The Pancha Rathas, monolithic shrines each carved from a single boulder, are located at which site?

The correct answer is B, Bihar. The Barabar and Nagarjuni hills lie near Gaya in Bihar and hold the oldest surviving rock-cut caves in the country, cut in the Mauryan period in the third century BCE and connected with the Ajivika sect; their polished interiors carry the mirror-like finish known as Mauryan polish. Option A is wrong because Maharashtra has the far more numerous Western Deccan caves at Bhaja, Karle, Ajanta and Ellora, but all of these are later. Option C is wrong because Odisha has the Udayagiri and Khandagiri Jain caves of Kharavela, which belong to the first century BCE. Option D is wrong because Madhya Pradesh is the home of the Sanchi and Bharhut stupas and the Bagh caves, not of the earliest rock-cut excavations. Fix the sequence as Barabar first, then the Deccan chaityas, then Ajanta and Ellora.

The correct answer is B, the Lomas Rishi cave. Its doorway copies in stone the curved wooden arch and lattice of a real chaitya hall, and above it runs a band of elephants moving towards a stupa; this carved arch is the ancestor of the horseshoe-shaped chaitya window, the gavaksha, seen later at Bhaja, Karle and Ajanta. Option A is wrong because the neighbouring Sudama cave, though also Mauryan and highly polished, has a plain entrance. Option C is wrong because the Karan Chaupar cave is a single polished chamber without the decorated facade. Option D is wrong because Vishwakarma is the name of Cave 10 at Ellora, the Carpenter's Cave, and belongs to a much later period. The Lomas Rishi facade is the standard illustration of stone copying timber in Indian art.

The correct answer is A, a carved cow representing the South direction. The abacus of the Sarnath capital carries four animals, not a cow: an elephant, a horse, a bull and a lion, and in the usual reading the horse stands for the south while the bull stands for the west. There is no cow anywhere on the capital, so option A is the component that does not exist. Option B is wrong as a choice because four lions standing back to back are the topmost element of the capital and the reason for its name. Option C is wrong because four twenty-four spoked Dharma Chakras separate the animals on the abacus, and one of them was placed at the centre of the national flag. Option D is wrong because the whole capital rests on an inverted lotus shaped like a bell. The capital was adopted as the State Emblem of India on 26 January 1950.

The correct answer is B, Ashoka. The Great Stupa, Stupa 1 at Sanchi in Madhya Pradesh, began as a brick mound raised in Ashoka's reign in the third century BCE, beside which he also set up a pillar with a lion capital; the Shungas later encased the mound in stone and added the railings, and the four carved gateways, the toranas, were put up in the Satavahana period. Option A is wrong because Chandragupta Maurya, Ashoka's grandfather, is not associated with stupa building. Option C is wrong because the Kushana ruler Kanishka is linked with Gandhara art and with a great stupa at Peshawar, not with Sanchi. Option D is wrong because Harshavardhana ruled in the seventh century CE, long after the stupa was finished. Sanchi was noticed by General Henry Taylor in 1818 and became a World Heritage Site in 1989.

The correct answer is B, Karle. The chaitya at Karle, near Lonavala in Maharashtra, is the largest such hall in the country: an apsidal prayer chamber with a high barrel-vaulted roof still carrying its wooden ribs, a screen wall pierced by a great horseshoe window, a rock-cut stupa at the far end and rows of pillars whose capitals show elephants with riders. It was excavated in the Satavahana period beside a trade route through the Western Ghats. Option A is wrong because Bhaja, though older and important as an early chaitya, is much smaller. Option C is wrong because Kanheri near Mumbai is famous for the sheer number of its excavations rather than for the size of any one hall. Option D is wrong because Pitalkhora is an early but modest group. Merchants and guilds paid for these caves, which is why they line the old trade passes.