25 February 2025 · Shift 1

Political parties of Andhra Pradesh YS Jagan Mohan Reddy belongs to the Yuvajana Sramika Rythu Congress Party (YSRCP), the party he founded in 2011 after leaving the Indian National Congress. He was the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh from 2019 to 2024; in the 2024 Assembly election the YSRCP was reduced to a handful of seats and the TDP-led alliance formed the government under N Chandrababu Naidu. The Jana Sena Party is Pawan Kalyan's party (founded 2014) and the Telugu Desam Party was founded by N T Rama Rao in 1982 - both fought the 2024 election against Jagan, so neither can be his party, and he had already quit the Congress in 2010. Hence the correct option is (a).

National Youth Policy The Government of India launched the National Youth Policy (NYP) in 2014, through the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports; it replaced the earlier policy of 2003. NYP 2014 defines 'youth' as the age group of 15-29 years - roughly a fourth of the country's population - and sets the vision of empowering them to realise their full potential. Its priorities run through education, employment and skill development, entrepreneurship, health and healthy lifestyle, sports, social values and community engagement, and participation in politics and governance. A draft NYP 2024 has since been prepared with a ten-year vision aligned to the Sustainable Development Goals, but the policy actually launched by the Government is the one of 2014. Hence the correct option is (a).

Boiling and evaporation Boiling is a bulk phenomenon: at the boiling point the vapour pressure of the liquid becomes equal to the pressure above it, so bubbles of vapour form everywhere inside the body of the liquid and rise up. Evaporation is a surface phenomenon: only the faster-moving molecules lying at the free surface escape, and this goes on at every temperature, even in the cold. That is also why evaporation cools the liquid left behind - the most energetic molecules are the ones that leave - while boiling needs a fixed temperature and a continuous supply of heat. So, in the order asked, boiling is bulk and evaporation is surface. Hence the correct option is (b).

Anoxygenic photosynthesis Bacteria that carry out anoxygenic photosynthesis use hydrogen sulphide, $H_{2}S$, as the electron donor in place of water. Because the donor is $H_{2}S$ and not $H_{2}O$, the by-product left behind is sulphur, not oxygen - which is exactly what the word 'anoxygenic' means. Green sulphur and purple sulphur bacteria of oxygen-poor, sulphide-rich water do this with a single photosystem. Water is the donor only in oxygenic photosynthesis of plants, algae and cyanobacteria, and that is where atmospheric $O_2$ comes from. Carbon dioxide is the carbon source that gets reduced (an electron acceptor, not a donor) and glucose is the product of the process, so neither of them can be the donor. Hence the correct option is (a).

Civilian awards 2024 Padma Subrahmanyam was conferred the Padma Vibhushan in 2024, the second-highest civilian award of India. She is the Bharatanatyam dancer and scholar who reconstructed the 108 karanas described in Bharata's Natya Shastra and built from them the style she calls 'Bharata Nrityam'. The Padma Shri, the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award and the Padma Bhushan had all reached her decades earlier, so none of those three can be the award of 2024 - the Padma awards are never repeated at the same rank. Hence the correct option is (d).

International Solar Alliance The Seventh Session of the International Solar Alliance (ISA) Assembly at New Delhi in 2024 was presided over by Pralhad Joshi, the Union Minister of New and Renewable Energy. India holds the Presidency of the ISA Assembly and France the Co-Presidency, so the Indian minister in charge of renewable energy takes the chair; the session drew ministers from 29 countries and delegates from over a hundred member and signatory nations. The ISA was launched by India and France at the Paris climate conference (COP21) in 2015 and is headquartered at Gwal Pahari, Gurugram - the first treaty-based international organisation with its seat in India. JP Nadda and Amit Shah hold the Health and Home portfolios respectively and Umesh Yadav is a cricketer, so none of them could preside over this Assembly. Hence the correct option is (d).

World Trade Organization The primary function of the World Trade Organization is to liberalise international trade and to keep it fair - it administers the trade agreements, settles disputes between members and reviews their trade policies. The WTO came into being on 1 January 1995 under the Marrakesh Agreement, taking over from the GATT of 1947, and works from Geneva; its highest body is the Ministerial Conference, which normally meets every two years. Purely domestic trade is a national matter, world tourism is the concern of the UN World Tourism Organization, and lending to developing countries is the work of the World Bank and the IMF - so options (a), (b) and (d) name someone else's job. Hence the correct option is (c).

Physiography of Meghalaya Tura stands in the Garo Hills of western Meghalaya, at the foot of Tura Peak, and is the headquarters of West Garo Hills district. In Meghalaya's agro-climatic classification this Garo Hills belt is the mild extremely humid zone - the south-west monsoon strikes these western and southern slopes first and soaks them. The Garo Hills form the western arm of the Garo-Khasi-Jaintia range, are drained by the Simsang river and carry Nokrek, their highest peak and a biosphere reserve; their people are the Garos. Shillong and Cherrapunji lie in the Khasi Hills and Jowai in the Jaintia Hills, and 'Laur Hills' is not one of the three hill ranges of Meghalaya at all. Hence the correct option is (b).

Literacy, Census 2011 Among the north-eastern states, Mizoram had the highest literacy rate in the Census of 2011 - $91.33\%$. In the country as a whole Mizoram stood third, after Kerala ($94.00\%$) and the union territory of Lakshadweep ($91.85\%$); its male literacy was $93.35\%$ and female literacy $89.27\%$, one of the narrowest gender gaps in India. Nagaland, Manipur and Assam all stayed well below Mizoram, and Assam was even below the national average of $73.00\%$, so none of them can be the answer. Hence the correct option is (c).

Revolutionary movement in Bengal The Anushilan Samiti and Jugantar were revolutionary secret societies of Bengal - they trained young men in arms, made bombs and struck at British officials. The Anushilan Samiti was organised at Calcutta in 1902 by Pramathanath Mitra along with Barindra Kumar Ghosh, Jatindranath Banerjee and Satish Chandra Basu; the Jugantar group broke away from it in 1906 and ran a Bengali weekly of the same name. Their best-known actions were the Muzaffarpur bomb attempt of 1908 by Khudiram Bose and Prafulla Chaki and the Alipore Bomb Case that followed it. Constitutional reform was the path of the Moderates, non-violent protest that of Gandhi's movements and social reform that of bodies like the Brahmo Samaj, so options (a), (c) and (d) describe other kinds of organisation. Hence the correct option is (b).

Three-age system The three-age system was introduced by Christian Jurgensen Thomsen, the Danish antiquarian who curated the National Museum of Denmark. To arrange the museum's collection he grouped pre-history by the material of its tools and weapons - the Stone Age, the Bronze Age and the Iron Age - and published the scheme in 1836. It was the first working system of relative dating in archaeology, and his student J J A Worsaae confirmed it by excavation, showing that the three kinds of tools really do lie in that order in the ground. The other three names are not connected with any such classification, and the near-name 'Robert Thomson' is only there to tempt. Hence the correct option is (c).

Khelo India Dus ka Dum The 'Khelo India Dus ka Dum' tournament was organised in ten cities. The name itself carries the number and is the easiest way to remember it - 'dus ka dum', ten sports disciplines played across ten cities. It was held by the Department of Sports, Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports, around International Women's Day 2023 as a women-only competition, and about 15,000 women athletes took part. Hence the correct option is (d).

Primary deficit The fiscal deficit - the 'total' deficit - is the gap between the government's total expenditure and its total receipts other than borrowings. A part of that borrowing goes only to pay interest on debt already taken. Take that part out and what is left is the primary deficit: with fiscal deficit F and interest payments I, primary deficit =F-I. So if the fiscal deficit is ₹6 lakh crore and interest payments are ₹4 lakh crore, the primary deficit is 6-4=2 lakh crore. The measure therefore shows how much the government is borrowing for its current needs alone; a zero primary deficit means the whole of this year's borrowing is going into servicing old debt. Adding the interest payments instead of subtracting them (option c) or mixing revenue and capital items (options a and b) gives no meaningful measure at all. Hence the correct option is (d).

Classical dances of India Raas-Leela, the dance-drama of the spiritual and eternal love of Radha and Krishna, is the very heart of Manipuri, the classical dance of Manipur. It grew out of the Vaishnava tradition that King Bhagyachandra gave shape to in the eighteenth century; the woman dancer wears the stiff barrel-shaped 'potloi' skirt and the men perform the Pung Cholom drum dance with it. Chhau is a masked dance of the eastern states that enacts episodes from the Mahabharata and the Ramayana, Kuchipudi belongs to Andhra Pradesh and Sattriya to the sattras of Assam - none of the three is built on the Raas-Leela. Hence the correct option is (a).

Sports mascots 2023 'Juhi', the mascot of the Women's Asian Hockey Champions Trophy 2023, was modelled on an elephant. The tournament was played at Ranchi from 27 October to 5 November 2023, and the elephant is the state animal of Jharkhand - a host state normally builds its mascot on its own state animal or bird, which is the clue to use here. India won that title at Ranchi, beating Japan 4-0 in the final. Hence the correct option is (d).

Government of India Act, 1935 The Government of India Act, 1935 divided legislative power between the federation and the provinces through three lists. The Federal List carried 59 subjects, the Provincial List 54 and the Concurrent List 36, and the residuary power was left with the Governor-General. The same three-list device was carried into the Constitution of 1950 as the Seventh Schedule, which is why this Act is called the chief source of our federal scheme; the Act also introduced provincial autonomy and dyarchy at the Centre. Hence the correct option is (d).

Festivals of North-East India The Hornbill Festival of Nagaland begins on 1 December every year and runs till 10 December. It is held at the Naga Heritage Village, Kisama, near Kohima, was started in 2000, and brings every Naga tribe on to one stage - hence its nickname, the 'Festival of Festivals'. It is named after the hornbill, the bird that fills Naga folklore. The other three belong to other states altogether, so none of them can be a festival of Nagaland. Hence the correct option is (d).

Hindustani classical music Raga 'Laswanti' (Lajwanti) was created by Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, the sarod maestro of the Maihar gharana. Trained by his father Ustad Allauddin Khan, he composed several new ragas - Chandranandan, Gauri Manjari, Medhavi and Lajwanti among them - and was the musician who first put Indian classical music on a long-playing record in the West in 1955. He was honoured with the Padma Bhushan (1967), the Padma Vibhushan (1989) and a MacArthur Fellowship (1991). Ronu Majumdar is a flautist; Amjad Ali Khan, also a sarod player, is known for other new ragas such as Kiran Ranjani and Haripriya Kanada; and Tansen sang in Akbar's court in the sixteenth century, long before this raga was made. Hence the correct option is (b).

State Legislative Council Article 171 of the Constitution fixes the maximum strength of a State Legislative Council at $\frac{1}{3}$ of the total strength of that state's Legislative Assembly. The same Article sets a floor of 40 members, so the Council of a small state cannot shrink to a token house; a Council is created or abolished by Parliament under Article 169 on a resolution of the Assembly. Within that strength, $\frac{1}{3}$ of the members are elected by local bodies, $\frac{1}{3}$ by the MLAs, $\frac{1}{12}$ by graduates and $\frac{1}{12}$ by teachers, while $\frac{1}{6}$ are nominated by the Governor. The Council is a permanent house that is never dissolved: an MLC serves six years and one-third of the members retire every two years. Hence the correct option is (b).

Five-Year Plans The theme of the Ninth Five-Year Plan (1997-2002) was 'Growth with Social Justice and Equality'. It began in the fiftieth year of independence and put its weight on the seven basic minimum services - safe drinking water, primary health care, primary education, housing for the poor, nutrition, connectivity and the public distribution system. Each of the other three options is the theme of a different plan, which is why they are placed here as distractors. Hence the correct option is (c).