The Surajkund International Crafts Mela is held every year in which district of Haryana?

The correct answer is B, 1 November 1966. On that day the Hindi speaking districts of the former Punjab were separated to form Haryana, which became the seventeenth state of India, while Chandigarh was made a union territory serving as the capital of both states. The day is observed every year as Haryana Day, and 1966 is the single most asked fact about the state.

Option A, 1 November 1956, is the day the States Reorganisation Act came into force, which reshaped many states but not Haryana. Option C, 1 May 1960, is the day Bombay State was divided into Maharashtra and Gujarat. Option D is the date of independence itself. Candidates often confuse 1956 with 1966 because both fall on 1 November, so the decade must be remembered carefully.

The correct answer is C, Shah Commission. The commission headed by Justice J. C. Shah was appointed in 1966 to decide how the Punjab should be divided on a linguistic basis, and its report fixed which districts and tehsils would go to Haryana, which would remain with Punjab and which would form Chandigarh and the hill areas transferred to Himachal Pradesh. The Punjab Reorganisation Act of 1966 gave effect to it.

Option A, the Dhar Commission of 1948, examined the demand for linguistic provinces soon after independence and advised against it. Option B, the commission under Fazl Ali, produced the report of 1955 that led to the States Reorganisation Act of 1956. Option D, the Sarkaria Commission of the 1980s, examined relations between the Union and the states and has no connection with the formation of Haryana.

The correct answer is B, Bhagwat Dayal Sharma. He took office as the first Chief Minister when the state was created on 1 November 1966, and Dharma Vira was its first Governor. Sharma later served as Governor of other states as well, and a medical university at Rohtak carries his name, which is a useful way to fix the fact in memory.

Option A, Bansi Lal, became Chief Minister later and is remembered for the electrification and irrigation drive in the state, but he was not the first. Option C, Devi Lal, was Chief Minister in the nineteen seventies and eighties and afterwards Deputy Prime Minister of India. Option D, Rao Birender Singh, was the second Chief Minister of Haryana, which makes him the closest trap in this question. The order to remember is Sharma first, then Rao Birender Singh.

The correct answer is A, Hisar. Rakhigarhi lies in the Hisar district on the dry bed of an old river course, and its mounds spread over a larger area than any other Harappan site in India, which makes it the biggest in the country. Excavations there have brought out planned streets, drains, a granary, bead workshops and burials, and the skeletons found in its cemetery have been used for studies of the ancestry of the Harappan people.

Option B, Fatehabad, holds Banawali, another important Harappan site of the state, and is the usual trap. Option C, Bhiwani, is near Mitathal, a smaller site of the same civilisation. Option D, Rohtak, has no major Harappan site, although Khokhrakot there has yielded remains of later periods. Remember the pairing Rakhigarhi with Hisar and Banawali with Fatehabad.

The correct answer is C, Ahmad Shah Abdali of Afghanistan. The Third Battle of Panipat was fought in January 1761 between the Maratha army, led by Sadashivrao Bhau with Vishwasrao, and the Afghan ruler Ahmad Shah Abdali, who had the support of the Rohillas and the Nawab of Awadh. The Marathas were heavily defeated, a blow that checked their advance in the north and eased the way for other powers.

Option A, Babur, fought the First Battle of Panipat in 1526 against Ibrahim Lodi and founded the Mughal empire. Option B, Nadir Shah, invaded India in 1739 and sacked Delhi, but his battle was at Karnal, not Panipat. Option D, the English East India Company, was not a party to any battle of Panipat, although it gained from Maratha weakness afterwards. The Second Battle, in 1556, was between Akbar's forces under Bairam Khan and Hemu.