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, in which he examined the question of partition.
Correct answer: (C) 1801
Ireland was forcibly joined to the United Kingdom by the Act of Union of 1801.
Correct answer: (C) Atal Bihari Vajpayee
Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan was begun in 2001 by Atal Bihari Vajpayee's government, to bring elementary education to children of 6 to 14.
Correct answer: (C) 1948
Sri Lanka, then Ceylon, became independent on 4 February 1948, about six months after India.
Correct answer: (A) Older and poor people above 65 years
Under the Annapurna Yojana free grain is given to the poor above 65 who do not receive the old-age pension.
Correct answer: (A) Odum
The Y-shaped, two-branched model of energy flow in an ecosystem was put forward by Odum, showing the grazing and the detritus food chains together.
Correct answer: (C) Lichens
Lichens are very sensitive to sulphur dioxide and vanish from polluted areas, which is why they are called the biological indicator of SO₂.
Correct answer: (E) None of the above
The Salim Ali Bird Sanctuary is in Goa, on Chorao island in the Mandovi river. All three states given are wrong, so the answer is ‘None of the above’.
Correct answer: (A) Switzerland
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has its headquarters at Gland in Switzerland; it is the body that publishes the Red List of threatened species.
Correct answer: (B) 10%
By Lindeman's ten per cent law only about 10% of the energy passes from one trophic level to the next.
Correct answer: (C) Halophytes
Pneumatophores, or breathing roots, are found in halophytes such as the mangroves of the Sundarbans. With little oxygen in the marshy soil the roots come up to breathe.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
A secondary pollutant is one formed in the atmosphere by the reaction of primary pollutants. Both ozone and PAN are formed that way, while SO₂ is a primary pollutant given off directly. So more than one option is correct.
Correct answer: (A) Lindeman
Lindeman gave the 10% law, by which only about a tenth of the energy reaches the next trophic level; the rest is lost in respiration and as heat.
Correct answer: (D) More than one of the above
Tropical rain forests are found where the rain is above 200 cm—the Karnataka and Kerala parts of the Western Ghats are such. Himachal Pradesh has temperate forests. So more than one option is correct.
Correct answer: (C) Rice field
The greatest source of methane in India is the rice field, since the flooded soil has no oxygen and the decay there is anaerobic.
Correct answer: (C) Mesosphere
The lowest temperature of the atmosphere is in the upper part of the mesosphere, where it falls to about −90 °C. Meteors burn up in this layer too.
Correct answer: (B) Biomagnification
The rise in the concentration of toxic substances at each higher trophic level is called biomagnification—as with DDT, growing from the fish to the birds.