Which initiative is the Health Ministry taking forward as a community awareness drive on mental health?

The correct answer is 14416. Tele-MANAS, which stands for Tele Mental Health Assistance and Networking Across States, offers free and confidential counselling on this number at any hour of the day, in several languages, without the caller having to reach a hospital. Options B, C and D are wrong because they are not the number for this service; they are the kind of close variants an examiner uses to test careful reading. Candidates should store the helpline alongside the other figures released for World Mental Health Day: the service began on 10 October 2022, it had taken 47,75,644 calls by October 2026, and it works through 53 cells covering all 36 states and union territories of the country. The service is especially valuable in rural and remote areas where specialists are hard to reach.

The correct answer is A. The day falls on 10 October every year, and the theme for the 2026 observance asks that the voices of those who have lived with mental health conditions be heard and allowed to shape policy and services. Option B pairs the right date with a theme of an earlier year, so it is wrong. Option C carries the right theme but the wrong date, since 7 April is observed as World Health Day. Option D is wrong on both counts, as 2 October is marked for other reasons in India. A useful link for revision: the launch date of Tele-MANAS, which also falls on 10 October, in the year 2022, so the service was started on a World Mental Health Day.

The correct answer is 767 districts. The programme runs under the National Mental Health Programme with support to states and union territories through the National Health Mission, and it funds outpatient care, counselling, psychosocial help, medicines, follow-up, outreach, referral and inpatient treatment at the district level. Options A, B and D are wrong because no such sanction figure was reported. Pair this number with the other reach figure of the same release: mental health services have been built into the primary healthcare package at more than 1.83 lakh Ayushman Arogya Mandirs, where health teams screen for early signs of distress, give psychosocial support and send patients to higher centres when needed. Together these form the ground-level layer below the telephone counselling service.

The correct answer is the Mission for Cotton Productivity and Kasturi Cotton Bharat. Padmini Singla, Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Textiles, named these two while explaining how India is working on better yields, better fibre quality and traceability of the crop, and she set them beside investment in textile infrastructure and support for artisans and small firms. Options A and C name other textile and fibre programmes that were not the pair presented on this occasion, and the silk and handloom schemes do not deal with cotton at all. Option D is the closest trap: PM MITRA was indeed mentioned at the event, but by Member of Parliament L. K. Sudhish while speaking about the integrated textile park being developed in Tamil Nadu, and it was not paired with a technology upgradation fund in the ministry’s presentation. Remember the pair as productivity plus the Kasturi brand for quality and traceability.

The correct answer is 7 October. The United Nations General Assembly set aside this date as World Cotton Day through resolution 75/318, and the observance draws attention to the place of cotton in economic development, in international trade and in the fight against poverty, particularly in developing and least developed countries. This year the Permanent Missions of India and Mali to the United Nations marked the day with a joint event at the United Nations Headquarters in New York. Option A, 5 October, is the date of the teachers’ observance and has nothing to do with cotton. Option C, 10 October, and option D, 16 October, are also wrong: no cotton observance falls on either date, and both are sometimes confused with other health and food related days on the United Nations calendar. For the examination hall, fix the pair together, World Cotton Day and 7 October, along with the resolution number that created it.