Geography Mixed Quiz: Set 23

The correct answer is C, 5 States. India's Standard Meridian, 82°30′E, crosses five states on its way south. Indian Standard Time is fixed by the local time of this meridian, which passes close to Mirzapur in Uttar Pradesh, so IST is 5 hours 30 minutes ahead of Greenwich Mean Time. Running south from Mirzapur, the meridian goes through Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Odisha and Andhra Pradesh before reaching the Bay of Bengal. One meridian was chosen for the whole country because India spans about 30 degrees of longitude, so the sun rises at Kibithu in Arunachal Pradesh nearly two hours before it rises in Gujarat. Option A is wrong because seven would mean adding states such as Telangana or Tamil Nadu, which this meridian does not touch. Option B is wrong because three would leave out Odisha and Andhra Pradesh in the south. Option D is wrong because six is one too many; no sixth state lies on 82°30′E. Exam tip: 82°30′E, five states, UP–MP–Chhattisgarh–Odisha–Andhra Pradesh, IST = GMT + 5:30.

The correct answer is C, Loess. Loess is a deposit of fine silt and dust carried by the wind and dropped far from where it was picked up, so it is the classic wind made or aeolian soil. It is loose, porous, pale yellow and stands in steep walls when cut, and because it holds nutrients well it is very fertile. The largest spread in the world is the Loess Plateau of northern China, formed from dust blown out of the Gobi desert, and it also covers parts of central Europe, Central Asia and the Mississippi valley. Option A is wrong because loam is a balanced mixture of sand, silt and clay and is not defined by the wind. Option B is wrong because marl is a clay rich in lime, laid down in water. Option D is wrong because podsol is the ash grey, acidic and leached soil of cold coniferous forest lands. Exam tip: loess means wind blown silt, and the Huang He carries it, which is why the river is called the Yellow River.

The correct answer is A, 1 to 12. The intensity of an earthquake is measured on the Modified Mercalli scale, whose grades run from I to XII. Intensity is not the same thing as magnitude: it records how strongly the shaking was felt at a particular place and how much damage it did, so it is judged from what people report and from the state of buildings, and it falls as you move away from the epicentre. Grade I is picked up only by instruments, grade VI cracks plaster and moves furniture, and grade XII means total destruction with the ground thrown into visible waves. Magnitude, by contrast, measures the energy released at the focus and is given as one number on the Richter scale. B is wrong because 1 to 7 is nearer the everyday span of Richter magnitudes. C is wrong because the Mercalli scale has no grade above XII. D is wrong because five grades cannot cover everything from barely felt to total ruin. Exam tip: Mercalli I to XII is damage felt; Richter is energy released.

The correct answer is D, a-iii, b-iv, c-ii, d-i. Coniferous forests grow in the cold northern belt of Asia, Europe and North America and are made of softwood evergreen trees such as pine, fir and spruce, whose light wood is used for paper and furniture. Mediterranean vegetation belongs to the west and south-west margins of the continents, where winters are wet and summers dry, and it is known for citrus fruits, olives and grapes. Tropical evergreen forests of the hot wet equatorial belt carry heavy hardwood trees such as mahogany, ebony and rosewood. Temperate evergreen forests lie on the eastern margins of the continents, where rain falls through the year. A, B and C are wrong because each misplaces at least two pairs, usually by tying coniferous forests to a continental margin instead of to softwood. Exam tip: conifer means softwood, Mediterranean means western margin, equatorial means hardwood.

The correct answer is A, Loo. The Loo is the hot, dry, dusty wind that blows over the plains of north India in summer. It develops in May and June, usually from the west or north-west, and blows strongest in the afternoon, when temperatures can cross 45 degrees Celsius in Rajasthan, Punjab, Haryana, Delhi and Uttar Pradesh. Long exposure to it causes heat stroke, so schools and outdoor work stop in the afternoon during a Loo spell. It weakens once the monsoon reaches the plains. Option B is wrong because the Chinook is a warm, dry wind that descends the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains in North America and is nicknamed the snow-eater. Option C is wrong because mango showers are pre-monsoon rain in Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu that helps mangoes ripen, not a wind. Option D is wrong because Purga is a cold, snow-laden wind of the Siberian tundra. Exam tip: Loo is hot and Indian, Chinook is American and warm, Purga is Siberian and cold.

The correct answer is C, A is true, but R is false. Iron and steel is indeed a heavy industry, but not because of light raw materials.

Industries are classified by the weight of the material they handle. A heavy industry uses bulky, heavy raw materials and turns out bulky products, so iron and steel, which consumes iron ore, coking coal, limestone, dolomite and manganese by the tonne, is the classic example. A light industry uses light raw materials and gives light finished goods, and it is here that cotton, rubber, silk and electronics belong. That is why the reason given is false: cotton and rubber are never the inputs of an iron and steel plant.

A is wrong as a choice because the reason is false. B is wrong for the same reason. D is wrong because the assertion about iron and steel being a heavy industry is perfectly true.

Exam tip: Heavy industry - iron and steel, cement, shipbuilding; light industry - cotton textiles, electronics, rubber goods.

The correct answer is D, Gujarat. Gujarat has the longest coastline of any Indian state. Its shore runs from the Rann of Kachchh round the Gulf of Kachchh, along the whole Saurashtra or Kathiawar peninsula and down the Gulf of Khambhat, and this deeply indented outline gives it far more shore than any other state. Option A is wrong because Karnataka has a short Kanara coast of only a few hundred kilometres between Goa and Kerala. Option B is wrong because Kerala, though famous for its Malabar coast and backwaters, is a narrow state whose coastline is much shorter than Gujarat's. Option C is wrong because Tamil Nadu, with the Coromandel coast, has one of the longer coastlines on the eastern side but still less than Gujarat. Remember that nine states of India touch the sea, and that Gujarat leads the list.

The correct answer is A, Mangrove Forests. Palm, coconut, keora and agar are the trees named for India's mangrove or tidal forests, which grow where the land meets the sea in deltas, estuaries and creeks. Their roots stand in salt water and mud, so many of them send up breathing roots above the ground to take in air. The largest such belt in India is the Sundarbans of the Ganga and Brahmaputra delta in West Bengal, famous for the sundari tree that gives it its name and for the Royal Bengal tiger, and mangroves also line the Mahanadi, Godavari and Krishna deltas and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Option B is wrong because evergreen forests of very heavy rainfall give rosewood, mahogany and ebony. Option C is wrong because deciduous or monsoon forests give teak, sal and shisham. Option D is wrong because montane forests of the hills give pine, deodar, oak and silver fir. Exam tip: tidal forest, Sundarbans and breathing roots all mean mangroves.

The correct answer is C, Tons. The Tons is a tributary of the Yamuna in the Ganga system, rising in the Garhwal Himalaya, and has nothing to do with the Brahmaputra basin. Option A is wrong as an answer because the Teesta, which drains Sikkim and north Bengal, does join the Brahmaputra, doing so in Bangladesh. Option B is wrong because the Siang, also called the Dihang, is the name the Brahmaputra itself carries in Arunachal Pradesh and is treated as its head stream, so it belongs to the system. Option D is wrong because the Manas, which comes down from Bhutan through the Manas national park, is one of the major north-bank tributaries of the Brahmaputra in Assam. The other tributaries worth remembering are the Subansiri, the Kameng, the Dibang and the Lohit, the last two giving the river its Assam name at Sadiya.

The correct answer is B, Meghalaya. Shillong is the capital of Meghalaya, the hill state whose name means abode of the clouds. Meghalaya was carved out of Assam and became a full state on 21 January 1972, the same day as Manipur and Tripura. Before that, Shillong had been the capital of undivided Assam, and its pine hills and cool weather earned it the name Scotland of the East. The state is home to the Khasi, Garo and Jaintia hills, and Mawsynram and Cherrapunji (Sohra) in the Khasi hills are among the wettest places on Earth. A is wrong because the capital of Tripura is Agartala. C is wrong because the capital of Nagaland is Kohima. D is wrong because Assam moved its capital from Shillong to Dispur, in Guwahati, after Meghalaya was formed. Exam tip: Shillong = Meghalaya, Kohima = Nagaland, Agartala = Tripura, Dispur = Assam, Imphal = Manipur, Aizawl = Mizoram, Itanagar = Arunachal Pradesh.

The correct answer is C, Western Ghats. Tropical evergreen forests need more than 200 cm of annual rainfall with a short dry season, and in India the western slopes of the Western Ghats get exactly that from the south-west monsoon. Such forests also grow in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, in Assam and along the upper Assam hills. Because there is no season without moisture, the trees shed leaves at different times and the forest never looks bare; it is layered, dense and hard to walk through, with rosewood, mahogany, ebony and aini among its trees. Option A is wrong because Punjab, with low rainfall and heavy cultivation, carries only thorn and scrub vegetation. Option B is wrong because the Sunderbans is tidal or mangrove forest of the delta, dominated by the salt-tolerant sundari tree. Option D is wrong because Rajasthan's dry climate supports desert thorn forest such as khejri and cactus. Exam tip: evergreen needs rainfall above 200 cm — Western Ghats, Andaman and Nicobar, north-east India.

The correct answer is C, Panama Canal. The Panama Canal cuts across the narrow Isthmus of Panama in Central America and joins the Atlantic Ocean, through the Caribbean Sea, with the Pacific Ocean. It was opened in 1914 by the United States and is about 82 km long. Because the land in between is higher than the sea, ships are raised and lowered by locks that use water from the man-made Gatun Lake. The canal saves ships the long voyage around Cape Horn at the southern tip of South America. The USA handed the canal over to Panama on 31 December 1999. A is wrong because the Kiel Canal in Germany joins the North Sea and the Baltic Sea. B is wrong because the Suez Canal in Egypt, opened in 1869, joins the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea. D is wrong because the White Sea Canal in Russia links the White Sea with the Baltic Sea. Exam tip: Suez 1869 (Mediterranean to Red Sea, no locks), Panama 1914 (Atlantic to Pacific, with locks), Kiel (North Sea to Baltic Sea).

The correct answer is C, Jhoom. Shifting agriculture is called jhoom or jhum cultivation in India, especially in the north eastern hills.

In this method a patch of forest is cleared and burnt, and the ash left behind manures the soil. The farmer grows crops on the patch for two or three years, and when the soil is exhausted moves to a fresh patch and lets the old one recover under forest. It is also known as slash and burn farming, and it carries different names in different regions: podu in Andhra Pradesh, kumari in the Western Ghats, bewar or dahiya in Madhya Pradesh, and milpa in Mexico. Its yields are low and it is discouraged today because the burning destroys forest and exposes the soil to erosion.

Option A is wrong because harvesting is simply the cutting of a ripe crop. Option B is wrong because transfer is not a farming term. Option D is wrong because transplanting means moving seedlings into a field, as in paddy.

Exam tip: jhum in the north east, podu in Andhra Pradesh, bewar in Madhya Pradesh, milpa in Mexico, all shifting cultivation.

The correct answer is A, A-ii, B-iii, C-iv, D-i. The Gobi is a cold desert of Asia spread over Mongolia and northern China, and it is famous for its dinosaur fossils. Patagonia lies in southern Argentina in South America; it is a rain-shadow desert, dry because the Andes block the moist westerly winds coming from the Pacific. The Great Victoria Desert is the largest desert of Australia, stretching across Western Australia and South Australia. The Kalahari covers most of Botswana and parts of Namibia and South Africa, in southern Africa. Paper setters like Patagonia because it lies on the eastern side of its continent, while most hot deserts lie on the western margins, next to cold ocean currents. Option B is wrong because it puts the Gobi in Australia and Patagonia in Asia. Option C is wrong because it places Patagonia in southern Africa and the Victoria Desert in South America. Option D is wrong because it gives every desert the wrong continent. Exam tip: Gobi–Asia, Patagonia–South America, Great Victoria–Australia, Kalahari–southern Africa.

The correct answer is A, Khetri. Khetri, in the Jhunjhunu district of Rajasthan, is famous for its copper mines. The Khetri belt runs along the Aravalli range, and its ore is mined and processed by Hindustan Copper Limited, which set up the Khetri Copper Complex there. Rajasthan is the country's leading copper state, followed by Madhya Pradesh with the Malanjkhand mine in Balaghat and Jharkhand with the Singhbhum belt. Copper is valued because it conducts electricity and heat well and is ductile, so it goes into wires, cables, utensils and alloys such as brass and bronze. Option B is wrong because Keonjhar in Odisha is known for iron ore and manganese. Option C is wrong because Gaya in Bihar lies in the mica belt and has no copper mining. Option D is wrong because Satna in Madhya Pradesh is known for limestone and its cement plants. Exam tip: for copper remember Khetri in Rajasthan, Malanjkhand in Madhya Pradesh and Singhbhum in Jharkhand.

The correct answer is A, Two. Because of the gravitational pull of the moon and the sun, together with the centrifugal effect of the earth's rotation, most coasts see the sea rise and fall twice in a day. The moon's pull raises a bulge of water on the side of the earth facing it and another on the opposite side, and as the earth turns a place passes through both bulges in about twenty-four hours. These are called semi-diurnal tides, and successive high tides come about twelve hours and twenty-five minutes apart. Option B is wrong because no shore gets three tidal cycles in a day. Option C is wrong because four counts the individual tides — two high and two low — while the rise-and-fall cycle itself happens twice. Option D is wrong because a single daily high and low, called a diurnal tide, occurs only on a few coasts such as parts of the Gulf of Mexico. Exam tip: spring tides come at full moon and new moon when sun and moon pull in line, and neap tides at the quarters.

The correct answer is C, 1 - C, 2 - A, 3 - D, 4 - B. BALCO, the Bharat Aluminium Company, has its smelter at Korba in Chhattisgarh, where cheap thermal power and nearby bauxite made aluminium smelting possible. IISCO, the Indian Iron and Steel Company, works at Burnpur near Asansol in West Bengal, in the Damodar valley coal and iron belt. NFL, National Fertilizers Limited, runs its gas-based urea plant at Bhatinda in Punjab, close to the farm belt it supplies. ICF, the Integral Coach Factory, is at Perambur in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, and has been building railway coaches since 1955. Option A is wrong because it pairs BALCO with Burnpur and IISCO with Chennai. Option B is wrong because it sends NFL to Chennai and ICF to Bhatinda. Option D is wrong because it places BALCO at Bhatinda and ICF at Korba. Exam tip: aluminium goes with Korba, steel with Burnpur, fertiliser with Bhatinda and coaches with Chennai.

The correct answer is A, 919. The final figures of Census 2011 put the child sex ratio, counted for the age group 0 to 6 years, at 919 females per 1000 males. This was the lowest child sex ratio recorded since independence and a fall from 927 in the 2001 census, even though the overall sex ratio improved in the same decade from 933 to 943. The gap points to sex selection before birth and to poorer care of girl children, which is why the Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques Act and the Beti Bachao Beti Padhao scheme focus on it. Haryana recorded the lowest child sex ratio among the states and Kerala the highest overall sex ratio at 1084. Option B, 909, is below any census figure for this group. Option C, 929, is close to the 2001 figure of 927 but not the 2011 one. Option D, 939, is nearer the overall sex ratio than the child figure. Exam tip: Census 2011 means overall sex ratio 943 and child sex ratio 919.

The correct answer is C, Using trees or large shrubs as fences for a garden. A line of trees or tall shrubs works as a windbreak: it slows the wind close to the ground so the moving air can no longer lift loose soil.

Wind erosion happens on dry, bare, open land where the topsoil is loose and there is no cover to hold it. Rows of trees planted across the direction of the wind are called shelterbelts, and they are the standard remedy in dry regions such as western Rajasthan, where they were planted along the Indira Gandhi Canal. The roots of the trees also bind the soil and their fallen leaves add humus to it.

Option A is wrong because paving land with tiles or cement seals the soil and destroys its use for plants; it is not soil conservation. Option B is wrong because crop rotation restores soil fertility rather than blocking the wind. Option D is wrong because growing vegetables in pots at home does nothing for open land.

Exam tip: shelterbelts and windbreaks check wind erosion; contour ploughing and terracing check water erosion.

The correct answer is C, 1 and 2 only. Statement 3 is wrong because the Kaleshwaram project is built on the Godavari, not the Krishna. The scheme takes its name from Kaleshwaram in Telangana, near the point where the Pranhita joins the Godavari, and it was inaugurated in June 2019, which makes statement 1 correct. It is described as the world's largest multi-stage, multi-purpose lift irrigation project, so statement 2 is correct: water is raised through a long chain of pump houses, barrages, tunnels, canals and reservoirs to fields that lie far above the river, and it is meant to serve lakhs of hectares in north Telangana as well as drinking water and industry. Option A is wrong and option D is wrong because both accept statement 3 and its Krishna River claim. Option B is wrong because it leaves out the correct statement 2. Exam tip: Kaleshwaram is on the Godavari in Telangana, while Polavaram is on the Godavari in Andhra Pradesh.