Important Days & Dates Mixed Quiz: Set 19

The correct answer is A, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. Patel was born on 31 October 1875 and, as the first Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister, brought the princely states into the Indian Union, which is why his birthday is observed as National Unity Day; the Statue of Unity at Kevadia in Gujarat, 182 metres high, was inaugurated on this date in 2018. B is wrong because 31 October is the death anniversary of Indira Gandhi, who was assassinated in 1984; her birthday was 19 November, and the clash of the two dates is the trap here. C is wrong because Subhas Chandra Bose was born on 23 January 1897, observed as Parakram Diwas. D is wrong because Birsa Munda was born on 15 November 1875, observed as Janjatiya Gaurav Diwas.

The correct answer is B, Jawaharlal Nehru. Shanti Van, meaning the forest of peace, is the memorial on the bank of the Yamuna where the first Prime Minister of India was cremated after his death on 27 May 1964. A is wrong because Mahatma Gandhi was cremated at Raj Ghat, the black marble platform with an eternal flame and the words Hey Ram, which is the best known of these memorials. C is wrong because Lal Bahadur Shastri's samadhi is Vijay Ghat, the name recalling the victory in the war of 1965. D is wrong because Indira Gandhi's memorial is Shakti Sthal; Vir Bhumi belongs to Rajiv Gandhi. Learning the five principal names in order, Raj Ghat, Shanti Van, Vijay Ghat, Shakti Sthal and Vir Bhumi, answers most questions of this kind.

The correct answer is B, P. C. Mahalanobis. Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis was born on 29 June 1893, founded the Indian Statistical Institute, gave the country its large-scale sample survey system and the statistical distance known by his name, and shaped the Second Five Year Plan. The Government declared his birth anniversary as National Statistics Day in 2007. Option A is wrong because C. R. Rao, though a statistician of the first rank and a student of Mahalanobis, is not the figure the day honours. Option C is wrong because V. K. R. V. Rao was an economist who founded the Delhi School of Economics and the Institute for Social and Economic Change. Option D is wrong because D. R. Gadgil was an economist associated with the Gokhale Institute and with the formula for plan assistance to states.

The correct answer is A, 15 March. World Consumer Rights Day takes its date from 15 March 1962, when United States President John F. Kennedy sent a message to Congress setting out the rights of the consumer, the first time a head of government did so; the consumer movement began observing the day in 1983. Option B is wrong because 24 December is National Consumer Rights Day in India, tied to the assent given to the Consumer Protection Act, 1986. Option C is wrong because 5 December is the International Day of Banks, declared by the United Nations General Assembly in 2019. Option D is wrong because 15 May is the International Day of Families and has nothing to do with consumer protection. Remember the pair: the world day in March, the Indian day in December.

The correct answer is A, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi. Shakti Sthal, the place of power, is the samadhi of Indira Gandhi, who was assassinated on 31 October 1984, and Vir Bhumi, the land of the brave, is the samadhi of Rajiv Gandhi, who was assassinated on 21 May 1991, a day now observed as Anti-Terrorism Day. B is wrong because it reverses the pair, which is exactly the mistake the question is set to catch. C is wrong because Vir Bhumi is Rajiv Gandhi's memorial, and no such named samadhi is asked for Sanjay Gandhi. D is wrong because the memorial of Jawaharlal Nehru is Shanti Van. Keeping the meanings in mind helps: Shanti for peace, Vijay for victory, Shakti for power and Vir for bravery.

The correct answer is A, Bombay State. The States Reorganisation Act of 1956 had left Bombay as a large bilingual state containing both Marathi and Gujarati speaking areas, and the demand for separate linguistic states continued in both. The Bombay Reorganisation Act of 1960 therefore divided it with effect from the first of May 1960 into Gujarat, with its capital first at Ahmedabad and later at Gandhinagar, and Maharashtra, with Bombay as its capital. The first of May is kept in one state as Gujarat Day and in the other as Maharashtra Day. Option B is wrong because Madras State kept its boundaries and simply took the name Tamil Nadu in January 1969. Option C is wrong because Mysore State similarly took the name Karnataka in November 1973 without being divided. Option D is wrong because Saurashtra was itself merged into Bombay State in 1956 and had ceased to exist as a separate state by 1960.

The correct answer is C, 5 December. The United Nations General Assembly declared 5 December as the International Day of Banks in 2019, to recognise the part that banks, and especially development banks, play in financing sustainable development. Option A is wrong because 1 April is the day the Reserve Bank of India began operations in 1935 and the first day of the Indian financial year, but it is not a United Nations observance. Option B is wrong because 19 July is remembered in India as Bank Nationalisation Day, the day fourteen large commercial banks were nationalised in 1969. Option D is wrong because 31 October is World Savings Day, also called World Thrift Day, which came out of the First International Thrift Congress held in Milan in 1924 and is not a United Nations day either.

The correct answer is B, 2014. The proposal was placed before the General Assembly in an address on 27 September 2014, and the Assembly adopted the resolution on 11 December 2014 with a record number of co-sponsoring countries. Option A is wrong because nothing on yoga was before the Assembly in 2013. Option C is the standard trap, because 2015 is the year of the first observance, held on 21 June 2015 with a mass demonstration at Rajpath in New Delhi; the resolution came the previous December. Option D is wrong because by 2016 the day was already in its second year. The date 21 June was chosen because it is the summer solstice, the longest day of the year in the northern hemisphere, a day of significance in many traditions. Separate the year of the resolution from the year of the first observance in your notes.

The correct answer is B, Mumbai. Chaitya Bhoomi, at Dadar on the sea front in Mumbai, is the place where Dr. B. R. Ambedkar was cremated after his death on 6 December 1956, and his followers gather there in lakhs on Mahaparinirvan Diwas. A is wrong because Nagpur is the city of Deekshabhoomi, where Ambedkar embraced Buddhism along with lakhs of followers in October 1956; the two sites are constantly swapped in options. C is wrong because Mhow, now Dr. Ambedkar Nagar in Madhya Pradesh, is his birthplace, where he was born on 14 April 1891. D is wrong because the memorials of prime ministers and presidents are in Delhi, but Ambedkar, who was neither, was cremated in Mumbai where he had lived and worked.

The correct answer is D, Faizpur. The fiftieth session of the Indian National Congress met in December 1936 at Faizpur in the Khandesh region of what is now Maharashtra, and it was the first session of the Congress held in a village rather than in a city. Jawaharlal Nehru presided, and the choice of a rural venue was deliberate, marking the Congress decision to take its programme of agrarian reform to the peasantry before the provincial elections held under the Government of India Act of 1935. Option A, Karumadi, is a village in Kerala known for the Karumadikkuttan statue of the Buddha. Option B, Punnapra, also in Kerala, is remembered for the Punnapra Vayalar uprising of 1946. Option C, Rampur, is a district town of Uttar Pradesh and hosted no such session; all three are placed here only because they sound like villages.

The correct answer is A, 31 October. The day goes back to the First International Thrift Congress, held in Milan in 1924, whose closing day was 31 October; savings banks across the world have marked it since, and in India banks use it to promote small savings and deposit habits. Option B is wrong because 30 August is National Small Industry Day in India. Option C is wrong because 27 June is Micro, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises Day, declared by the United Nations in 2017. Option D is wrong because 20 October is World Statistics Day, observed at an interval of five years since 2010, and it is easy to confuse the two October dates. Note also that 31 October is Rashtriya Ekta Diwas in India, so one date carries two observances.

The correct answer is A, 8 September. UNESCO proclaimed the day in 1966 and it has been observed since 1967 to remind governments that literacy is the base of every other right, with a theme announced each year and the UNESCO literacy prizes awarded. Option B is wrong because 5 October is World Teachers' Day, kept since 1994 to mark the recommendation on the status of teachers adopted in 1966. Option C is wrong because 24 January is the International Day of Education, proclaimed by the United Nations and observed since 2019. Option D is wrong because 10 November is the World Science Day for Peace and Development. The September date is easy to fix in memory because Teachers' Day on the fifth and Engineers' Day on the fifteenth stand on either side of it.

The correct answer is B, Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan. Born on 5 September 1888, he was a philosopher and teacher before becoming the first Vice President and the second President of India, and when his students wished to celebrate his birthday he asked that it be kept as Teachers' Day instead. A is wrong because Dr. Zakir Husain was the third President of India and an educationist, but no national day is attached to his birthday. C is wrong because Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, the first Education Minister of independent India, was born on 11 November 1888, observed as National Education Day, which is the closest distractor in the set. D is wrong because Dr. Rajendra Prasad, born on 3 December 1884, was the first President and has no day named after him.

The correct answer is B, 1799. Napoleon Bonaparte seized power in November 1799 in the coup that overthrew the Directory, and he became First Consul of France, which is the point at which the French Revolution is usually said to have ended; he crowned himself emperor five years later, in 1804. A is wrong because 1797 is the year of the Treaty of Campo Formio, which ended his first Italian campaign but gave him no political office in Paris. C is wrong because by 1800 he was already in power and fought the battle of Marengo as First Consul. D is wrong because in 1798 he was away in Egypt, where his fleet was destroyed by Nelson at the Battle of the Nile, and he returned from that campaign only in 1799. The chain worth keeping is 1789 revolution, 1799 Napoleon in power, 1804 emperor, 1815 Waterloo.

The correct answer is A, 27 June. The United Nations General Assembly declared 27 June as Micro, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises Day in 2017, in recognition of the share of such enterprises in employment and in world output. Option B is wrong because 30 August is National Small Industry Day, an Indian observance, and the two are the classic pair in this question: one is a United Nations day in June, the other an Indian day in August. Option C is wrong because 7 August is National Handloom Day, chosen because the Swadeshi movement was launched on that day in 1905. Option D is wrong because 12 February is National Productivity Day in India, which opens National Productivity Week and is observed by the National Productivity Council.

The correct answer is B, 21 April. On this day in 1947 Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel addressed the first batch of probationers of the administrative service at Metcalfe House in Delhi and described the services as the steel frame that would hold the country together, and the day is now marked with awards for excellence in public administration. Option A is wrong because 14 April is National Fire Service Day, kept for the firemen who died in the Bombay dock explosion of 1944, and it is also the birth anniversary of Dr B. R. Ambedkar. Option C is wrong because 1 July is National Doctors' Day, for Dr B. C. Roy. Option D is wrong because 15 September is Engineers' Day, for Sir M. Visvesvaraya. April holds two service days, so keep the pair apart.

The correct answer is B, Chaudhary Charan Singh. Known as the champion of the peasantry, he served as Prime Minister and his memorial in Delhi is named Kisan Ghat; his birthday, 23 December 1902, is observed across the country as Kisan Diwas or Farmers' Day. A is wrong because Gulzarilal Nanda, who twice served as acting Prime Minister, has Narayan Ghat as his memorial. C is wrong because Morarji Desai's samadhi is Abhay Ghat at Ahmedabad in Gujarat, outside Delhi. D is wrong because no separately named samadhi of this kind is asked for Chandra Shekhar; later leaders are cremated at Rashtriya Smriti Sthal, the common memorial ground created in Delhi so that no fresh plot need be allotted for each one. For revision, note that Charan Singh's slogan and his work on land reform in Uttar Pradesh are asked in the same paper as his memorial, so the name Kisan Ghat and the day Kisan Diwas should be learnt as one pair.

The correct answer is B, Chaudhary Charan Singh, who was born on 23 December 1902, served as Prime Minister of India and is remembered for the laws and the politics that put the peasant at the centre of Indian public life. Option A is wrong because Verghese Kurien, born on 26 November 1921, is honoured on National Milk Day for building the dairy co-operative movement and Operation Flood. Option C is wrong because M. S. Swaminathan is associated with the green revolution in wheat and rice and with the commission on farmers, but Kisan Diwas is not his birth anniversary. Option D is wrong because Jagjivan Ram was a labour and agriculture minister of long standing, and his birth anniversary falls in April, not December.

The correct answer is B, Mahatma Gandhi. Gandhi was assassinated on 30 January 1948 at Birla House in Delhi, and the day is observed every year as Martyrs' Day, with two minutes of silence at eleven in the morning. A is wrong because Bhagat Singh, along with Sukhdev and Rajguru, was hanged at Lahore on 23 March 1931, and that date is also observed as Shaheed Diwas, which is why the question has to be read carefully: India marks more than one Martyrs' Day. C is wrong because Chandra Shekhar Azad died fighting the police at Alfred Park, Allahabad, on 27 February 1931. D is wrong because Lala Lajpat Rai died on 17 November 1928 of injuries from a lathi charge during the protest against the Simon Commission.

The correct answer is B, the first session of the Customs Co-operation Council was held. That inaugural session took place in Brussels on 26 January 1953; the Council took the working name World Customs Organization in 1994, and 26 January is kept as International Customs Day, a date Indian students remember easily because it is also Republic Day. Option A is wrong because the World Trade Organization came into being on 1 January 1995. Option C is wrong because the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade was signed in 1947 and took effect in 1948, before the Council existed. Option D is wrong because the Customs Act of India was passed in 1962 and governs Indian customs law, which is a separate matter from the international observance.