Gallantry Awards: Param Vir Chakra to Shaurya Chakra, with MCQs

The correct answer is B, Param Vir Chakra. It is given for the most conspicuous act of bravery or self-sacrifice in the presence of the enemy, on land, at sea or in the air, and its name means the wheel of the ultimate brave. It stands first in the order of precedence of all gallantry decorations.

Option A, the Ashoka Chakra, is the highest peacetime gallantry award and stands second in the order of precedence, so it is correct only when the question says peacetime. Option C, the Maha Vir Chakra, is the second wartime award, below the Param Vir Chakra. Option D, the Kirti Chakra, is the second peacetime award and the counterpart of the Maha Vir Chakra. The word wartime in the stem is what settles this question, so read it before marking.

The correct answer is C, Ashoka Chakra. It is awarded for the most conspicuous bravery or an act of daring or self-sacrifice of the highest order away from the field of battle, and it may be given to civilians as well as to members of the armed forces.

Option A, the Shaurya Chakra, is the third peacetime award, the counterpart of the Vir Chakra. Option B, the Kirti Chakra, is the second peacetime award, the counterpart of the Maha Vir Chakra. Option D, the Vir Chakra, belongs to the wartime family altogether, which makes it wrong on two counts here. The three peacetime awards in descending order are Ashoka Chakra, Kirti Chakra and Shaurya Chakra, and remembering them as one line saves time when the options mix the families.

The correct answer is A, Major Somnath Sharma, of the 4th Battalion of the Kumaon Regiment, who received the award posthumously for the action at Badgam near Srinagar in November 1947. His company held off a much larger body of raiders and kept them from reaching the airfield, which allowed reinforcements to continue arriving in Kashmir.

Option B, Captain Vikram Batra, and option C, Lieutenant Manoj Kumar Pandey, both received the Param Vir Chakra posthumously for the Kargil conflict of 1999, more than fifty years later. Option D, Subedar Joginder Singh, was awarded it for an action of the 1962 conflict. All four are genuine recipients, so the question turns purely on the word first, and the answer is fixed by the year 1947. Note also that the award was instituted only in 1950 but takes effect from 15 August 1947, which is precisely why an action of November 1947 could be honoured with it at all.

The correct answer is B, Savitri Khanolkar. Born in Switzerland to a Swiss father and a Hungarian mother, she married an officer of the Indian Army, took Indian citizenship and made a deep study of Indian languages and tradition, which she drew on for the design of the medal and its vajra motif.

Option A, Nandalal Bose, was the artist who illustrated the manuscript of the Constitution of India, a related but different piece of work. Option C, Pingali Venkayya, designed the flag on which the national flag of India was based. Option D, Deenanath Bhargava, drew the state emblem for the illustrated Constitution. All four names belong to the making of India's national symbols, which is why they are placed together, and the medal belongs to Savitri Khanolkar.

The correct answer is C, 26 January 1950, the day the Constitution came into force and the Republic came into being. The three wartime awards were instituted on that date but were given effect from 15 August 1947, so that acts of bravery in the fighting in Kashmir could be recognised.

Option A, 15 August 1947, is the date from which the awards take effect, not the date of institution, and this fine distinction is the whole point of the question. Option B, 26 November 1949, is the date on which the Constitution was adopted, which belongs to the polity paper. Option D, January 1952, is when the peacetime awards, the Ashoka Chakra, Kirti Chakra and Shaurya Chakra, were instituted. Hold the pair together: 1950 for the wartime family and 1952 for the peacetime one.

The correct answer is B, Kirti Chakra. The three wartime awards have three peacetime counterparts in the same order: Param Vir Chakra with Ashoka Chakra, Maha Vir Chakra with Kirti Chakra and Vir Chakra with Shaurya Chakra. Since the Maha Vir Chakra is second in its family, its counterpart is the second peacetime award.

Option A, the Ashoka Chakra, is the counterpart of the Param Vir Chakra and stands one step higher. Option C, the Shaurya Chakra, is the counterpart of the Vir Chakra and stands one step lower. Option D, the Sena Medal, is a gallantry medal of the Army alone, with the Nao Sena Medal and the Vayu Sena Medal as its counterparts in the Navy and the Air Force, and it does not belong to the chakra series. Learn the three pairs in order and this family of questions is settled.

The correct answer is C, Vir Chakra. The Shaurya Chakra is the third of the peacetime gallantry awards and therefore corresponds to the third of the wartime awards, the Vir Chakra, both being given for acts of gallantry that rank below the first two grades.

Option A, the Param Vir Chakra, has the Ashoka Chakra as its counterpart. Option B, the Maha Vir Chakra, has the Kirti Chakra as its counterpart. Option D, the Yudh Seva Medal, is not a gallantry award at all; it belongs to the distinguished service group awarded during operations, along with the Uttam Yudh Seva Medal and the Sarvottam Yudh Seva Medal. Separating gallantry from distinguished service is worth one clear line in your notes, because papers sometimes mix the two lists in the options.

The correct answer is C, 1967. The three peacetime gallantry awards were instituted in 1952 as the Ashoka Chakra of the first, second and third class, and in January 1967 the second and third were renamed the Kirti Chakra and the Shaurya Chakra, while the first kept the name Ashoka Chakra.

Option A, 1952, is the year of institution, not of renaming, and it is the trap the question is built on. Option B, 1962, is the year of the conflict with China and has no connection with the naming of these awards. Option D, 1972, follows the conflict of 1971 and again has nothing to do with it. Three years matter in this chapter and they should be learnt as a single line: 1950 for the wartime awards, 1952 for the peacetime awards and 1967 for their present names.

The correct answer is A, Neerja Bhanot. She was the flight purser on a hijacked aircraft at Karachi in 1986 and was killed while shielding passengers as she helped them escape. The Ashoka Chakra was conferred on her posthumously, and she remains the standard answer to this question.

Option B, Kamaljeet Sandhu, was an athlete, the first Indian woman to win a gold medal in an individual event at the Asian Games, so she belongs to the sports chapter. Option C, Punita Arora, was the first woman to reach the rank of Lieutenant General in the Indian Army and Vice Admiral in the Navy, a distinction of service rather than a gallantry award. Option D, Kiran Bedi, was the first woman officer of the Indian Police Service. Each name is a genuine first of some kind, which is exactly how this question is made difficult.

The correct answer is C, Kirti Chakra. It is a peacetime gallantry award, given for conspicuous gallantry away from the field of battle, and it may be conferred on civilians as well as on members of the armed forces. It is the counterpart of the Maha Vir Chakra rather than a member of the wartime family.

Options A, B and D, the Param Vir Chakra, the Maha Vir Chakra and the Vir Chakra, are the three wartime decorations, all instituted on 26 January 1950 and all given for acts performed in the presence of the enemy. The simple test is the word vir in the name: the three wartime awards carry it, while the peacetime three are the Ashoka Chakra, the Kirti Chakra and the Shaurya Chakra. That single clue answers most questions of this type at once.

The correct answer is B, Param Vir Chakra. Captain Vikram Batra of the 13 Jammu and Kashmir Rifles received it posthumously for the recapture of heights during the Kargil conflict of 1999. Four Param Vir Chakras were awarded for that conflict, the others going to Lieutenant Manoj Kumar Pandey, also posthumously, and to Grenadier Yogendra Singh Yadav and Rifleman Sanjay Kumar, who survived.

Option A, the Ashoka Chakra, is a peacetime award and therefore cannot be given for an action against the enemy in an armed conflict. Option C, the Maha Vir Chakra, is a genuine wartime award but one grade below the Param Vir Chakra, and several officers received it in the same conflict, which makes it the closest distractor. Option D, the Shaurya Chakra, is again a peacetime decoration. The presence of the enemy rules out both peacetime options at once.

The correct answer is A, four replicas of the vajra, the thunderbolt of Indra. Savitri Khanolkar chose the motif from the old story in which the sage Dadhichi gave up his body so that his bones could be made into the weapon with which Indra defeated his enemy, a symbol of sacrifice that suits the highest award for valour.

Option B, lotus flowers, appear on other Indian decorations, notably the Padma awards, whose very names are drawn from the lotus. Option C, the chakra with twenty-four spokes, is on the national flag and on the emblem, and it lends its name to the Ashoka Chakra award but is not the motif of the Param Vir Chakra. Option D, crossed swords and a shield, is a common military emblem but not the design of this medal. The vajra is the detail worth remembering, along with the name of its designer.