State Exams 2022 Previous Year GK Questions with Answers

The correct answer is C, the number of holes equals the number of electrons. In an intrinsic, that is a chemically pure, semiconductor every free electron is produced by breaking a covalent bond, and breaking a bond leaves behind exactly one hole, so electrons and holes are created strictly in pairs and their concentrations must be equal. Option A is wrong because a product of two concentrations cannot equal a bare number one; the product is fixed by temperature and the band gap, not by unity. Option B is wrong because holes can outnumber electrons only in a p-type crystal, which needs a trivalent dopant. Option D is wrong because electrons outnumber holes only in an n-type crystal, which needs a pentavalent dopant. Equal numbers are therefore the signature of the pure crystal, and any inequality means doping has taken place.

The correct answer is D, A - 4, B - 3, C - 2, D - 1. Ramanuja taught Vishishtadvaita or qualified non dualism, in which souls and matter are real but exist as attributes of Brahman. Madhvacharya taught Dvaita, a thoroughgoing dualism in which god and the individual soul remain eternally distinct. Nimbarka taught Dvaitadvaita or bhedabheda, holding that difference and non difference are both real. Vallabhacharya taught Shuddhadvaita, pure non dualism, in which Brahman is real and untouched by maya. Option A is wrong because it gives Ramanuja Dvaitadvaita, which belongs to Nimbarka. Option B is wrong because it gives Ramanuja Dvaita and Madhvacharya Shuddhadvaita, reversing the two positions that are most often confused. Option C is wrong because it pairs the four teachers with the philosophies in the order in which the lists happen to be printed, which is the trap in every match the list question of this kind.

The correct answer is B, Calcutta (Kolkata). India's first cotton mill was set up in 1818 at Fort Gloster near Calcutta, at Bauria in present-day Howrah district, so Kolkata holds the first place in the story of the Indian cotton industry. That early mill did not survive, and the first commercially successful cotton textile mill was started at Bombay in 1854 by Cowasjee Nanabhai Davar, which is why Mumbai came to be called the Manchester of India. Ahmedabad followed in 1861, when Ranchhodlal Chhotalal set up its first mill, and the city grew into so large a centre that it earned the name Manchester of the East. A is wrong because Surat was famous for handloom textile trade in Mughal times, not for the first mill. C is wrong because Ahmedabad's mill of 1861 came much later. D is wrong because Coimbatore, called the Manchester of South India, built its mills only in the twentieth century. Exam tip: first mill 1818 near Kolkata, first successful mill 1854 at Bombay.

The correct answer is B, Reserved forests. Indian forests are classified administratively into reserved, protected and unclassed forests, and the first two together are described as the permanent forest estate, that is land maintained permanently for timber and other forest produce and for the protection of soil and water. Reserved forests are the most valuable of the three and enjoy the strictest protection, with grazing and cultivation prohibited or closely regulated. Option A, unprotected forests, is not one of the recognised administrative classes at all. Option C, unclassed forests, covers the remaining wooded land, a great deal of it owned by communities and private persons in the north-east and in Gujarat, and it lies outside the permanent estate. Option D, community forests, again describes ownership rather than an administrative class, and such land usually falls within the unclassed category.

The correct answer is A, low coefficient of friction. Teflon is the trade name of polytetrafluoroethylene, a polymer whose surface is one of the most slippery among solids, with a coefficient of friction of about 0.04. A bearing has to let a shaft turn with as little rubbing as possible, so this slipperiness is the reason Teflon is chosen; it also lets many such bearings work without any oil or grease. The polymer was found by accident by Roy Plunkett in 1938, resists almost every chemical and holds up to about 260 degrees Celsius, which is why it also coats non-stick cookware and is wound as sealing tape on pipe threads. B is wrong because Teflon is a poor conductor of heat, so it is not chosen to carry heat away. C is wrong because saving space depends on the design of the bearing, not on the material. D is wrong because only the first reason holds. Exam tip: Teflon is PTFE, the non-stick polymer with the lowest friction.

The correct answer is B, Karnataka. Article 168 says a State legislature consists of the Governor and either one House or two Houses. Where there are two, the upper House is the Legislative Council or Vidhan Parishad, and Karnataka is one of the few States that has kept it. Article 169 allows Parliament to create or abolish a Council if the Legislative Assembly of that State passes a resolution by a special majority, which is why the list of such States is short and changes only by law. Option A, Jharkhand, has only a Legislative Assembly; so does option C, Odisha, although proposals for a Council have been discussed there; and option D, Gujarat, also has a single House. Under Article 171 one-sixth of a Council is nominated by the Governor from persons distinguished in literature, science, art, the cooperative movement and social service, which is the link between this chapter and the State Executive.

The correct answer is D, the Pancheshwar Main Dam. It is the centrepiece of the Pancheshwar Multipurpose Project, planned on the Mahakali river, which forms part of the boundary between India and Nepal, and it is to be built and operated jointly by the two countries under the Mahakali Treaty for power, irrigation and flood control. Option A, the Tehri Dam, stands on the Bhagirathi in Uttarakhand and is the tallest dam in India, but it lies well inside Indian territory. Option B is wrong because the Son is a tributary of the Ganga flowing through Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand and Bihar, nowhere near the Nepal border. Option C, the Rajghat Dam, is on the Betwa river on the border of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, an interstate rather than an international project.

The correct answer is D, copper and zinc. Brass takes the workability of copper and the hardness of zinc, resists corrosion and is easy to cast, which is why it is used for utensils, locks, taps, fittings and wind instruments. Option A, copper and tin, is bronze, and the brass and bronze pair is the single most frequently confused item in this chapter, so fix zinc with brass and tin with bronze. Option B, copper and nickel, is cupronickel, used in coins and in condenser tubes. Option C, copper and iron, is not a standard alloy of this kind, though iron and copper occur together in the ore copper pyrites. Related alloys are worth learning with these: German silver is copper, zinc and nickel; gun metal is copper, tin and zinc; and bell metal is copper with a larger proportion of tin.

The correct answer is A, gold. Ductility is the property of being drawn into a wire, and gold is the most ductile metal known; it is also the most malleable, so a very small quantity can be beaten into an extremely thin sheet or drawn into a very long wire. Option C, silver, is the next most ductile and is the best conductor of both heat and electricity, which is why it is easy to confuse the two superlatives; remember that silver leads in conduction while gold leads in ductility and malleability. Option B, copper, is ductile enough to be drawn into the wires used in household wiring, but far less so than gold. Option D, iron, is ductile when hot but comparatively hard and is valued for strength rather than for being drawn out.

The correct answer is D, Pigou. A.C. Pigou belongs to the welfare group of definitions, not the wealth group. In his book The Economics of Welfare he treated economics as the study of that part of social welfare which can be brought into relation with money, carrying forward the line taken by Alfred Marshall, who called economics a study of people in the ordinary business of life. The wealth definitions came earlier. A is wrong because Adam Smith, in An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, called economics the science of wealth and is the father of the wealth definition. B is wrong because J.B. Say described economics as the science which deals with wealth. C is wrong because Francis Walker held that economics is that body of knowledge which relates to wealth. Later Lionel Robbins gave the scarcity definition, treating economics as the study of human behaviour as a relationship between ends and scarce means. Exam tip: wealth – Smith, Say, Walker; welfare – Marshall, Pigou; scarcity – Robbins.

The correct answer is B, the wire will not experience any force at all. The force on a current carrying conductor kept in a magnetic field is given by F equal to B I L sin theta, where theta is the angle between the direction of the current and the direction of the field. When the wire lies along the lines of force that angle is zero, sin theta becomes zero, and the force disappears however strong the field or the current may be. The same formula shows that the force is greatest when the wire is at right angles to the field, because sin theta is then one. Option A is wrong because the force, when there is one, never acts along the field; Fleming's left hand rule places it at right angles to both the field and the current. Option C is wrong for the same reason, as no rule gives a force pointing against the field. Option D is wrong here only because the angle is zero and no force arises at all. Exam tip: parallel means no force, perpendicular means maximum force.

The correct answer is C, Oersted. In 1820 the Danish scientist Hans Christian Oersted saw that a compass needle kept near a wire swung aside the moment a current flowed through the wire, and swung the other way when the current was reversed. That small observation proved that an electric current sets up a magnetic field around itself, which is the magnetic effect of current, and it opened the whole study of electromagnetism. The CGS unit of magnetising field strength, the oersted, carries his name. Option A is wrong because James Clerk Maxwell came later and gathered the laws of electricity and magnetism into four equations, showing that light itself is an electromagnetic wave. Option B is wrong because John Ambrose Fleming only gave the left hand and right hand rules, which tell us the direction of the force or of an induced current. Option D is wrong because Michael Faraday discovered electromagnetic induction in 1831, the opposite effect. Exam tip: Oersted 1820, current makes magnetism; Faraday 1831, magnetism makes current.

The correct answer is C, the SAPAP model. The South Asia Poverty Alleviation Programme model is called the international model of self help group formation because it was taken up with the support of the United Nations Development Programme and followed the same design across South Asian countries, beginning in India in the districts of Andhra Pradesh. It builds a three-tier structure, the group of poor women at the bottom, a village organisation above it and a federation at the mandal level, with savings first and credit afterwards.

Option A, the CDF model, refers to the Cooperative Development Foundation work in Andhra Pradesh, which is a cooperative thrift model. Option B, the SEWA model, grew out of the Self Employed Women's Association of Ahmedabad and its own bank. Option D, DWCRA, the Development of Women and Children in Rural Areas, was a government programme of 1982 and is the domestic, not the international, model.

The correct answer is B, Kisan Credit Card. The Kisan Credit Card scheme was introduced in 1998 on the recommendation of the R V Gupta Committee and is worked by commercial banks, regional rural banks and cooperative banks. It gives a farmer a single revolving limit for seeds, fertiliser, labour and other crop expenses, valid for several years with a yearly review, so that he need not apply afresh every season. The limit has since been extended to animal husbandry and fisheries, and short-term crop loans under it carry an interest subvention with a further rebate for prompt repayment.

Option A, Krishi Credit Card, uses the Hindi word for agriculture and is the closest trap, but the scheme is named after the farmer, the kisan. Options C and D both end in Corporation, which would make the name that of an institution rather than of a credit instrument, so neither can be right.

The correct answer is C, 110010111. Octal has base 8, and because 2 raised to the power 3 equals 8, every octal digit expands into exactly three binary bits. Take the digits of 627 one at a time. The digit 6 becomes 110, the digit 2 becomes 010 and the digit 7 becomes 111. Writing them in the same order gives 110 010 111, that is 110010111. A quick check works the other way: grouping 110010111 in threes from the right gives 110, 010 and 111, which read back as 6, 2 and 7. Option A is wrong because 111010110 reads as 7, 2 and 6, which is octal 726. Option B is wrong because 110010110 ends in 110 and so reads as 626. Option D is wrong because 011010111 reads as 3, 2 and 7, that is octal 327.

The correct answer is D, Khushwant Singh. The End of India, published in 2003, is his book of essays written in English on communal violence and the danger it poses to the idea of India. He is better remembered for the novel Train to Pakistan, a story of Partition, and for Delhi and his newspaper columns.

Option A, Dr. Manmohan Singh, was an economist and Prime Minister whose name is tied to policy papers rather than to such a book. Option B, Salman Rushdie, wrote Midnight's Children, which won the Booker Prize in 1981, and The Satanic Verses. Option C, Shashi Tharoor, wrote The Great Indian Novel and An Era of Darkness, and because his books also argue about India's past, he is the strongest distractor here. Tie the word Partition, and this title, to Khushwant Singh.

The correct answer is A, Tughlaq dynasty. The Khalji dynasty ended in 1320 when Khusrau Khan, who had seized the throne after Mubarak Shah Khalji, was defeated by Ghazi Malik, the governor of Dipalpur. Ghazi Malik took the title Ghiyasuddin Tughlaq and founded the Tughlaq dynasty, which ruled until 1414 and was the longest-lived of the five. Option B is wrong because no Rajput dynasty ruled Delhi after 1192; the Chahamana or Chauhan rule under Prithviraj III ended before the Sultanate began. Option C is wrong because the Sayyid dynasty came later, founded by Khizr Khan in 1414 after Timur's invasion had broken Tughlaq power. Option D is wrong because the Lodi dynasty, founded by Bahlul Khan Lodi in 1451, was the last of the five and followed the Sayyids, not the Khaljis.

The correct answer is A, Both I and II. Statement one is correct because the securities transaction tax is charged on the purchase and sale of securities on a recognised stock exchange and is borne by the investor who makes the transaction; the burden cannot be passed on to anybody else, which is the test of a direct tax, and it is administered by the Central Board of Direct Taxes. Statement two is correct because value added tax was levied by the states on the sale of goods at each stage of the chain, with credit for the tax paid on inputs, and the dealer recovered it from the buyer in the price, which is the test of an indirect tax; VAT has since been subsumed into GST for most goods.

Option B rejects the first statement, option D rejects the second, and option C rejects both, so all three miss one or other of these classifications. Remember the rule and not the list: if the payer can shift the burden, the tax is indirect.

The correct answer is C, issuance of treasury bills. A receipt is capital if it either creates a liability for the government or reduces an asset it holds. A treasury bill is a short-term borrowing instrument, so issuing it creates a liability that must be repaid, and it is therefore classified as a capital receipt along with market loans, external loans, recovery of loans and disinvestment proceeds.

Option A, commercial revenue, is earned by government departments and undertakings from the sale of goods and services and neither creates a liability nor reduces an asset, so it is non-tax revenue. Option B, interest received on loans advanced by the government, is likewise recurring non-tax revenue. Option D, dividends and profits received from public sector undertakings and the Reserve Bank, is also non-tax revenue. All three are revenue receipts.

The correct answer is C, Prakrit. The Gathasaptasati, also written as Gatha Saptasati, is an anthology of seven hundred short verses compiled by the Satavahana king Hala. It is written in Maharashtri Prakrit, the spoken language the Satavahanas favoured for their inscriptions and literature, and its verses describe village love and daily life in the Deccan rather than royal deeds. The work matters in an examination because it shows that the Satavahanas, unlike the later Guptas, promoted Prakrit as the language of the court.

Option A, Sanskrit, became the normal language of royal inscriptions later, with the Junagadh record of Rudradaman I as the first long example. Option B, Pali, is the language of the Buddhist Tripitaka and of the Milindapanho, not of Hala's anthology. Option D, Hindi, developed more than a thousand years after Hala and cannot belong to a first or second century text.