The Vijay Stambha, or Tower of Victory, at Chittorgarh was built by which ruler?

The correct answer is C, New Delhi. The Bahai House of Worship, known the world over as the Lotus Temple, stands at Bahapur near Kalkaji in New Delhi. It was designed by the Iranian-born Canadian architect Fariborz Sahba in the shape of a half-open lotus with twenty-seven marble-clad petals arranged in nine groups, and it was opened to visitors in 1986. Like every Bahai house of worship it has nine sides and nine entrances and holds no idol, altar or pulpit. Option A is wrong because Mumbai's landmarks of this kind are the Gateway of India and the Haji Ali Dargah, not a Bahai temple. Option B is wrong because Chennai is known for the Kapaleeshwarar Temple and the San Thome Basilica. Option D is wrong because Kolkata's famous buildings are the Victoria Memorial and the Dakshineswar Kali Temple.

The correct answer is B, Ustad Ahmad Lahori. Shah Jahan raised the Taj Mahal over the grave of his wife Mumtaz Mahal, and the court records name Ustad Ahmad Lahori as the chief architect of the work, which went on at Agra from about 1632 to 1653. Option A is wrong because Mirak Mirza Ghiyas was the Persian architect of Humayun's Tomb at Delhi, the garden tomb that the Taj Mahal is descended from, and he died long before Shah Jahan's reign. Option C is wrong because Lal Chand Ustad designed the Hawa Mahal at Jaipur for Sawai Pratap Singh in 1799, more than a century later and in a different kingdom. Option D is wrong because Ustad Isa Khan appears only in later legend and in no contemporary Mughal record, although his name is often repeated in popular accounts of the monument.

The correct answer is B, Qutb-ud-din Aibak. Aibak, the founder of the Slave or Mamluk dynasty of Delhi, laid the foundation of the Qutub Minar in 1199 and completed only its first storey. Option A is wrong because Iltutmish, his son-in-law and successor, carried the tower up to the fourth storey; he raised it, but he did not begin it, and this is exactly the distinction examiners test. Option C is wrong because Alauddin Khalji's work at the Qutub complex was the Alai Darwaza of 1311 and the unfinished Alai Minar, which he meant to be twice the height of the Qutub Minar. Option D is wrong because Firoz Shah Tughlaq came much later and only repaired the tower after it was struck by lightning, adding the fifth and topmost storey in the process.

The correct answer is B, Bega Begum, the widow of Humayun. Bega Begum, also called Haji Begum because she had made the pilgrimage to Mecca, had the tomb built at Delhi from about 1565 and engaged the Persian architect Mirak Mirza Ghiyas for it. It is the earliest surviving charbagh tomb in India and the ancestor of the Taj Mahal, and it was the first Mughal building to use red sandstone with white marble inlay on this scale. Option A is wrong because Akbar was a boy when his father died and the credit in the chronicles goes to the widow, not the son. Option C is wrong because Nur Jahan belonged to Jahangir's reign two generations later and built the tomb of Itimad-ud-Daulah at Agra. Option D is wrong because Sher Shah Suri was Humayun's rival, and his own tomb stands at Sasaram in Bihar.

The correct answer is B, Muhammad Adil Shah. The Gol Gumbaz at Bijapur in Karnataka is the tomb of Muhammad Adil Shah of the Adil Shahi dynasty and was finished in about 1656. Its single chamber is covered by a dome of roughly forty-four metres in external diameter, among the largest masonry domes anywhere, and the whispering gallery below it carries sound right around the drum. Option A is wrong because Ibrahim Adil Shah II built the Ibrahim Rauza at Bijapur, a smaller and more finely carved tomb that is often called the Taj Mahal of the Deccan. Option C is wrong because Yusuf Adil Shah founded the dynasty in 1489 and did not build this tomb. Option D is wrong because Muhammad Quli Qutb Shah belonged to the rival Qutb Shahi house of Golconda and built the Charminar at Hyderabad.