Five Centres of Excellence Approved for Classical Languages

The correct answer is five. The Department of Higher Education under the Ministry of Education approved the establishment of five Centres of Excellence, one each for Classical Assamese, Classical Bengali, Classical Marathi, Classical Pali and Classical Prakrit. Options A, B and D are wrong because each names a count other than the one approved, and the number here is tied to a list that can be recited: five languages, five host institutions and five States. The count is also easy to confirm from the other direction, since the States involved are Assam, West Bengal, Maharashtra, Odisha and Gujarat. Questions of this type reward a candidate who learns the list rather than the bare number, because an examiner can ask for the figure one year and for a language to institution pairing the next, and the list answers both.

The correct answer is the Central University of Odisha. This pairing is a favourite with paper setters precisely because it is not the one a candidate would guess, since Pali is not a language a reader would associate with a particular modern State in the way Assamese or Bengali is. Option A is wrong because the Central University of Gujarat hosts the centre for Classical Prakrit, and swapping the two central universities is the trap in this question. Option C is wrong because Tezpur University in Assam hosts the centre for Classical Assamese. Option D is wrong because Visva-Bharati University in West Bengal hosts the centre for Classical Bengali. The safest way to carry these is in pairs: Pali with Odisha and Prakrit with Gujarat, both at central universities, and Marathi at the Deccan College Post-Graduate and Research Institute in Pune.

The correct answer is the Deccan College Post-Graduate and Research Institute in Pune, a deemed-to-be university, which will host the centre for Classical Marathi in Maharashtra. Option A is the strongest distractor because it names another well known university in the same city, and a candidate who remembers only the city of Pune can be caught by it. Option C is wrong because the host is in Pune rather than Mumbai. Option D is wrong because the Central University of Gujarat hosts the centre for Classical Prakrit, not for Marathi. Note the type of institution as well as its name: the Pune host is a deemed-to-be university, while two of the five centres sit in central universities that carry the word central in their names, and an examiner may test that distinction rather than only the name.

The correct answer is compulsory teaching of the languages in all schools, which is not among the stated areas of focus. The four areas are strengthening academic research and scholarship, preservation and digitisation of linguistic and literary resources, wider dissemination of classical language heritage, and strengthening regional academic ecosystems. Options A, B and D are therefore wrong answers to a question asking what is not included, because each of them is in fact one of the four. The centres are research and preservation bodies placed in higher educational institutions, so their work runs to documentation, digitisation, scholarship and access rather than to school curricula. Reading the question carefully matters here, since a hurried candidate who answers what the centres will do rather than what they will not do loses the mark on an item they knew.