UPSC 2022 Previous Year GK Questions with Answers

The correct answer is C, Both 1 and 2. The Common Framework for Debt Treatments was agreed by the G20 and the Paris Club in November 2020 to help low-income countries with unsustainable debt.

During the COVID-19 crisis many poor countries could not service their loans. The G20 first offered the Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI), which only postponed payments. The Common Framework went further: it lets eligible countries (those eligible for the DSSI) seek a full restructuring of their official bilateral debt, with all G20 creditors, including newer lenders outside the Paris Club such as China and India, negotiating together on comparable terms. The Paris Club is an informal group of major creditor countries that coordinates solutions for debtor nations.

A is wrong because statement 2, its purpose, is also correct.

B is wrong because the framework was indeed endorsed by the G20 together with the Paris Club.

D is wrong because both statements describe the framework correctly.

Exam tip: DSSI postponed debt payments; the Common Framework (2020) restructures debt of low-income countries.

The correct answer is C, 1 and 3 only. A rise in NEER means the rupee has gained against a basket of currencies, and higher domestic inflation makes REER drift away from NEER.

NEER is a weighted average of the rupee's exchange rate against the currencies of India's trading partners; in the RBI's indices a rise means the rupee has appreciated, so statement 1 is correct. REER is NEER adjusted for the gap between Indian prices and partner-country prices. A rising REER means Indian goods are becoming dearer abroad, which hurts trade competitiveness, so statement 2 is wrong. Because REER includes relative prices and NEER does not, faster inflation in India than abroad widens the gap between the two, so statement 3 is correct.

A is wrong because statement 2 is false.

B is wrong because it drops statement 1 and keeps the false statement 2.

D is wrong because statement 2 reverses the effect of a rising REER.

Exam tip: REER = NEER adjusted for relative inflation; REER up means exports lose competitiveness.

The correct answer is B, International Monetary Fund. Both are IMF windows for quick emergency financing to member countries facing an urgent balance of payments need.

The Rapid Financing Instrument (RFI) is open to all IMF members and gives fast, low-access financial help without a full-fledged programme. The Rapid Credit Facility (RCF) does the same for low-income countries but at concessional terms, through the Poverty Reduction and Growth Trust. Both were used widely during the COVID-19 pandemic, when many countries needed money quickly after sudden shocks such as natural disasters or a collapse in exports.

A is wrong: the Asian Development Bank funds development projects in Asia and the Pacific; it does not run these IMF facilities.

C is wrong: the UNEP Finance Initiative is a partnership with banks and insurers on sustainable finance, not a lender.

D is wrong: the World Bank gives long-term development loans, while short-term balance of payments support is the IMF's role.

Exam tip: RFI is for all IMF members; RCF is the concessional version for low-income countries.

The correct answer is C, 1, 3 and 4. Under dyarchy the Governor kept the reserved subjects, which were those touching revenue and coercive power: administration of justice, land revenue, police, irrigation, famine relief, forests and labour relations. Local self-government, along with education, public health, agriculture, industries and excise, belonged to the transferred list, run by Indian ministers answerable to the legislative council. Option A is wrong because it includes local self-government, a transferred subject. Option B is wrong for the same reason, as it too carries local self-government. Option D is wrong because it drops land revenue, the most jealously guarded of the reserved subjects, and adds local self-government. The simple rule for the examination hall is that whatever earned money or kept order was reserved, and whatever spent money on people was transferred.

The correct answer is D, nickel. An alkene has a carbon-carbon double bond, and adding hydrogen across that bond turns it into the corresponding alkane. The reaction needs a finely divided metal catalyst, and nickel is the cheap industrial choice, usually at about 150 to 200 degrees Celsius; palladium and platinum do the same job at lower temperatures. The catalyst holds hydrogen molecules on its surface, splits them into atoms and lets them join the double bond, so it only speeds the reaction up and is not used up. The best known use is in food: unsaturated vegetable oils are hydrogenated over nickel to make solid vanaspati ghee. Option A is wrong because copper is used to dehydrogenate alcohols, which is the opposite kind of change. Option B is wrong because zinc dust is used for other reductions, not for adding hydrogen to a double bond. Option C is wrong because aluminium is not a hydrogenation catalyst at all. Exam tip: alkene plus hydrogen over nickel gives an alkane; oil plus hydrogen over nickel gives vanaspati.

The correct answer is A, temperature is highest at ground level and decreases with increasing altitude. In the troposphere the air is warmed mainly from below: the earth absorbs incoming short-wave insolation and then heats the layer of air touching it by conduction, radiation and convection. So the farther you go from this heat source, the colder the air, and the normal lapse rate is about 6.5 degrees Celsius for every 1,000 metres of ascent. This is why hill stations are cool in summer and high peaks stay under snow even in the tropics. Option B is wrong because that upside-down pattern is a temperature inversion, a local and short-lived reversal seen in valleys on calm clear winter nights, not the normal rate. Option C is wrong because temperature does not stay steady with height; the troposphere cools steadily upward. Option D is wrong because no such initial warming occurs in the normal profile. Exam tip: normal lapse rate is a fall of about 6.5 degrees Celsius per kilometre; the opposite is called an inversion.

The correct answer is A, a destination-based consumption tax. Goods and Services Tax is collected by the state where the goods or services are finally consumed, not by the state that produced them. It came into force on 1 July 2017 through the Constitution (101st Amendment) Act, 2016, and replaced a thicket of central and state taxes such as excise duty, service tax, VAT and octroi. It is a multi-stage value-added tax: a seller pays tax on the full value but claims input tax credit for the tax already paid on purchases, so only the value added at each stage is really taxed. Rates are decided by the GST Council under Article 279A, chaired by the Union Finance Minister. Option B is wrong because GST is not levied at the point of production; the earlier regime taxed at origin. Option C is wrong because GST is not a plain sales tax on each transaction, since input credit runs through the chain. Option D is wrong on both counts, origin and sales transaction. Exam tip: GST — destination-based, multi-stage, value-added; 101st Amendment, 1 July 2017.

The correct answer is C, they are appointed by the Governor in consultation with the High Court of the concerned State. This is the rule laid down in Article 233 of the Constitution. Appointment, posting and promotion of district judges in a state are made by the Governor, who must consult the High Court that exercises jurisdiction over that state. A person not already in government service can be appointed only if they have practised as an advocate or pleader for at least seven years and are recommended by the High Court. Article 234 covers other judicial officers, who are appointed by the Governor from the state judicial service as per rules framed after consulting the High Court and the State Public Service Commission. Option A is wrong because the High Court is only consulted; its Chief Justice does not appoint. Option B is wrong because the President appoints judges of the Supreme Court and the High Courts, not district judges. Option D is wrong because the Supreme Court has no role here. Exam tip: Article 233 — Governor appoints, High Court is consulted.

The correct answer is C, only two pairs. Dignaga and Nathamuni are matched rightly while Aryadeva is not, so exactly two pairs are correct. Aryadeva, who lived about the third century, was a Buddhist monk of the Madhyamaka school and the chief disciple of Nagarjuna; his Chatuhshataka defends the doctrine of emptiness, so calling him a Jaina scholar is wrong. Dignaga, of the fifth or sixth century, founded the Buddhist school of logic and wrote the Pramanasamuchchaya, which shaped debate on perception and inference for centuries. Nathamuni, of about the tenth century, was the first acharya of the Srivaishnava tradition at Srirangam; he gathered the Tamil hymns of the Alvars into the Nalayira Divya Prabandham and was the grandfather in the line that led to Ramanuja. A is wrong because two pairs do match. B understates the count and D overstates it. Exam tip: Nagarjuna, Aryadeva, Buddhapalita and Chandrakirti all belong to the Madhyamaka line.

The correct answer is A, 1 and 2 only. Statement 1 is right because when the United States Federal Reserve tightens, returns there become attractive and portfolio money flows out of emerging markets, which is capital flight. Statement 2 is right because such an outflow weakens the rupee and raises risk premiums, so a firm servicing an external commercial borrowing pays more in rupee terms and finds refinancing dearer. Statement 3 is wrong, and this settles the other options: a fall in the value of the domestic currency raises, not lowers, the currency risk on a loan that must be repaid in dollars, because every dollar of repayment now costs more rupees. Option B is wrong because it accepts the faulty third statement and drops the correct first one, option C is wrong for accepting statement 3 while leaving out statement 2, and option D is wrong because it accepts all three.

The correct answer is C, 1 and 3 only. Statement 1 is right because the NEER is a trade weighted index of the rupee against a basket of partner currencies, so a rise in the index means the rupee has appreciated in nominal terms. Statement 3 is right because the REER adjusts the NEER for relative prices, so when domestic inflation runs faster than inflation abroad the two indices move apart. Statement 2 is wrong, and this is why options A, B and D fail: a rise in the REER means the rupee has become expensive in real terms, which makes Indian goods dearer abroad and weakens, not improves, trade competitiveness. Option A is wrong because it accepts statement 2 and leaves out the correct statement 3, option B is wrong because it accepts statement 2 and drops the correct statement 1, and option D is wrong because it accepts all three including the faulty second one.

The correct answer is C, Ratnavali. Harshavardhana was a dramatist as well as a king, and three Sanskrit plays are credited to him: Ratnavali, Priyadarshika and Nagananda. Ratnavali is a court comedy about the love of King Udayana for Ratnavali, and it is the work most often named in question papers.

Option A, the Harshacharita, is about Harsha but was not written by him; it is the biography composed by his court poet Banabhatta. Option B, Kadambari, is also by Banabhatta, a Sanskrit prose romance left unfinished at his death and completed by his son. Option D, the Gitagovinda, is much later: it was written by Jayadeva in the twelfth century at the court of the Sena king Lakshmanasena of Bengal, and it celebrates Radha and Krishna. Only Ratnavali is the king's own composition.

The correct answer is A. The Polar Code is the International Code for Ships Operating in Polar Waters, adopted by the International Maritime Organization and in force since the beginning of 2017. It is mandatory under the conventions on safety of life at sea and on prevention of pollution from ships, and it covers ship design, equipment, crew training and operation in ice-covered waters, as well as discharges of oil, sewage and garbage in the Arctic and the Antarctic.

Option B is wrong because territorial claims in the Arctic are dealt with under the law of the sea and the continental shelf procedure, not by this code. Option C describes what the Antarctic Treaty system and its environmental protocol do for scientific activity. Option D is wrong because the Arctic Council is a forum for cooperation on environment and sustainable development and does not conclude trade or security agreements.

The correct answer is B, Quantum Computing. A qubit, short for quantum bit, is the basic unit of information in a quantum computer. An ordinary bit can be only 0 or 1, but a qubit can exist in a superposition of 0 and 1 at the same time, and qubits can be entangled, so that the state of one is linked to another. Because of this, a set of qubits can explore many possibilities together, which could let quantum computers solve certain problems, such as simulating molecules or breaking some kinds of encryption, far faster than classical machines. Qubits are built from superconducting circuits, trapped ions or photons, and most must be kept close to absolute zero. India supports this field through its National Quantum Mission, approved in 2023. Option A is wrong because cloud services run on ordinary bits and servers. Option C is wrong because visible light communication, or Li-Fi, sends data using LED light. Option D is wrong because wireless communication uses radio waves, not qubits. Exam tip: a bit is 0 or 1, a qubit means superposition and entanglement.

The correct answer is B, 2 and 3 only. Selling dollars supports a falling rupee and buying dollars absorbs heavy inflows, but to fight inflation the RBI sells, not buys, securities. Buying government securities through open market operations pumps rupees into the system and would add to inflation, so when inflation is too high the RBI sells securities to soak up money. So statement 1 is wrong. When the rupee is falling fast, the RBI sells dollars from its reserves, which raises the supply of dollars and steadies the rupee, so statement 2 is right. When interest rates in the USA or the EU fall, investors move money to India for better returns; the dollar inflow pushes the rupee up, and the RBI buys dollars to prevent sharp appreciation and to add to reserves, so statement 3 is right. Option A is wrong because it includes statement 1. Option C is wrong for the same reason. Option D is wrong because statement 1 is false. Exam tip: high inflation, sell bonds; weak rupee, sell dollars; heavy inflows, buy dollars.

The correct answer is B, Second half of the month of June. The longest day in the northern hemisphere is the summer solstice, which falls on 20, 21 or 22 June, usually 21 June. On that day the Sun is overhead at the Tropic of Cancer (23.5° N), because the North Pole is tilted most towards the Sun. Places north of the equator get their longest daylight and shortest night, and north of the Arctic Circle the Sun stays above the horizon for 24 hours. At the same time the southern hemisphere has its shortest day. The other solstice, around 22 December, puts the Sun over the Tropic of Capricorn and gives the north its shortest day. Option A is wrong because in the first half of June the days are still growing longer. Option C is wrong because by early July the days have started getting shorter. Option D is wrong for the same reason, as the days keep shortening through July. Exam tip: 21 June Tropic of Cancer, 22 December Tropic of Capricorn, 21 March and 23 September equinoxes.

The correct answer is B, 2 and 3 only. Goa was taken from Bijapur and the Madras site came from a Vijayanagara Nayak, but the Dutch did not get their east coast land from the Gajapatis. Albuquerque captured Goa in 1510 from the Adil Shahi Sultanate of Bijapur, and it became the centre of Portuguese power in the East. In 1639 Francis Day obtained the site of Madras from Damarla Venkatadri Nayaka, a local chief under the Vijayanagara ruler, and Fort St. George was built there. Statement 1 is wrong because the Dutch set up their east coast factories, such as Masulipatnam (1605) and Pulicat (1610), with grants from the Golconda Sultanate and from Vijayanagara and its Nayaks, long after Gajapati power in Odisha had ended. So A, C and D, which include statement 1, are wrong. Exam tip: Goa 1510 from Bijapur, Madras 1639 from a Vijayanagara Nayak, the Dutch at Masulipatnam and Pulicat.