State Exams GK Questions 2026

The Satavahanas, who rose in the Deccan after the Mauryas, were founded by Simuka and ruled from Pratishthana, the modern Paithan on the Godavari in Maharashtra; their greatest king, Gautamiputra Satakarni, is praised in the Nashik inscription of his mother Gautami Balashri.

Gopala was elected ruler by the chiefs of Bengal in about 750 CE, ending a long period of disorder known in the sources as matsyanyaya, and founded the Pala dynasty, which became one of the three contenders in the tripartite struggle for Kannauj.

Pushyamitra Shunga, the commander of the Mauryan army, killed the last Mauryan ruler Brihadratha in about 185 BCE and founded the Shunga dynasty, which ruled from Pataliputra and Vidisha and under which the Sanchi and Bharhut stupas were enlarged.

Sri Gupta, who bore the modest title Maharaja, is named in the inscriptions as the founder of the Gupta family, and he was followed by his son Ghatotkacha.

Mahapadma Nanda founded the Nanda dynasty in about the middle of the fourth century BCE after displacing the Shishunagas, and the Puranas call him Ekarat, the sole sovereign, and Sarva-kshatrantaka, the destroyer of all Kshatriyas, because he is described as a ruler of low birth who uprooted the older ruling…

The Buddhist text Mahaparinibbana Sutta and the Jaina tradition credit Ajatashatru of the Haryanka dynasty with two engines used in his long war against the Lichchhavis of Vaishali: the Mahashilakantaka, which hurled great stones, and the Rathamusala, a chariot fitted with a mace that swept down ranks of soldiers.

Kanchipuram in northern Tamil Nadu was the Pallava capital from about the fourth century until the dynasty fell to the Cholas in the ninth, and it was there that Hiuen Tsang was received by Narasimhavarman I and that the Kailasanatha temple was raised by Narasimhavarman II Rajasimha.

Mahendravarman I ruled the Pallava kingdom from Kanchipuram in the early seventh century, fought Pulakeshin II of Badami, began the rock-cut mandapas of the Tamil country and bore the titles Vichitrachitta and Mattavilasa, the second being the name of the Sanskrit farce attributed to him.

Vijayalaya, who founded the line of the imperial Cholas in the middle of the ninth century, captured the Kaveri delta from the Muttaraiyar chiefs and built Thanjavur, which became the Chola capital and later the site of Rajaraja I's Brihadeeswara temple.

Dantidurga founded the Rashtrakuta dynasty in the middle of the eighth century, threw off the overlordship of the Chalukyas of Badami by defeating Kirtivarman II, and took imperial titles; his successors ruled from Manyakheta, the modern Malkhed.

A development finance institution is not a deposit-taking bank for the public; it raises resources from bonds and debentures, from the government, from the Reserve Bank and from multilateral agencies, and uses them for long-term lending.

NaBFID was created by the National Bank for Financing Infrastructure and Development Act, 2021 as a development finance institution for long-term infrastructure finance, with its head office in Mumbai, and it is the newest of the country's apex development institutions.

CGTMSE was established in 2000 by the Government of India together with SIDBI to guarantee loans given without collateral or third-party guarantee to micro and small enterprises, so that a lender's fear of security does not keep a small unit out of formal credit.

The National Housing Bank was established on 9 July 1988 under the National Housing Bank Act, 1987, with its head office in New Delhi, to refinance and regulate housing finance; it was set up as a wholly owned subsidiary of the Reserve Bank, whose shareholding was transferred to the Government…

Besides refinancing them, NABARD carries out the inspection and supervision of the regional rural banks, the state cooperative banks and the district central cooperative banks on behalf of the Reserve Bank, and it also prepares the potential linked credit plans from which district credit plans are drawn.

The Rural Infrastructure Development Fund was created in 1995 to 1996 and is maintained with NABARD; it is funded by the amounts commercial banks fall short of in their priority sector lending targets, and NABARD lends from it to state governments for rural roads, bridges, irrigation works, warehouses and similar…

MUDRA was created in 2015 as a subsidiary of SIDBI to refinance the small loans given by banks, microfinance institutions and non-banking finance companies under the Pradhan Mantri Mudra Yojana, the loans being classified as Shishu up to fifty thousand rupees, Kishore from fifty thousand to five lakh and Tarun…

The EXIM Bank was established on 1 January 1982 under the Export-Import Bank of India Act, 1981, is wholly owned by the Government of India, has its head office in Mumbai, and finances and promotes India's foreign trade, including the lines of credit the government extends to other countries.

The Industrial Finance Corporation of India was set up in 1948 under the Industrial Finance Corporation Act of that year to provide medium and long-term finance to industry, which makes it the first development finance institution in the country; it was converted into a company in 1993.

SIDBI has its head office at Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh, which makes it the one major apex financial institution of the country not headquartered in a metropolitan financial centre, and that is exactly why the question is asked.