UPSC Civil Services GK Questions 2026

Under the Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana, launched on 22 January 2015, a parent or legal guardian may open the account for a girl at any time before she completes the age of ten years, for a maximum of two girls in one family, and the account matures twenty-one years after it…

The scheme was launched on 22 January 2015 from Panipat because Haryana had one of the lowest child sex ratios in the country in the Census of 2011, and the launch was meant to carry the message from the worst affected region.

Cytokinins promote cytokinesis, that is cell division; kinetin was the first of them to be identified, from the degraded DNA of herring sperm, and zeatin, the natural form, was obtained from maize grains.

Jute is a bast or stem fibre taken from the inner bark of plants of the genus Corchorus, extracted by soaking the cut stems in water, a process called retting, and India and Bangladesh are the main producers.

Clove is the unopened flower bud of Syzygium aromaticum, picked before it blooms and dried, and it is grown in India chiefly in Kerala, Tamil Nadu and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

Quinine is an alkaloid extracted from the bark of trees of the genus Cinchona, native to South America and grown in India in the Nilgiris and in Darjeeling, and it was the standard treatment for malaria before synthetic drugs appeared.

Saffron is made from the stigmas of the flower of Crocus sativus, and since each flower carries only three stigmas which must be picked by hand, the spice is the most expensive in the world; in India it is grown mainly in the Kashmir valley.

2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid is a synthetic auxin, and when it is sprayed in a heavy dose it throws broad-leaved dicot weeds into uncontrolled growth that kills them, while narrow-leaved cereals such as wheat and rice are far less affected, so it clears weeds from a standing crop.

Auxin made at the shoot tip moves downwards and keeps the lateral buds below it inactive, which is why a gardener who nips off the tip of a hedge plant gets a bushy growth of side branches.

Japanese rice plants attacked by this fungus grew abnormally tall and spindly, a condition called the foolish seedling or bakanae disease, and the substance responsible was isolated from the fungus and named gibberellin; gibberellic acid is the best known member of the group.

It is produced when a plant faces drought, salinity or extreme temperature; it closes the stomata so that water is not lost, for which reason it is called an antitranspirant, and it induces dormancy in seeds and buds so that growth waits for better conditions.

Ethylene is the only gaseous plant hormone, and it raises the rate of respiration in climacteric fruits such as banana, mango and tomato, so a single ripe fruit speeds up the ripening of those around it; the compound ethephon releases ethylene and is used in orchards for uniform ripening.

Excavations at these two localities of modern Patna have uncovered the main remains of Mauryan Pataliputra. At Bulandibagh, digging in the early twentieth century exposed long lines of heavy wooden palisade, matching the Greek envoy Megasthenes' description of a city surrounded by a timber wall with towers and gates.

The OSCE has 57 participating states and works as a forum for dialogue on early warning, conflict prevention, crisis management and post-conflict rehabilitation, but it is neither a military body nor a maker of binding law.

Both statements are true, and black soil suits rain-fed farming precisely because it holds moisture for a long time. Black soil, or regur, formed from the weathering of Deccan basalt and is rich in clay, iron, lime and magnesium.

Vithalbhai Patel was a pro-changer: he backed entry into the legislative councils and joined the Swaraj Party. After the Non-Cooperation Movement was called off in 1922, Congress split over council entry.

Each description belongs to a different term or says the opposite of the real rule, so no pair is correct.

Earthquakes start deep in the Earth's crust, and a reef in shallow water can do nothing to stop or soften the ground shaking.

The prose romance Vasavadatta was written by Subandhu, not Kalidasa, so this pair is wrong. Subandhu's Vasavadatta, of about the sixth or seventh century, is famous for its ornate style full of puns and long compounds.

Krishnadevaraya (ruled 1509-1529) of the Tuluva dynasty wrote the Amuktamalyada in Telugu.