On which day is Constitution Day celebrated every year in India?

The correct answer is D, 25 January. National Voters' Day is observed on 25 January every year because the Election Commission of India was set up on 25 January 1950, a day before the Constitution came into force. The day has been observed since 2011 to encourage citizens who have turned eighteen to enrol as voters, and new electors are handed their Elector Photo Identity Cards at functions held in polling-station areas, each year under a chosen theme. Option A is wrong because 26 March is not an Indian observance of this kind; it is the independence day of Bangladesh. Option B is wrong because 24 February is marked in India as Central Excise Day. Option C is wrong because 27 December is remembered as the day Jana Gana Mana was first sung, at the Calcutta session of the Congress in 1911. Exam tip: the Election Commission was founded on 25 January 1950, so National Voters' Day falls a day before Republic Day.

The correct answer is A, the Lahore session of 1929. Presided over by Jawaharlal Nehru, the Lahore session of December 1929 passed the resolution of Purna Swaraj or complete independence, unfurled the tricolour on the bank of the Ravi and called on the country to observe the twenty sixth of January 1930 as Independence Day. Option B, the Karachi session of 1931, is remembered for the resolution on fundamental rights and the national economic programme, and for endorsing the Gandhi Irwin Pact. Option C, the Nagpur session of 1920, adopted the Non Cooperation Movement and changed the creed of the Congress to swaraj by peaceful means, but it did not define swaraj as complete independence. Option D, the Lucknow session of 1916, is the session of the Lucknow Pact between the Congress and the Muslim League and of the reunion of the moderates and the extremists.

The correct answer is C, 26 November 1949. The Constituent Assembly adopted, enacted and gave to itself the Constitution on the twenty sixth of November 1949, and that day is kept every year as Constitution Day or Samvidhan Divas. Option A, 26 January 1950, is the date the Constitution came into force, which is Republic Day; the day was chosen because the Lahore session of the Congress had made the twenty sixth of January 1930 the first Independence Day. Option B, 9 December 1946, is the day the Constituent Assembly met for the first time, with Sachchidananda Sinha as temporary chairman before Rajendra Prasad was elected president. Option D, 15 August 1947, is the date of independence under the Indian Independence Act. Papers turn this question on the single word adopted, enforced or commenced, so read the stem carefully.

The correct answer is B, Allahabad. The fourth session of the Indian National Congress met at Allahabad in 1888 and elected George Yule as its president, and he was the first Englishman and the first non Indian to hold the office. Yule was a Calcutta businessman and a former president of the Bengal Chamber of Commerce, and his election was meant to show that the Congress was not a body of one community alone. Option A, Calcutta, hosted the second session of 1886 under Dadabhai Naoroji. Option C, Madras, hosted the third session of 1887 under Badruddin Tyabji, the first Muslim president of the Congress. Option D, Bombay, hosted the very first session of December 1885 under Womesh Chandra Bonnerjee, and is the option most often chosen by mistake because it is the city students associate with the early Congress.

The correct answer is C, 1757. At Plassey on the bank of the Bhagirathi, Robert Clive defeated Siraj-ud-Daulah, the Nawab of Bengal, after buying over his commander Mir Jafar, and the victory made the Company the real power in the richest province of India. Option A, 1764, is the Battle of Buxar, where the Company defeated the combined forces of Mir Qasim of Bengal, Shuja-ud-Daulah of Awadh and the Mughal emperor Shah Alam the second, and which completed what Plassey had begun. Option B, 1765, is the year of the Treaty of Allahabad, by which the Company received the diwani, the right to collect the revenues of Bengal, Bihar and Odisha. Option D, 1761, is the Third Battle of Panipat, fought between Ahmad Shah Abdali and the Marathas in the same decade, which is why it is placed among the options.