Static general knowledge is the larger part of every UPSC general studies paper. The notices name the same areas again and again: the history of India and the national movement, Indian and world geography, polity and the Constitution, the economy and social development, and general science with environment and ecology. The balance shifts from exam to exam. NDA puts about half of its General Knowledge part on Physics, Chemistry and General Science. CSE favours polity, modern history, environment and the economy. CAPF adds security and human rights, and CDS spreads its questions across polity, history, geography, the economy and school science.
GK24's GK notes are written topic by topic in English and Hindi, as short, fact-first chapters that are easy to revise. They cover Indian Polity, Indian History, Geography, Indian Economy, General Science, Environment and Ecology, Art and Culture, Computer, and the fact lists of awards, sports, books and days. A new chapter is added in each subject as the series grows. Each note carries practice questions, and those that have appeared in an exam say which exam and year. Start with Polity and modern history, then Geography, the Economy and Science. Read a note, take its topic quiz, and come back to it in your monthly revision.
The Ramakrishna Mission was founded in 1897 by:
He founded the Mission in 1897 in the name of his teacher and established its headquarters at Belur Math near Calcutta in 1898, four years after his address to the Parliament of Religions at Chicago in 1893.
Read the full explanation →The Hindu Widows' Remarriage Act of 1856 was passed largely because of the campaign of:
A Sanskrit scholar and principal of Sanskrit College, he argued from the shastras themselves that the remarriage of widows was permissible, petitioned the government and so brought about the Act of 1856; he also worked for girls' schools and against polygamy.
Read the full explanation →The Satyashodhak Samaj, founded in 1873 to fight caste domination, was started by:
He founded the Satyashodhak Samaj, the society of truth seekers, in 1873 in Maharashtra to free the lower castes from Brahminical domination, and his book Gulamgiri of the same year compared their condition with that of slaves.
Read the full explanation →The Arya Samaj, which gave the call of 'back to the Vedas', was founded in 1875 by:
He founded the Arya Samaj at Bombay in 1875, held the Vedas to be the source of all true knowledge, rejected idol worship, priestly authority and hereditary caste, and set out his views in Satyarth Prakash.
Read the full explanation →Who was the founder of Atmiya Sabha?
He founded the Atmiya Sabha, a society of friends for religious and philosophical discussion, at Calcutta in 1815, and it was the first of his organised efforts against idol worship and empty ritual.
Read the full explanation →At the height of the crisis in 1991, India's foreign exchange reserves were sufficient to pay for imports of about:
Reserves had been drained by years of current account deficits, by the rise in oil prices and the fall in remittances after the Gulf crisis, and by the withdrawal of deposits held by non-resident Indians, and at the worst point they could cover only a fortnight of imports.
Read the full explanation →The Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Practices Act, 1969 was replaced by:
The older law had treated size itself with suspicion and required large firms to obtain the government's approval before expanding, setting up a new undertaking or merging; the reforms of 1991 removed that requirement, and the Act of 2002 replaced the law altogether, shifting attention from the size of a…
Read the full explanation →The sale by the government of a part of its shareholding in a public sector enterprise is called:
It is the sale of a part of the government's equity in a public enterprise, either to the public through the stock market or to institutional and strategic buyers; when a majority holding is sold and management also passes to the buyer, it is called a strategic sale.
Read the full explanation →India became a founder member of the World Trade Organisation with effect from:
The World Trade Organisation came into being on that date at the end of the Uruguay Round of negotiations, taking the place of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade of 1947, and India, having been a party to the GATT, became a founder member.
Read the full explanation →The Foreign Exchange Regulation Act was replaced by which law, and in which year?
The older Act of 1973 treated a breach of exchange control as a criminal offence and presumed guilt; the new Act treats most breaches as civil contraventions punishable with a penalty, and its purpose is stated as facilitating external trade and payments and the orderly development of the foreign exchange…
Read the full explanation →The committee appointed in 1991 to recommend reform of the financial system and banking was headed by:
His committee of 1991 recommended reducing the statutory pre-emption of bank funds through the Cash Reserve Ratio and the Statutory Liquidity Ratio, allowing new private banks, introducing prudential norms for the recognition of income and for capital adequacy, and giving banks freedom in branch expansion; a second committee under him…
Read the full explanation →In the first days of July 1991 the Indian rupee was:
The Reserve Bank lowered the value of the rupee on 1 July and again on 3 July 1991 to make exports cheaper abroad, discourage imports and restore confidence in the currency during the crisis.
Read the full explanation →Who presented the budget of July 1991 that began the economic reforms?
As Finance Minister in the government of P. V. Narasimha Rao he presented the budget of July 1991, which cut subsidies, reduced the fiscal deficit, lowered tariffs and set out the framework of the reforms, following the devaluation of the rupee earlier that month.
Read the full explanation →The three components of India's New Economic Policy of 1991 are together known by which acronym?
Liberalisation removed licensing and other controls on industry and trade, privatisation reduced the ownership and the role of the public sector through disinvestment and strategic sales, and globalisation opened the economy to foreign trade, investment and technology.
Read the full explanation →The New Industrial Policy that abolished industrial licensing for most industries was announced on:
The Statement on Industrial Policy of that date ended licensing for all industries except a short reserved list, cut back the industries kept for the public sector, removed the requirement of prior government approval for expansion by large firms under the monopolies law, and allowed foreign direct investment up to…
Read the full explanation →Removing barriers or restrictions set by the government on trade is known as _______.
Liberalisation means freeing economic activity from government controls: industrial licences, import licences and quantitative restrictions, ceilings on investment and administered interest rates.
Read the full explanation →Who was the Prime Minister during economic reforms 1991 in India?
He became Prime Minister in June 1991, in the middle of the balance of payments crisis, and his government devalued the rupee, borrowed from the International Monetary Fund and announced the New Economic Policy of liberalisation, privatisation and globalisation, with the Statement on Industrial Policy issued on 24 July 1991.
Read the full explanation →The Visvesvaraya Iron and Steel Works, which uses hydel power instead of coking coal, is located at:
The works, begun in the time of the Mysore state and later named after Sir M. Visvesvaraya, lies on the Bhadra river and is remembered in geography as the plant that uses electricity generated from water power, along with charcoal from the nearby forests, because the region has no coking…
Read the full explanation →Which one of the following is an agro-based industry?
An agro-based industry uses a farm product as its raw material, and sugar is made from sugarcane, which is why the mills stand in the cane belts of Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu; cotton textiles, jute, vegetable oil, tea and paper from bagasse belong to the same class.
Read the full explanation →Industries whose raw material is light and valuable, so that they are not tied to any particular location, are called:
Because their raw material is light, valuable and easy to move, and because they need little power or water, such units are free of the usual pulls of ore, coal and bulky material; electronics, computer assembly, diamond cutting and software are the standard examples, and they depend mainly on skilled…
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