How many members of the Puducherry Legislative Assembly are directly elected by the voters?

The correct answer is C, Mahe. Mahe is the smallest of the four regions of Puducherry, about nine square kilometres on the Malabar coast, and it is completely surrounded by the Kannur district of Kerala. The Mahe river, also called the Mayyazhi, runs through it, and Malayalam is its official language. The French took it in 1725.

Option A, Karaikal, lies on the Coromandel coast and is surrounded by Tamil Nadu; the French acquired it in 1739. Option B, Yanam, is an enclave in the Godavari delta of Andhra Pradesh, where Telugu is the official language. Option D, Ariyankuppam, is not a separate region at all; it is a commune inside the Puducherry region itself, best known for the Arikamedu archaeological site beside it. The pairing worth memorising is Puducherry and Karaikal in Tamil Nadu, Yanam in Andhra Pradesh and Mahe in Kerala.

The correct answer is B, 1 November 1954. On that day France handed over the administration of Pondicherry, Karaikal, Mahe and Yanam, and India began governing them, although France still held sovereignty in law. This is the de facto transfer that exams ask about.

Option A, 15 August 1947, is the date of Indian independence from British rule; the French settlements were untouched by it and stayed French for seven more years. Option C, 16 August 1962, is a real date but a different one: it is the de jure transfer, when the instruments of ratification of the treaty of cession were exchanged and the territory became legally Indian, the same year the Fourteenth Amendment listed it as a union territory. Option D belongs to the renaming of Pondicherry as Puducherry in 2006, which changed the name and nothing else. Keep 1954 for the handover and 1962 for the law.

The correct answer is C, the Fourteenth Amendment Act, passed in 1962. It listed Pondicherry in the First Schedule as a union territory after the legal transfer from France, and inserted Article 239A, which empowers Parliament to create by law a legislature and a Council of Ministers for the territory. Parliament exercised that power through the Government of Union Territories Act, 1963.

Option A, the Seventh Amendment of 1956, gave effect to the States Reorganisation Act and redrew states on linguistic lines, which is why candidates confuse it with this one. Option B, the Twelfth Amendment of 1962, incorporated Goa, Daman and Diu into the Union after their liberation; the same year, a different amendment. Option D, the Thirty-sixth Amendment of 1975, made Sikkim a full state. Also keep Article 239A, for Puducherry, apart from Article 239AA, which the Sixty-ninth Amendment inserted for Delhi.

The correct answer is C, 1968. Auroville, the city of dawn, was inaugurated on 28 February 1968. It was founded by Mirra Alfassa, the French-born disciple of Sri Aurobindo whom followers call the Mother, and planned by the French architect Roger Anger as a township where people of every nation could live together; the Matrimandir stands at its centre.

Option A, 1926, is the year the Sri Aurobindo Ashram was founded in the town itself, a different institution that examiners pair with Auroville to create confusion. Option B, 1947, is Indian independence, which did not touch the French settlements. Option D, 1985, is the year Pondicherry University, a central university, was established. Remember the sequence: Aurobindo arrives in 1910, the Ashram in 1926, Auroville in 1968 and the university in 1985.

The correct answer is B, Andhra Pradesh. Yanam is a small region of about seventeen square kilometres in the delta of the Godavari, surrounded by Andhra Pradesh, and Telugu is its official language. The French held it from the eighteenth century until the transfer of 1954.

Option A, Odisha, is a common trap because it also lies on the eastern coast north of Andhra Pradesh, but no part of Puducherry falls in it. Option C, Telangana, was carved out of Andhra Pradesh in 2014 and is landlocked, so it could not contain a coastal delta enclave. Option D, Tamil Nadu, does surround two regions of the territory, Puducherry and Karaikal, but not Yanam. The complete list is worth repeating: Puducherry and Karaikal in Tamil Nadu, Yanam in Andhra Pradesh, Mahe in Kerala.