State Exams Previous Year GK Questions with Answers

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 D, Ninety days. Section 22 of the National Green Tribunal Act, 2010 allows a person aggrieved by an award, order or decision of the Tribunal to appeal to the Supreme Court within ninety days of the day it is communicated, and the Court may admit a later appeal if it is satisfied that there was sufficient cause for the delay. The Tribunal itself was created in 2010 to hear environmental cases quickly, with its principal bench at New Delhi, and it is expected to decide a case within six months. A is wrong because thirty days is the period within which a person may go to the Tribunal against an order of a body such as a State Pollution Control Board, not the period for an appeal to the Supreme Court. B and C are wrong because the Act fixes no limit of forty-five or sixty days for such an appeal. Exam tip: NGT Act 2010 – thirty days to appeal to the Tribunal, ninety days to appeal to the Supreme Court.

The correct answer is A, National Green Tribunal. The National Green Tribunal was set up under the National Green Tribunal Act of 2010 to settle cases on the environment, forests, water, air and biodiversity quickly, and India thus became one of the first countries in the world to create a special court of this kind. Its principal bench sits at New Delhi, with other benches at Bhopal, Pune, Kolkata and Chennai, and it is expected to dispose of a case within six months of filing. The Tribunal is not bound by the Code of Civil Procedure and follows the principles of natural justice, applying the polluter pays principle, the precautionary principle and the idea of sustainable development. It can order compensation, restoration of the environment and the closing of a polluting unit. B, C and D are wrong because they are invented expansions; no body of any of those names exists, and the word in the title is Tribunal, a court-like body, not Tribe. Exam tip: NGT Act 2010, principal bench New Delhi, cases to be decided in six months.

The correct answer is B, dyne-sec/cm². The poise is the CGS unit of dynamic or absolute viscosity, named after the French physician Jean Poiseuille, and one poise equals one dyne-second per square centimetre, which is the same as one gram per centimetre per second. Dynamic viscosity measures the internal friction of a fluid, the shearing stress needed for a unit rate of shear, so its unit is a stress multiplied by time. In SI the unit is the pascal-second, and one poise equals 0.1 pascal-second. Water at room temperature has a viscosity of about one centipoise, while honey is thousands of times thicker. A is wrong because dyne/cm² is a unit of stress or pressure, with no time in it. C is wrong because gram is a unit of mass, and g-sec/cm² does not reduce to the dimensions of viscosity. D is wrong because gm-cm/sec² is the dyne itself, a unit of force. Exam tip: 1 poise = 1 dyne-s/cm² = 0.1 Pa-s; water is about 1 centipoise.

The correct answer is B, Article 315. Article 315 provides for a Public Service Commission for the Union and a Public Service Commission for each State, and allows two or more States to ask Parliament for a Joint Public Service Commission. It opens Part XIV of the Constitution, which runs from Article 315 to Article 323 and deals with services under the Union and the States. Article 316 covers appointment and tenure, a chairman or member of the UPSC serving six years or till the age of 65 and of a State Commission till 62; Article 317 allows removal only by the President on a report of the Supreme Court; Article 320 lists the functions, mainly conducting examinations and advising on recruitment and discipline. A is wrong because Article 340 lets the President appoint a commission to look into the conditions of backward classes. C is wrong because Article 328 deals with a State legislature's power to make laws on elections to that legislature. D is wrong because Article 238 applied to the old Part B States and was repealed by the Seventh Amendment in 1956. Exam tip: 315 Public Service Commissions, 317 removal, 320 functions, 324 Election Commission.

The correct answer is B, Geitonogamy. Geitonogamy is pollination between two different flowers borne on the same plant. It is an odd halfway case: because the pollen has to travel from one flower to another it needs an agent such as an insect or the wind, so in working it looks like cross-pollination, yet the pollen comes from the same plant, so genetically it is self-pollination and brings no new variation. A is wrong because autogamy is pollination within the same flower, where pollen falls on the stigma of that very flower, as in pea and wheat. C is wrong because xenogamy is the transfer of pollen to the stigma of a flower on a different plant, and it is the only one of the three that brings genetically different pollen and so gives rise to variation. D is wrong because option B already names the process correctly. Exam tip: autogamy – same flower; geitonogamy – same plant, another flower; xenogamy – another plant.

The correct answer is A, 1856. The Hindu Widows' Remarriage Act was passed in July 1856 and made the remarriage of a Hindu widow lawful, so that the children of such a marriage were treated as legitimate. It came after a long campaign by Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, the Sanskrit scholar of Bengal, who argued from the shastras themselves that remarriage was allowed, and who gathered thousands of signatures in its support. The reformer also had to accept a condition in the Act by which a widow who remarried gave up the property she held from her first husband. B is wrong because 1858 is the year of Queen Victoria's Proclamation, which passed the rule of India to the Crown. C is wrong because 1859 is remembered for the Bengal Rent Act and the Indigo revolt, not for this law. D is wrong because 1862 is the year the High Courts were set up at Calcutta, Bombay and Madras. Exam tip: 1829 sati banned, 1856 widow remarriage allowed, 1891 Age of Consent Act.

The correct answer is C, Carbohydrates. The buccal cavity is the mouth, and the saliva poured into it begins the digestion of starch, a carbohydrate. Three pairs of salivary glands supply saliva, which carries the enzyme salivary amylase, also called ptyalin. It works best in a slightly alkaline medium and breaks the long starch chains into the sugar maltose, which is why a piece of bread kept in the mouth slowly tastes sweet. The teeth and tongue help by grinding the food and rolling it into a bolus. A is wrong because protein digestion begins in the stomach, where pepsin works in the acid of hydrochloric acid. B is wrong because the digestion of fat takes place chiefly in the small intestine, where bile from the liver breaks fat into small droplets and pancreatic lipase acts on them. D is wrong because starch digestion clearly does begin in the mouth. Exam tip: mouth – starch by amylase; stomach – protein by pepsin; small intestine – fat by bile and lipase.

The correct answer is D, Charter Act – 1833. This Act ended the last trading rights of the East India Company, its monopoly of trade with China and of the tea trade, and turned the Company into a purely administrative body holding India in trust for the British Crown. The same Act made the Governor-General of Bengal the Governor-General of India, with William Bentinck the first to hold that title, gave him alone the power to legislate for the whole of British India, and added a Law Member to his council, a post first held by Macaulay, who led the work on a common code of law. A is wrong because the Regulating Act of 1773 was only the first step towards control, setting up a Supreme Court at Calcutta. B is wrong because Pitt's India Act of 1784 created the Board of Control and the system of dual government. C is wrong because the Charter Act of 1813 opened Indian trade to all British merchants but kept the Company's monopoly of trade with China and in tea. Exam tip: 1813 – Indian trade opened except tea and China; 1833 – that exception also removed.

The correct answer is D, Black. In the colour code used for fire extinguishers, a black band or label marks a carbon dioxide extinguisher. The body of the cylinder is signal red and a coloured patch near the label tells you the filling at a glance, so the right cylinder can be picked in a hurry. A carbon dioxide extinguisher works by smothering: the gas is heavier than air, so it pushes oxygen away from the fuel, and it also chills the surface as it expands out of the horn. Because it does not conduct electricity and leaves no residue, it is the choice for live electrical equipment, switchboards, laboratories and computer rooms. Option A is wrong because a red band marks a plain water extinguisher, used on wood and paper fires. Option B is wrong because blue marks dry powder, the all-purpose filling for liquid and gas fires. Option C is wrong because cream, not white, is the colour for a foam extinguisher. Exam tip: red — water, cream — foam, blue — dry powder, black — carbon dioxide, yellow — wet chemical.

The correct answer is A, Used on ordinary combustibles such as wood and paper. Fires are sorted into classes by what is burning, and Class A covers ordinary solid fuels — wood, paper, cloth, straw, rubber and many plastics. These fires leave glowing embers, so they are put out mainly by cooling, and plain water or a water-based extinguisher is the cheapest and most effective choice for them. Option B is wrong because burning liquids such as petrol, kerosene, oil, paint and solvents are Class B, where water would spread the fire and foam or dry powder is used instead. Option C is wrong because a fire in live electrical equipment is a separate class — Class C in the American scheme and marked Class E in the Indian and European ones — and it needs a non-conducting agent such as carbon dioxide, never water. Option D is wrong because burning metals such as magnesium, sodium and potassium form Class D and need a special dry powder, since water reacts violently with them. Exam tip: A — solids, B — liquids, C — gases, D — metals, F or K — cooking oil.

The correct answer is B, France. Le Corbusier is counted as a French architect. He was born Charles-Édouard Jeanneret in Switzerland in 1887, settled in Paris, took French citizenship in 1930 and worked from France for the rest of his life. Jawaharlal Nehru brought him to India to plan Chandigarh, the shared capital of Punjab and Haryana, after the first planner Albert Mayer and his architect Matthew Nowicki left the project. Le Corbusier laid the city out in numbered sectors on a grid and designed the Capitol Complex in Sector 1 — the High Court, the Secretariat, the Legislative Assembly and the Open Hand monument — which UNESCO added to its World Heritage list in 2016. Option A is wrong because Germany is the home of the Bauhaus school and Walter Gropius, not of Le Corbusier. Option C is wrong because Italy is linked with Renaissance architects such as Brunelleschi and Palladio. Option D is wrong because Spain is known for Antoni Gaudí of Barcelona. Exam tip: Chandigarh — Le Corbusier; New Delhi — Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker.

The correct answer is A, Crown Gall. Crown gall is caused by the bacterium Agrobacterium tumefaciens, which enters through a wound near the base, or crown, of the stem and makes the plant grow rough tumour-like swellings there. The bacterium works by pushing a piece of its own Ti plasmid into the plant's cells and forcing them to divide, and that natural trick is why laboratories use it as a vector to carry new genes into plants. Grapevine, apple, rose, walnut and stone fruits suffer the most. Option B is wrong because mosaic diseases, such as tobacco mosaic, are caused by viruses that mottle the leaves in light and dark patches. Option C is wrong because smut of wheat, bajra and sugarcane is a fungal disease that fills the ear with black powdery spores. Option D is wrong because white blister, or white rust, of crucifers such as mustard is also fungal and raises white blisters on leaves and stems. Exam tip: bacterial — crown gall, citrus canker, bacterial blight of rice; viral — mosaic, leaf curl; fungal — smut, rust, blight.

The correct answer is B, Pulmonary artery. The pulmonary artery is the one artery in the body that carries deoxygenated blood. It leaves the right ventricle and takes blood that has returned from the body's tissues to the lungs, where carbon dioxide is given up and fresh oxygen is picked up. This makes it the standard exception to the rule that arteries carry oxygen-rich blood away from the heart while veins bring oxygen-poor blood back. Option A is wrong because the pulmonary vein is the matching exception on the other side: it is the only vein carrying oxygenated blood, from the lungs into the left atrium. Option C is wrong because the aorta is the largest artery of the body and carries oxygenated blood from the left ventricle to every organ. Option D is wrong because capillaries are the fine exchange vessels in the tissues, holding oxygenated blood at the arterial end and deoxygenated blood at the venous end, so they cannot be named for one kind. Exam tip: pulmonary artery — deoxygenated, pulmonary vein — oxygenated; the two exceptions.

The correct answer is D, Mizoram. Mizoram is a full state, not a Union Territory. It was carved out of Assam as a Union Territory in 1972, and after the Mizo Accord of 1986 it became a state on 20 February 1987 under the 53rd Constitutional Amendment, on the same day as Arunachal Pradesh. The difference matters: a Union Territory is administered by the President through an Administrator or Lieutenant Governor under Article 239, while a state has its own Governor and its own government under Part VI of the Constitution. Option A is wrong because Ladakh has been a Union Territory since 31 October 2019 and Puducherry since 1962, and both are listed as Union Territories in the First Schedule. Option B is wrong because Dadra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu were joined into one Union Territory on 26 January 2020. Option C is wrong because Lakshadweep is a Union Territory of coral islands in the Arabian Sea, with its capital at Kavaratti. Exam tip: Mizoram and Arunachal Pradesh became states on 20 February 1987, Goa on 30 May 1987.

The correct answer is D, Areolar. Animal tissues are grouped into four kinds — epithelial, muscular, connective and nervous — and areolar is not one of them, because it is only a type of connective tissue. Areolar tissue is the loose packing tissue found between the skin and the muscles, around blood vessels and nerves and inside bone marrow, where it fills space, supports organs and helps repair damaged parts. Since it sits inside the connective group, putting it beside the four main classes is exactly the mistake the question wants you to catch. Option A is wrong because epithelial tissue is one of the four and covers and lines all body surfaces and cavities. Option B is wrong because muscular tissue, made of contractile fibres of three sorts — striated, smooth and cardiac — is also one of the four. Option C is wrong because connective tissue is a main class and takes in bone, cartilage, blood, tendon, ligament, adipose and areolar tissue itself. Exam tip: four animal tissues — epithelial, muscular, connective, nervous; blood, bone and areolar are all connective.

The correct answer is C, Potassium. A wet chemical extinguisher sprays a fine mist of a potassium salt solution — usually potassium acetate, potassium citrate or potassium carbonate — so potassium is the working element inside it. This type is built for kitchen fires of cooking oil and fat, which are put in Class F in the Indian and European scheme and Class K in the American one. It works in two ways at once: the mist cools the burning oil below the temperature at which it catches fire, and the potassium salt reacts with the hot fat to form a soapy foam layer on the surface. That reaction, called saponification, seals the oil off from oxygen so it cannot flare up again. Option A is wrong because copper is used in wiring and alloys and has no part in extinguishers. Option B is wrong because magnesium burns fiercely itself and is a fuel in metal fires, never a suppressant. Option D is wrong because phosphorus catches fire very easily and is used in matches. Exam tip: wet chemical — potassium salt, cooking-oil fires, works by saponification.

The correct answer is A, Capra aegagrus hircus. The domestic goat is treated as a subspecies of the wild goat, so its name carries three parts — the genus Capra, the species aegagrus and the subspecies hircus. It is often shortened to Capra hircus. Carl Linnaeus gave science this binomial system, in which the genus name begins with a capital letter, the species name does not, and the whole name is printed in italics or underlined when handwritten. Goats were among the first animals humans tamed, in western Asia roughly ten thousand years ago, and India keeps one of the largest goat populations in the world. Option B is wrong because Bos indicus is the humped Indian cattle, the zebu. Option C is wrong because Sus scrofa is the wild boar, the ancestor of the domestic pig. Option D is wrong because Ovis aries is the domestic sheep, the animal most often confused with the goat in such questions. Exam tip: goat Capra hircus, sheep Ovis aries, cattle Bos indicus, buffalo Bubalus bubalis.

The correct answer is C, Fundamental Rights. Article 226 gives every High Court the power to issue writs for the enforcement of Fundamental Rights. The five writs are habeas corpus, mandamus, prohibition, certiorari and quo warranto. Article 226 is in fact wider than Article 32, because a High Court may issue these writs both for Fundamental Rights and 'for any other purpose', which covers ordinary legal rights as well, while the Supreme Court's power under Article 32 is confined to Fundamental Rights. The other difference is that Article 32 is itself a Fundamental Right and cannot be taken away, whereas the power under Article 226 is not. Option A is wrong because ordinary civil rights are enforced through civil suits in the regular courts. Option B is wrong because 'sanctioning rights' is not a category the Constitution knows. Option D is wrong because children's rights come from statutes such as the Juvenile Justice Act and bodies like the NCPCR, not from Article 226. Exam tip: Article 32 — Supreme Court, Fundamental Rights only; Article 226 — High Court, wider reach.

The correct answer is D, Alveoli. The alveoli are the tiny balloon-like air sacs at the ends of the smallest airways, and their thin walls are the surface where gases are exchanged. The two lungs together hold roughly 300 million alveoli, which give a surface of about 70 square metres — the size of a badminton court folded into the chest. Each alveolus has a wall one cell thick and is wrapped in blood capillaries, so oxygen passes into the blood and carbon dioxide passes out by simple diffusion, moving from higher to lower concentration without any pumping. Option A is wrong because the diaphragm is the dome of muscle below the lungs that changes the volume of the chest and drives breathing in and out; no exchange happens in it. Option B is wrong because bronchioles are the fine branching tubes that only carry air to the alveoli. Option C is wrong because the bronchi are the two large tubes running from the windpipe into each lung, again passages and not exchange surfaces. Exam tip: trachea to bronchi to bronchioles to alveoli, and only the alveoli exchange gases.