UPSC GK Questions 2026

The Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993 bars the Commission from inquiring into any matter after the expiry of one year from the date on which the act constituting the violation of human rights is alleged to have been committed.

The selection committee has six members: the Prime Minister as its head, the Speaker of the Lok Sabha, the Deputy Chairman of the Rajya Sabha, the Leaders of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha, and the Union Home Minister; the President then makes the appointment on…

The correct answer is B, 12 October, the date on which the Commission was constituted in 1993.

The Act began life as an ordinance in September 1993, and the Commission was constituted on 12 October 1993 with Justice Ranganath Misra, a former Chief Justice of India, as its first Chairperson.

The Protection of Human Rights (Amendment) Act, 2019 reduced the term of the Chairperson and the members of the Commission from five years to three years, or until they attain the age of seventy, whichever is earlier, and it also made them eligible for reappointment.

A State Human Rights Commission is created by Chapter V of the Protection of Human Rights Act, 1993, an ordinary law of Parliament, so it is a statutory and not a constitutional body; Parliament could abolish it by amending that Act alone.

The correct answer is B, the Hartog Committee, which reported in 1929 that most children left school before becoming literate and that the hurried expansion of primary schools had produced wastage and stagnation; it recommended consolidation of existing schools rather than further expansion.

The correct answer is A, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, who launched the Urdu weekly Al-Hilal and, when it was suppressed, followed it with Al-Balagh, using both to argue for Hindu-Muslim unity against the colonial government.

The correct answer is B, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, who published Kesari in Marathi and Mahratta in English from Pune and was tried for sedition under Section 124A of the Indian Penal Code for what he wrote in them.

The correct answer is A, W. W. Hunter, who led the Indian Education Commission appointed in 1882 to review the working of Wood's Despatch; it urged attention to primary education given in the vernacular, the transfer of schools to local boards and support for private schools through grants.

The correct answer is C, Charles Metcalfe, who as acting Governor-General repealed the Licensing Regulations of 1823 through the Press Act of 1835 and freed Indian newspapers from the need for a licence, earning the title of liberator of the Indian press.

The correct answer is A, the Bengal Gazette, also known as Hicky's Gazette or the Calcutta General Advertiser, started by James Augustus Hicky in 1780; its attacks on the officials of the Company led to its seizure.

The correct answer is A, Lord Lytton, whose Vernacular Press Act of 1878 is remembered as the gagging act because it applied only to newspapers in Indian languages, allowed the government to demand a bond and forfeit printing presses, and gave no right of appeal to a court.

The correct answer is C, 1857, the year of the revolt, when the three presidency universities were founded on the model recommended by Wood's Despatch of 1854; they were examining rather than teaching universities at the start.

The correct answer is B, the Charter Act of 1813, which required the Company to set aside not less than one lakh rupees a year for the revival and improvement of literature, the encouragement of the learned natives of India and the introduction of useful knowledge.

Thomas Babington Macaulay wrote his Minute on 2 February 1835, and Lord William Bentinck's resolution of the following month accepted it, ending the long quarrel between the Orientalists and the Anglicists in favour of European learning taught in English.

The correct answer is B, Wood's Despatch of 1854, sent by Charles Wood, the President of the Board of Control, and called the Magna Carta of English education in India because it laid down a complete system: departments of public instruction in the provinces, universities in the presidency towns, a…

The correct answer is B, Raja Ram Mohan Roy, who brought out Sambad Kaumudi in Bengali in 1821 and the Persian weekly Mirat-ul-Akhbar the next year, closing the latter in protest against the Licensing Regulations of 1823.

The correct answer is B, greenfield investment, the building of a new unit from the ground up, which adds fresh capacity and employment to the host economy.

The correct answer is B, the capital account, more precisely the capital and financial account, which records transactions that change a country's assets and liabilities abroad; investment flows, loans and banking capital all sit here.