19 November 2025 · Shift 2

Advaita Vedanta philosopher The renowned philosopher born in Kerala in the 8th century is Adi Shankaracharya, born at Kaladi on the bank of the Periyar river. He propounded Advaita Vedanta — Brahman alone is real and the individual soul is not different from it — and wrote commentaries on the Upanishads, the Brahma Sutra and the Bhagavad Gita. He established four mathas at Sringeri, Puri, Dwarka and Badrinath to spread this teaching. Madhvacharya (13th century) founded Dvaita; Vallabhacharya (15th–16th century) founded Shuddhadvaita and the Pushti Marg; Kabirdas was a 15th-century Nirguna saint-poet. Hence, option (c) is the correct answer.

Constituent Assembly office-bearers Sir B. N. Rau (Benegal Narsing Rau) was appointed Constitutional Adviser to the Constituent Assembly in 1946. After studying the constitutions of other countries he prepared the original draft of about 240 clauses, on which the Drafting Committee headed by Dr B. R. Ambedkar then worked. K. M. Munshi and Alladi Krishnaswami Ayyar were members of that Drafting Committee, while Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel chaired the Advisory Committee on Fundamental Rights and Minorities. Rau later represented India at the UN Security Council and became a judge of the International Court of Justice at The Hague. Hence, option (c) is the correct answer.

Sources of the Constitution The Concurrent List — the list of subjects on which both Parliament and the State legislatures may make laws — was borrowed from the Constitution of Australia. It is the third list of the Seventh Schedule; if a Union law and a State law on a Concurrent subject clash, the Union law prevails (Article 254). Freedom of trade, commerce and intercourse within the territory of India (Article 301) and the joint sitting of the two Houses (Article 108) also come from Australia. Fundamental Rights are drawn from the USA, the Directive Principles from Ireland, and single citizenship from Britain. Hence, option (c) is the correct answer.

Chabahar Port agreement On 13 May 2024 India signed a ten-year contract with Iran for the operation of the Shahid Beheshti terminal of Chabahar Port. It was signed by India Ports Global Limited (IPGL) and the Port and Maritime Organisation of Iran, and is India's first long-term contract to run an overseas port. Chabahar stands on the Gulf of Oman in Sistan-Baluchistan province and gives India sea access to Afghanistan and Central Asia while bypassing Pakistan. It is a key node of the International North–South Transport Corridor (INSTC). Hence, option (d) is the correct answer.

SAGAR maritime vision SAGAR — Security and Growth for All in the Region — is India's maritime vision, announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Port Louis, Mauritius, in March 2015. Under it India acts as the first responder in the Indian Ocean Region, sending humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, medicines, food and drinking water to neighbours such as Maldives, Sri Lanka, Mauritius, Madagascar and Mozambique. Mission Sagar and Operation Samudra Setu during the COVID-19 pandemic carried this policy forward. The vision also covers maritime security, sustainable use of ocean resources and closer economic ties with island neighbours. Hence, option (c) is the correct answer.

Indian Nobel laureates Kailash Satyarthi won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014, sharing it with Malala Yousafzai of Pakistan. Born in 1954 at Vidisha, Madhya Pradesh, he gave up an engineering career and founded the Bachpan Bachao Andolan in 1980, which has rescued tens of thousands of children from bonded labour and trafficking and helped push the Right to Education through. The other three Indians in the options are Nobel laureates too, but in Physics, Chemistry and Economic Sciences — not Peace. Hence the correct option is (c).

Ancient Indian mathematicians The 7th-century scholar described here is Brahmagupta (598-668 CE). In his work Brahmasphutasiddhanta (628 CE) he was the first to treat zero as a number and to state the rules of arithmetic for zero and for negative (debt) quantities. Aryabhata belongs to the 5th century, Varahamihira to the 6th, and Sushruta was a surgeon, not a mathematician — so only Brahmagupta fits both the century and the subject. Hence the correct option is (c).

Diplomatic appointments Vinay Mohan Kwatra was named India's Ambassador to the United States in July 2024. A 1988-batch Indian Foreign Service officer, he had just completed his term as Foreign Secretary and had earlier been Ambassador to Nepal and to France. He took over the Washington mission from Taranjit Singh Sandhu, while Vikram Misri succeeded him as Foreign Secretary in the same month. Hence the correct option is (b).

State Chief Secretary Maharashtra appointed senior IAS officer Rajesh Kumar as its Chief Secretary at the end of June 2025. He is a 1989-batch officer of the Maharashtra cadre and was serving as Additional Chief Secretary (Revenue) before the elevation. He took charge from Sujata Saunik, who retired on 30 June 2025 after becoming the first woman Chief Secretary of Maharashtra. The Chief Secretary is the senior-most civil servant of a State and heads its entire administrative machinery. Hence the correct option is (b).

AI Kiran initiative AI Kiran was launched in April 2025. It is a national movement for inclusive leadership in Artificial Intelligence, aimed at bringing a far larger number of Indian women into AI research, entrepreneurship and policy. The movement is co-led with the Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India and works through mentorship, capacity building and recognition of women AI leaders. Hence the correct option is (c).

New criminal laws The Indian Evidence Act, 1872 has been replaced by the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam (BSA), 2023, which came into force on 1 July 2024. The BSA modernises the law of evidence chiefly by giving electronic and digital records the status of primary evidence and by simplifying the old sections. It is one of three laws that together replaced the colonial criminal-law framework, so the other options — which deal with data protection, women's reservation and decriminalising minor offences — are unrelated. Hence the correct option is (b).

Water conservation campaign The Jal Utsav campaign of 2024 was led by NITI Aayog. It was run as a fortnight-long drive in the Aspirational Districts and Aspirational Blocks, spread over about twenty States. Its purpose was to spread awareness of water conservation, revive traditional water bodies and get the local community involved in managing water — matching NITI Aayog's role as the government's policy think tank for such programmes. Hence the correct option is (b).

Unified Pension Scheme The Union Cabinet approved the Unified Pension Scheme on 24 August 2024. The scheme was framed on the recommendations of the committee headed by Finance Secretary T. V. Somanathan, which had been set up in 2023 to review the National Pension System. It assures a pension of 50 per cent of the average basic pay of the last twelve months for employees with at least 25 years of service, along with a family pension and a guaranteed minimum pension of ₹10,000 a month. The UPS came into effect from 1 April 2025 as an option for central government employees covered by the NPS. Hence the correct option is (c).

Sports organisations The World Anti-Doping Agency has its headquarters at Montreal in Canada. WADA was founded in 1999 to lead a worldwide, uniform campaign against doping in sport, and it publishes the World Anti-Doping Code and the annual list of prohibited substances. Lausanne is often confused with it because the International Olympic Committee sits there; India's own body is the National Anti-Doping Agency, set up in New Delhi in 2005. Hence the correct option is (c).

Sports terminology The wall that encloses an ice hockey rink is called the boards. It is a low, rigid barrier, usually of fibreglass or plastic with padding on the inside, and transparent safety glass is fixed above it to protect spectators. The boards keep the puck in play, so players can deliberately bank a pass off them or check an opponent against them. 'Nets' are the goals at the two ends, while 'rails' and 'curbs' are not ice hockey terms at all. Hence the correct option is (c).

E-waste eco-park Delhi has been chosen for India's first e-waste eco-park, to be built at Holambi Kalan in the north-west of the city. The park will bring dismantling, scientific recycling and the recovery of metals such as gold, copper and rare earths into one regulated campus spread over about 11 acres. The aim is to draw the huge informal e-waste trade of the capital into a safe, formal system, cutting pollution and supporting a circular economy in line with the E-Waste (Management) Rules. Hence the correct option is (b).

Ramsar sites The two wetlands added in June 2025 are Khichan in Phalodi district and Menar in Udaipur district, both in Rajasthan. Khichan is famous for the thousands of demoiselle cranes that winter there, and Menar, called the 'bird village', hosts large flocks of migratory waterbirds around its two ponds. With these two, Rajasthan's Ramsar tally rose to four, the earlier ones being Keoladeo Ghana National Park in Bharatpur and Sambhar Lake. A Ramsar site is a wetland recognised as being of international importance under the Ramsar Convention of 1971. Hence the correct option is (c).

Rock-cut architecture The Kailasa Temple stands in Cave 16 of the Ellora caves, near Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar (Aurangabad) in Maharashtra. It was carved in the 8th century under the Rashtrakuta king Krishna I and is dedicated to Lord Shiva. It is called monolithic because the whole temple — tower, courtyard, pillars and elephants — was cut downwards out of a single basalt hillside instead of being built up stone by stone. The Ellora caves are a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Hence the correct option is (b).

Folk dances of India Rai is a folk dance of the Bundelkhand region of Madhya Pradesh. It is danced by women called bedni to the beat of the mridang, chiefly at fairs, weddings and harvest celebrations, and is admired for its swift spinning and rhythmic footwork. Gaur, Matki, Karma, Jawara and Tertali are the other well-known folk dances of Madhya Pradesh. Hence the correct option is (c).

Folk theatre forms Kakkarissi Natakam is a folk dance-drama of Kerala, seen mostly in the southern districts of the State. The play follows a gypsy couple, Kakkalan and Kakkathi — treated as forms of Shiva and Parvati — and uses their adventures to poke fun at social evils. Its dialogue is a lively mixture of Malayalam and Tamil, and the satirical, comic tone is what sets it apart from Kerala's classical forms. Kathakali, Koodiyattam, Ottan Thullal and Chakyar Koothu are the better-known dance-drama traditions of the same State. Hence the correct option is (b).

Revenue expenditure Revenue expenditure is spending that neither creates an asset for the government nor reduces any of its liabilities; it is the recurring cost of running the administration. Salaries are paid year after year for services already rendered and leave behind no asset, so statement I is revenue expenditure. Pensions are likewise a recurring payment out of the current year's revenue and create no asset, so statement II is also revenue expenditure. Capital expenditure, by contrast, covers items such as building roads, buying machinery or repaying loans. Both statements are therefore correct, and the correct option is (c).

Mughal dynasty Aurangzeb (Alamgir I), who ruled from 1658 to 1707, is counted as the last of the Great Mughals. The Great Mughals are the six strong rulers from Babur to Aurangzeb; the empire reached its largest extent under Aurangzeb, stretching deep into the Deccan. After his death in 1707 the throne passed to weak successors beginning with Bahadur Shah I, and the empire slid into decline — so the emperors after him are called the Later Mughals. Bahadur Shah Zafar was the last Mughal emperor of all, deposed after the Revolt of 1857, but he ruled only in name. Hence the correct option is (c).

Fiscal policy effects A tax cut leaves households with a larger share of their income, that is, disposable income rises. In Keynesian analysis a part of every extra rupee of disposable income is spent, the proportion being the marginal propensity to consume, so consumption goes up. Higher consumption raises aggregate demand, which encourages firms to produce more — this is why a tax cut financed by a deficit is called an expansionary fiscal measure. Options (a), (c) and (d) all describe a contraction, which is the opposite of what a tax cut does. Hence the correct option is (b).

Jainism — Mahavira Vardhamana Mahavira renounced his princely life at the age of 30. Born in 599 BCE at Kundagrama near Vaishali, he was the son of the Jnatrika chief Siddhartha and queen Trishala, and became the 24th Tirthankara of Jainism. After renunciation he practised severe penance for 12 years, attained Kevala Jnana at 42 on the bank of the Rijupalika river, and attained Nirvana at 72 at Pavapuri. The age 29 belongs to Gautama Buddha's Great Renunciation, which is the usual trap in this question. Hence the correct option is (b).

Vedic literature The earliest recorded mention of the name 'Bharata' occurs in the Rig Veda, the oldest text in Indian literature. There it is the name of a Vedic tribe, the Bharatas, whose chief Sudas defeated a confederacy of ten kings in the Dasarajna, the Battle of Ten Kings fought on the Parushni (Ravi) river. The Vishnu Purana later develops the idea of Bharatavarsha as the land south of the Himalayas, but that is a much later use of the name. The Samaveda is a collection of melodies drawn largely from Rig Vedic verses, and the Arthashastra of Kautilya is a treatise on statecraft, so neither can be the earliest source. Hence the correct option is (c).