Art & Culture Mixed Quiz: Set 34

The correct answer is B, his enlightenment. Bodh Gaya in Bihar is where Siddhartha attained enlightenment under the Bodhi tree, and the Mahabodhi Temple complex that grew around the spot, with the Vajrasana or diamond throne beside the tree, was inscribed as a World Heritage Site in 2002. Option A is wrong because the first sermon, the Dhammachakkappavattana, was delivered at Sarnath near Varanasi in the deer park. Option C is wrong since the Buddha was born at Lumbini in present-day Nepal, which is the fourth of the great Buddhist sites. Option D is wrong because the mahaparinirvana took place at Kushinagar in Uttar Pradesh. The four events and their four places are asked together very often, so fix the sequence of birth, enlightenment, sermon and passing against Lumbini, Bodh Gaya, Sarnath and Kushinagar.

The correct answer is D, New Delhi. The institution stands at Teen Murti Bhavan in New Delhi, the house where Jawaharlal Nehru lived as Prime Minister for sixteen years, and it was opened to the public in 1964 after his death. It holds a museum on his life, a research library on modern Indian history with private papers and old newspapers, and a planetarium added in 1984. It works under the Ministry of Culture and has since been renamed the Prime Ministers' Museum and Library. The name Teen Murti comes from the three-soldier memorial in the circle outside. A is wrong because Kolkata has the Victoria Memorial and the National Library. B is wrong because Prayagraj has Anand Bhawan, the Nehru family home turned museum. C is wrong because Mumbai has the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya. Exam tip: pair Teen Murti Bhavan with Nehru and Anand Bhawan with Prayagraj.

The correct answer is C, Shah Jahan, who built the Red Fort of red sandstone as the citadel of his new capital Shahjahanabad, completing it in 1648; the Diwan-i-Aam, the Diwan-i-Khas, the Rang Mahal and the Moti Masjid stand inside, and it was inscribed as a World Heritage Site in 2007. Option A is wrong because Akbar built the Agra Fort and the city of Fatehpur Sikri, both also in red sandstone, which is why he is the strongest distractor here. Option B is wrong because Jahangir built no fort of this scale; the Jahangiri Mahal that carries his name stands inside Agra Fort and was built in Akbar's reign. Option D is wrong because Aurangzeb added the Moti Masjid within the Red Fort but did not build the fort itself. The Prime Minister of India hoists the national flag at this fort on Independence Day.

The correct answer is B, Ashoka. The core of the Great Stupa at Sanchi in Madhya Pradesh, also called Stupa Number One, was raised in the reign of the Mauryan emperor Ashoka in the third century before the common era; the Shungas later enlarged the dome and added the railing, and the four carved gateways or toranas were added in the Satavahana period. Option A, Chandragupta Maurya, was Ashoka's grandfather and no building at Sanchi is attributed to him. Option C, Kanishka, was the Kushana ruler under whom the Gandhara and Mathura schools flourished and the fourth Buddhist council was held, far from Sanchi. Option D, Harshavardhana, ruled in the seventh century of the common era, nearly a thousand years later. Remember that Sanchi shows the Buddha only through symbols, never as a human figure.

The correct answer is D, 2023. Garba, the ritual and devotional dance performed during Navaratri around an earthen lamp in honour of the goddess, was inscribed at the eighteenth session of the Intergovernmental Committee held in Botswana in December 2023. Option A, 2017, is the year of the Kumbh Mela inscription, which is why it appears here. Option B, 2019, is wrong because India had no inscription that year, and students who guess a year in the middle of the decade fall into it. Option C, 2021, is the year of Durga Puja in Kolkata, the inscription immediately before Garba, and it is the strongest distractor in the set. The order at the end of the list is worth memorising as a chain: Kumbh Mela in 2017, Durga Puja in 2021, Garba in 2023 and Deepavali in 2025.

The correct answer is B, both statements are true, but B is not the correct explanation of A. Chola temples such as the Brihadisvara temple at Thanjavur, built by Rajaraja I, were far more than places of worship. They held land and villages, employed priests, garland makers, cooks, dancers and musicians, ran schools and craft workshops, and even lent money, so the religious, social and cultural life of the region gathered around them. Chola bronzes were cast by the lost wax method and mostly show deities such as Nataraja, Vishnu and Parvati, while a few portray donors and devotees, including saints and members of the royal family. Both statements are correct facts, but the subject matter of the bronzes does not explain why the temples were social centres; their land, wealth and grants do. So option A is wrong. Option C is wrong because Statement B is true, and option D is wrong because Statement A is true. Exam tip: Brihadisvara temple, Thanjavur, Rajaraja I; Chola bronzes by the lost wax method, Nataraja the most famous.

The correct answer is A, Chittorgarh Fort, which spreads over the largest area of any fort in the country and holds within it palaces, tanks and temples as well as the Vijay Stambha and the Kirti Stambha. Option B is wrong on the measure being asked: Kumbhalgarh is famous for the length of its wall, held to be among the longest in the world, which is a different superlative and the commonest confusion in this question. Option C is wrong because Gwalior Fort, though called a pearl among the forts of Hind by Babur, is smaller, and is remembered for the Man Mandir palace of Raja Man Singh Tomar. Option D is wrong because Mehrangarh at Jodhpur, founded by Rao Jodha in 1459, is remembered for its cliff-top position above the blue city. Both Chittorgarh and Kumbhalgarh are part of the Hill Forts of Rajasthan inscribed in 2013.

The correct answer is B, Sowa-Rigpa. Sowa-Rigpa, the science of healing, is the Amchi system of medicine practised in the Himalayan belt of Ladakh, Lahaul and Spiti, Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh and the Darjeeling hills, and its foundational text is the Gyud-Zhi or Four Tantras. Parliament gave it statutory recognition in 2010 by amending the law governing the central council for Indian medicine, which made it the seventh system in the AYUSH family. Options A, C and D are wrong because naturopathy, homoeopathy and Siddha were all part of the group from the beginning: the acronym AYUSH itself is built from Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy. A National Institute of Sowa-Rigpa was later set up at Leh in Ladakh, and the system is also practised across the Himalayan belt of Nepal, Bhutan and Mongolia, which is why it is sometimes described as the Himalayan or Tibetan system of medicine.

The correct answer is B, Kerala. Kutiyattam is performed in temple theatres called kuttampalam, uses the Sanskrit drama repertoire, and is counted among the oldest living theatre traditions in the world; UNESCO recognised it as a Masterpiece in 2001 and it moved to the Representative List in 2008. Option A, Tamil Nadu, is wrong, though the state has its own classical form in Bharatanatyam, which is not on the list. Option C, Karnataka, is wrong; Yakshagana of that state is a famous theatre form but has not been inscribed. Option D, Andhra Pradesh, is wrong as well, and Kuchipudi of that state is often confused with Kutiyattam because the names begin alike. Kerala holds two Indian elements, Kutiyattam and Mudiyettu, and that is the fact to store.

The correct answer is B, France. Le Corbusier is counted as a French architect. He was born Charles-Édouard Jeanneret in Switzerland in 1887, settled in Paris, took French citizenship in 1930 and worked from France for the rest of his life. Jawaharlal Nehru brought him to India to plan Chandigarh, the shared capital of Punjab and Haryana, after the first planner Albert Mayer and his architect Matthew Nowicki left the project. Le Corbusier laid the city out in numbered sectors on a grid and designed the Capitol Complex in Sector 1 — the High Court, the Secretariat, the Legislative Assembly and the Open Hand monument — which UNESCO added to its World Heritage list in 2016. Option A is wrong because Germany is the home of the Bauhaus school and Walter Gropius, not of Le Corbusier. Option C is wrong because Italy is linked with Renaissance architects such as Brunelleschi and Palladio. Option D is wrong because Spain is known for Antoni Gaudí of Barcelona. Exam tip: Chandigarh — Le Corbusier; New Delhi — Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker.

The correct answer is B, Chittorgarh Fort. The Vijay Stambha was raised by Rana Kumbha of Mewar to mark a victory, and the Kirti Stambha, the tower of fame, stands in the same fort, so a question may ask for either. Option A is wrong because the feature named in questions on Amber, near Jaipur, is the Sheesh Mahal or hall of mirrors, the fort itself having been built up by Raja Man Singh I. Option C is wrong because Ranthambore is remembered for its isolated hill and for lying inside a tiger reserve rather than for a tower. Option D is wrong because Junagarh at Bikaner, built by Raja Rai Singh, is a fort of the plains with no such monument. All of these except Junagarh and Mehrangarh belong to the group of six inscribed as the Hill Forts of Rajasthan.

The correct answer is B, Only two. Bhaja is a Buddhist cave site and Sittanavasal a Jain one, but Besnagar has no Shaivite cave shrine. Besnagar, near Vidisha in Madhya Pradesh, is known for the Heliodorus pillar of about 113 BCE, a Garuda pillar set up by a Greek envoy who called himself a devotee of Vasudeva, so its link is Vaishnava. Bhaja, near Lonavala in Maharashtra, has some of the earliest Buddhist rock-cut chaityas and viharas, from about the second century BCE. Sittanavasal, near Pudukkottai in Tamil Nadu, is a Jain cave, the Arivar Koil, famous for its paintings of a lotus pond. So pair 1 is wrong and pairs 2 and 3 are right. Option A is wrong because two pairs match, not one. Option C is wrong because Besnagar is not a Shaivite cave site. Option D is wrong because Bhaja and Sittanavasal are correctly matched. Exam tip: Besnagar means Heliodorus and Vasudeva; Bhaja is Buddhist, Sittanavasal is Jain.

The correct answer is B, Yoga. Yoga was inscribed in 2016, and in the same year India joined the multinational element Nawrouz, the spring new year celebrated across a belt of countries, so 2016 carries two entries for India. Option A, the Kumbh Mela, was inscribed in 2017, and its citation described it as the largest peaceful congregation of pilgrims in the world. Option C, Durga Puja in Kolkata, came in 2021 and was noted as the first element of its kind from Asia, an urban festival recognised for its public art and community organisation. Option D, Chhau dance, belongs to 2010 along with Kalbelia and Mudiyettu, which makes that year the busiest in India's list. Year questions are set from exactly these four, so keep them in a single chain.

The correct answer is C, 16. Teentaal runs over sixteen matras divided into four equal vibhags of four beats each. The first beat of the cycle is the sam and carries the stress, the third vibhag opens on a khali, and the cycle returns to the sam at the end. Its regularity is why most khayal performances and most instrumental gats are set in it.

Option A, 10, is the count of Jhaptaal, which is divided unevenly as two, three, two and three. Option B, 12, belongs to Ektaal and to Chautaal, the latter played on the pakhawaj for dhrupad. Option D, 14, is the count of Dhamar tala, the cycle used for the dhamar form sung at Holi, and also of Deepchandi. Each of the four numbers is a real tala count, so the question rewards a student who has memorised the whole table rather than one entry from it.

The correct answer is B, Sawai Pratap Singh, who had the Hawa Mahal built in 1799 as a screen of small windows and jharokhas through which the women of the household could watch the processions in the street below without being seen. Option A is wrong because Sawai Jai Singh II founded Jaipur itself and began the City Palace and the observatory, the Jantar Mantar, several decades earlier; he is the natural wrong answer because his name is attached to the city. Option C is wrong because Raja Man Singh I belongs to Amber, the older seat of the house. Option D is wrong because Maharaja Umaid Singh built the Umaid Bhawan palace at Jodhpur in the twentieth century, as relief work during a famine. The Hawa Mahal is built of pink and red sandstone, in keeping with the rest of the old city.

The correct answer is A, Karnataka. Yakshagana is performed through the night in coastal Karnataka on episodes from the epics, with tall headgear, painted faces, a singer who carries the story and drums that mark the dance. Option B is wrong because Kerala's Sanskrit theatre is Kutiyattam, recognised by UNESCO as intangible cultural heritage, and its dance drama is Kathakali. Option C is wrong because Maharashtra's folk theatre is Tamasha, with the Powada ballad beside it. Option D is wrong because Gujarat, along with Rajasthan, has Bhavai, a satirical folk play. This is the commonest question shape in the chapter, so revise the forms as pairs with their states rather than by their descriptions. The singer who carries the story in Yakshagana is called the Bhagavata, and the drums used are the chande and the maddale.

The correct answer is B, Odisha, Jharkhand and West Bengal. Chhau is a masked dance built on martial movement and episodes from the epics, and it has three recognised styles: Seraikella in Jharkhand, Purulia in West Bengal and Mayurbhanj in Odisha, the last of which is danced without masks. Option A names north-eastern states, where Sankirtana of Manipur is the inscribed element, not Chhau. Option C is wrong; the Ramlila of northern India is on the list, but that is a theatrical performance of the Ramayana rather than a dance. Option D is wrong, and the western element on the list is the Garba of Gujarat, inscribed in 2023. The three Chhau styles and their states are the detail papers test, so learn the pairings rather than the dance alone.

The correct answer is C, Telangana. Golconda, on the edge of Hyderabad, was the capital of the Qutb Shahi rulers before they moved down to the new city; it was the market through which the diamonds of the region were traded, and its acoustics are famous, a clap at the Fateh Darwaza being heard at the top of the hill. Option A is wrong because the Deccan forts of Karnataka are Bidar, Gulbarga and Chitradurga, the last known as the fort of seven circles of wall. Option B is wrong because Maharashtra holds Daulatabad, Raigad and the Maratha forts. Option D is wrong although it is the closest answer historically, since Hyderabad lay in Andhra Pradesh until the state of Telangana was formed; a question set today expects Telangana. The Qutb Shahi tombs stand near the fort.

The correct answer is A, Rajasthan. The Kalbelia are a community of the Thar region traditionally associated with handling snakes, and their dance, performed by women in flowing black skirts, imitates the movement of a serpent while the men play the been and the khanjari. Option B, Haryana, has no element on the Representative List. Option C, Punjab, does have one, but it is the brass and copper utensil craft of the Thatheras of Jandiala Guru, inscribed in 2014, and not a dance. Option D, Gujarat, is represented by the Garba of 2023. Kalbelia was inscribed in 2010, the same year as the Chhau dance and Mudiyettu, so the three can be asked together in a single matching question. One more marker helps: Kalbelia was nominated in the domain of performing arts, and its songs are composed on the spot during a performance, which the citation singled out as the mark of a living oral tradition.

The correct answer is B, Raigad, which Shivaji made his capital and where his coronation took place in 1674, the ceremony at which he took the title Chhatrapati. Option A is wrong because Pratapgad is remembered for his meeting with Afzal Khan, the encounter in which the Bijapur commander was killed. Option C is wrong because Sinhagad is remembered for its capture under Tanaji Malusare, who died in the assault. Option D is wrong because Shivneri is the fort where Shivaji was born, which makes it the most tempting answer of the four; birthplace and capital are deliberately offered together in this question. His sea forts, Sindhudurg among them, and the island fort of Murud-Janjira held by the Siddis, which was never taken, are asked in the same group.