The floating masses of soil and vegetation on Loktak Lake are known by which name?

The correct answer is B, Imphal. Imphal lies in the valley at the centre of Manipur, surrounded by hills, and holds the Kangla Fort, the old seat of the Meitei kings, and Ima Keithel, the market run entirely by women. Option A is wrong; Aizawl is the capital of Mizoram, which stands on a long ridge and from which the Tropic of Cancer passes close by. Option C is wrong; Shillong is the capital of Meghalaya and was the capital of undivided Assam until 1972, when Meghalaya was separated and Assam moved its capital to Dispur. Option D is wrong; Kohima is the capital of Nagaland and is remembered for the battle fought there in 1944, though its nearness to Manipur makes it a natural distractor. Imphal is also where the Indian National Army campaign of 1944 was directed, and Moirang in the same state saw the flag raised in April of that year.

The correct answer is C, Manipur. Keibul Lamjao lies in the southern part of Loktak Lake and rests on phumdis, floating mats of soil, roots and decaying vegetation thick enough to carry animals and even huts; nowhere else in the world is a national park built on such a surface. It was created to protect the sangai, the brow-antlered deer that is the state animal of Manipur. Option A is wrong; the national parks of Meghalaya are Nokrek and Balphakram, both in the Garo hills and both on solid ground. Option B is wrong; Assam has Kaziranga and Manas, famous for the one-horned rhinoceros and for the tiger reserve on the Bhutan border, but no floating park. Option D is wrong; Mizoram has Phawngpui Blue Mountain National Park and Murlen National Park, which lie in high hill country.

The correct answer is A, 21 January 1972. The North-Eastern Areas Reorganisation Act 1971 took effect on that day, turning Manipur, Meghalaya and Tripura into full states and creating the Union Territories of Mizoram and Arunachal Pradesh, then called the North East Frontier Agency; the day is observed as statehood day in all three states. Option B is wrong for these three but is the date on which Mizoram and Arunachal Pradesh became states, fifteen years later. Option C is wrong; 1 December 1963 is the day Nagaland became the sixteenth state of India, the first of the north-eastern states to be created after independence. Option D is wrong; 16 May 1975 is the day Sikkim became the twenty-second state under the thirty-sixth amendment. Learning these four dates in order answers most questions set on the north-east.

The correct answer is B, Meghalaya. The name is Sanskrit for the home of the clouds and was chosen for the new state in 1972 because of the rainfall of its southern slopes, which face the moist air coming off the Bay of Bengal and receive the heaviest rain in the country at Mawsynram and Cherrapunji. Option A is wrong; Mizoram is called the land of the highlanders or the land of the blue mountains, from Phawngpui, its highest peak. Option B being correct, option C is wrong; Manipur is called the jewelled land or, in a phrase of Jawaharlal Nehru, the jewel of India, from the valley ringed by hills. Option D is wrong; Sikkim is often described as the land of the thunderbolt or, in the Lepcha phrase, the valley of rice, and its mountain Kanchenjunga is the highest in India. These epithets are a standard source of questions in this part of the syllabus.

The correct answer is B, Meghalaya. Mawsynram lies in the East Khasi Hills district, a short distance west of Cherrapunji, now called Sohra, and the two places between them hold the records for rainfall in the country; the moist air from the Bay of Bengal is forced up the steep southern face of the Khasi hills, cools and sheds its water in enormous quantity. Option A is wrong; Assam lies in the Brahmaputra valley, which is wet but nowhere near these figures, and its rainfall questions usually concern floods rather than records. Option C is wrong; Arunachal Pradesh is heavily watered and holds the largest forest cover among the north-eastern states, but its wettest stations do not approach Mawsynram. Option D is wrong; Nagaland has a hill climate of moderate rainfall. The pairing of Mawsynram and Cherrapunji with Meghalaya is one of the most frequently asked facts about the north-east.