UPSC Civil Services GK Questions 2026

New Zealand forms the south-western corner of the Polynesian Triangle in the Pacific Ocean. The Pacific islands are grouped into three regions.

Harishena was the court poet and minister of the Gupta ruler Samudragupta and wrote this praise-poem in his honour. The Prayaga Prashasti, also called the Allahabad Pillar Inscription, is in elegant Sanskrit and is engraved on the same pillar that carries an edict of Ashoka.

The second industrial revolution, from about 1850 to 1914, was driven by steel, chemicals, electricity and oil. The first industrial revolution began in Britain around 1760 and rested on cotton textiles, coal, iron and the steam engine.

The New Development Bank was founded by the five BRICS countries, and Canada is not one of them. The founding members are Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

When the jobs on offer need skills, or are in places, that do not match the workers available, people stay jobless even though vacancies exist.

The route runs from the dry west to the wet east coast, so the vegetation changes as rainfall rises. Bikaner lies in the Thar Desert of western Rajasthan, where rainfall is below about 25 cm and only desert plants such as khejri and cactus grow.

The Sugamya Bharat Abhiyan is a campaign to make places, transport and information accessible; it is run by the Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities and has no pension component.

Olivine is a silicate of magnesium and iron that forms greenish crystals and is common in basalt. Olivine takes its name from its olive-green colour.

Under First Past the Post, the candidate with the most votes wins, even if that is far less than half of all votes cast.

Buried organic waste rots without air in a landfill, and bacteria that work without oxygen release methane. Food scraps, paper and garden waste make up a large share of city garbage.

With an area of about 7.86 lakh sq km, New Guinea is the world's second-largest island, after Greenland. New Guinea lies just north of Australia and is shared by two countries: its western half belongs to Indonesia and its eastern half is the mainland of Papua New Guinea.

Nominal GDP values each year's output at that year's own (current) prices, not at constant prices, so this statement is not correct.

Man Kautuhal was compiled under the patronage of Raja Man Singh Tomar, who ruled Gwalior from 1486 to 1516. Man Singh Tomar was a great patron of music, and his court is closely linked with the growth of the Dhrupad style of Hindustani singing.

S-waves are transverse waves: they shake the ground at right angles to their direction of travel, and that sideways motion forms crests and troughs.

The events fall in 1972, 1974, 1985 and 2001 in that order, which is also UPSC's official key. The Simla Agreement was signed on 2 July 1972 by Indira Gandhi and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto after the 1971 war; it turned the ceasefire line in Kashmir into the Line of Control.

The first three are written into Article I of the SAARC Charter; ending cross-border terrorism is not one of its listed objectives.

The number after PM gives the upper size limit of the particles in micrometres. Particulate matter is classed by aerodynamic diameter: PM10 is 10 micrometres or less, PM2.5 is 2.5 micrometres or less, and PM1 is 1 micrometre or less, about one-seventieth of a human hair's width.

All three subjects sit in the list named against them in the Seventh Schedule. The Seventh Schedule, read with Article 246, divides law-making powers into three lists.

Sunlight reaching a glasshouse is mostly visible light and short-wavelength (near) infrared, which glass transmits easily. The plants and soil inside absorb it, warm up and re-radiate the energy as long-wavelength infrared, because cooler bodies emit at longer wavelengths.

Plantations do lie mostly in the humid tropics, but the soils there are generally poor, not highly fertile. Plantation farming grows a single cash crop such as tea, coffee, rubber, sugarcane, cocoa, banana or oil palm on large estates with heavy capital and hired labour.