General English
(Held on 22-1-2012)
Directions—(Q. 1–10) In the following passage there are blanks, each of which has been numbered. These numbers are printed below the passage and against each, five words/phrases are suggested, one of which fits the blank appropriately. Find out the appropriate word/phrase in each case.
“India lives in its villages,” said Mahatma Gandhi. Literally and from the social, economic and political …(1)…, the statement is …(2)… even today. Around 65% of the State’s population is living in rural areas. People in rural areas should have the same …(3)… of life as is …(4)… by people living in sub-urban and urban areas. Further, there are cascading …(5)… of poverty, unemployment, poor and inadequate infrastructure in rural areas on urban centres causing slums and …(6)… social and economic tensions manifesting in economic deprivation and urban poverty. Hence Rural Development, which is concerned …(7)… economic growth and social justice, improvement in the living standard of the rural people by providing adequate and quality social services and minimum basic needs, …(8)… essential. The present strategy of rural development mainly …(9)… on poverty alleviation, better livelihood opportunities, provision of basic amenities and infrastructure facilities …(10)… innovative programmes of wage and self-employment.
1. (A) controversies
(B) issues
(C) strata
(D) perspectives
(E) nuance
Ans: (D)
2. (A) truth
(B) valid
(C) major
(D) alive
(E) placid
Ans: (B)
3. (A) desire
(B) access
(C) quality
(D) span
(E) method
Ans: (C)
4. (A) asked
(B) gained
(C) administered
(D) enjoyed
(E) relaxed
Ans: (D)
5. (A) result
(B) consequence
(C) effects
(D) lines
(E) affects
Ans: (C)
6. (A) gathering
(B) ending
(C) aspects
(D) virtual
(E) consequential
Ans: (A)
7. (A) by
(B) with
(C) in
(D) on
(E) of
Ans: (B)
8. (A) becomes
(B) were
(C) are
(D) befalls
(E) turns
Ans: (A)
9. (A) symbolises
(B) talks
(C) attends
(D) favours
(E) focuses
Ans: (E)
10. (A) through
(B) of
(C) from
(D) along
(E) past
Ans: (A)
Directions—(Q. 11–15) Which of the phrases (A), (B), (C) and (D) given below each sentence should replace the word/phrase printed in bold in the sentence to make it grammatically correct ? If the sentence is correct as it is given and ‘No correction is required’, mark (E) as the answer.
11. For the first time ever, a government advisory board asked scientific journals not to publish details of certain biomedical experiments.
(A) This is first time
(B) For the first ever time
(C) At the first time
(D) First time for
(E) No correction required
Ans: (A)
12. People living downstream would get 15–20 minutes to run for their life if the dam bursts.
(A) run for their lives
(B) run at their life
(C) run after their lives
(D) run for life
(E) No correction required
Ans: (A)
13. The minister also claimed that all the formalities had been completed and it would be implemented in immediate effects.
(A) immediately in affect
(B) with immediate effect
(C) to immediate effect
(D) immediately with effects
(E) No correction required
Ans: (B)
14. A meeting was convened in order to give SEZs a new lease in life.
(A) new lease of life
(B) new leasing in life
(C) leased life
(D) newer lease on life
(E) No correction required
Ans: (A)
15. As group of lawyers took violence while trying to stop another group from attending court.
(A) violent
(B) took to violence
(C) opted for taking of violence
(D) violently took
(E) No correction required
Ans: (B)
Directions—(Q. 16–20) Rearrange the following six sentences (1), (2), (3), (4), (5) and (6) in the proper sequence to form a meaningful paragraph; then answer the questions given below them.
(1) This, thus, diminishes the effectiveness of these employees to motivate change.
(2) In this context of advocating behaviour change, it can be said that rural NGOs in India that depend on local population for employees face a limited labour pool who are as likely to be vulnerable to the traditional social pressures and therefore equally marginalized as their clients.
(3) It was found that employees indeed ‘walked the talk’ and their index of empowerment was related to their tenure in the NGO, thus disproving the theory of failure due to local employees.
(4) If NGO employees are advocating behaviour change for self-empowerment, such behaviour must also be modeled for successful transmission.
(5) A successful rural NGO in India that has received accolades for its work in empowerment and has succeeded despite having a major employee pool of locals was examined to established if the employees actually ‘walked the talk’.
(6) These pressures may cause a gap between what the employees may be trained to ‘preach’ and what they may ‘practice’.
16. Which of the following should be the FIRST sentence after rearrangement ?
(A) 1
(B) 2
(C) 3
(D) 4
(E) 5
Ans: (E)
17. Which of the following should be the SECOND sentence after rearrangement ?
(A) 6
(B) 5
(C) 3
(D) 2
(E) 1
Ans: (C)
18. Which of the following should be the THIRD sentence after rearrangement ?
(A) 1
(B) 2
(C) 3
(D) 4
(E) 6
Ans: (B)
19. Which of the following should be the FIFTH sentence after rearrangement ?
(A) 3
(B) 2
(C) 6
(D) 4
(E) 5
Ans: (C)
20. Which of the following should be the LAST (SIXTH) sentence after rearrangement ?
(A) 1
(B) 2
(C) 3
(D) 4
(E) 5
Ans: (A)
Directions—(Q. 21–25) Each question below has two blanks, each blank indicating that something has been omitted. Choose the set of words for each blank which best fits the meaning of the sentence as a whole.
21. Police officials said that they..… a tip-off about the plan and …… to catch the gang.
(A) received - managed
(B) attempted - sprung
(C) sensed - tried
(D) got - caught
(E) rendered – pleased
Ans: (A)
22. Three rag-pickers who ………… missing from the dump yard are suspected to have been buried under the ……… of waste.
(A) are - bag
(B) went - mounds
(C) go - heaps
(D) is - tons
(E) since – rubble
Ans: (B)
23. The campaign was …. at creating awareness among the public ….. drug abuse.
(A) expected - to
(B) targeted - for
(C) meant - regarding
(D) aimed - about
(E) intended – on
Ans: (D)
24. The judge has ……… a ‘defiant’ assistant commissioner to one month jail for his deliberate …... of the court orders.
(A) ruled - infringement
(B) sent - action
(C) sentenced - violation
(D) auctioned - breach
(E) ordered – attempt
Ans: (C)
25. Fed up by official ………, the villagers repaired a road themselves which had been in dire straits for the ………… thirteen years.
(A) indifference - many
(B) entry - last
(C) apathy - past
(D) guidance - next
(E) lethargy – passed
Ans: (C)
Directions—(Q. 26–35) Read each sentence to find out whether there is any grammatical error or idiomatic error in it. The error, if any, will be in one part of the sentence. The letter of that part is the answer. If there is no error, the answer is (E). (Ignore errors of punctuation, if any)
26. The Magician, who has been (A) / using his talent for make the public aware (B) / of various social issues, is confident (C) / that his mission would be a success. (D) No error (E)
Ans: (B)
27. Apart from the dance programmes, (A) / there will be training sessions for (B) / students from various schools in the city (C) / on a daily basis. (D) No error (E)
Ans: (E)
28. The government’s earnings (A) / through royalty, dividends and profit sharing (B) / have been steady rising (C) / over the years. (D) No error (E)\
Ans: (C)
29. In the afternoon, (A) / devotees organised a programme (B) / in which the name of the deity (C) / was chanted one lakh time. (D) No error (E)
Ans: (D)
30. Slick advertising campaigns, (A) / soaring gold prices and (B) / increasing purchasing power for consumers have (C) / helped develop a market for diamonds. (D) No error (E)
Ans: (C)
31. Despite of (A) / elaborate search operations, (B) / the police could find no trace (C) / of the missing girl. (D) No error (E)
Ans: (A)
32. The revelation comes (A) / at a time when (B) / women’s reservation is (C) / being deliberated upon. (D) No error (E)
Ans: (E)
33. The man was (A) / reportedly upset (B) / over his sister’s death (C) / about a fortnight behind. (D) No error (E)
Ans: (D)
34. The factory always emits (A) / a loud sound of hammering while (B) / operations of its machines generate a strong vibration, (C) / causing severely inconvenience to residents. (D) No error (E)
Ans: (E)
35. The society for animal welfare has (A) / urged people to keep an eye out (B) / for injured birds (C) / during the forthcoming festival. (D) No error (E)
Ans: (B)
Directions—(Q. 36–50) Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below it. Certain words/phrases have been printed in bold to help you locate them while answering some of the questions.
Renewable Energy Technologies (RETs) have long been recognised for their potential as environment friendly, versatile and sustainable energy alternatives for rural areas of India. However, despite efforts by the Ministry o f Non-conventional Energy Sources (MNES) and the India Renewable Energy Development Agency (IREDA), RETs have not yet succeeded as a major alternative source of energy in rural India. The programmes of MNES and IREDA designed to support small-scale distributed systems have relied on heavily subsidized credit, technology training and consumer awareness activities to stimulate the market for end-user finance for renewable energy systems for domestic use and a tiered set of capital and interest rate subsidies for water pumping in the agriculture sector. While end-users in some rural areas now have access to solar-powered lanterns or lights and biogas systems for their home, and agricultural operations are taking advantage of remarkable capital subsidies for solar energy to use for water pumping, the use of heavy capital and interest rate subsidies, and the focus on domestic use rather than on matching renewable energy technology applications with income enhancement opportunities have tied the success of these programmes to government budgets and political cycles limiting both the breadth and depth of development and penetration of projects that harness renewable energy resources.
In order of fully understand the barriers to the development of renewable energy enterprises/projects in rural India, we must review a few of the key characteristics of investments in renewable energy projects.
First, investments in renewable energy projects are relatively information and capital-intensive. The greater information intensity arises primarily from the need for more upfront information regarding the energy resource compared to conventional power projects. Renewable energy resource assessments, in most cases, need to be site-specific and preferably with data for a significant period of time. Renewable energy technologies are also more capital-intensive than conventional hydrocarbon ones because of the large upfront investment cost in generation equipment needed to utilize a ‘free’ or low-cost energy source. Due to the capital intensity, the financial viability of such investments and projects is often more dependent on longer-term financing structures available at the outset of the project.
Second, individual renewable energy investments are generally smaller than those made in conventional power generation projects due to constraints on local resource availability. Local resource availability is in turn limited by the low energy density of renewable energy resources. As extensive time and resources are necessary to catalogue the sitespecific resource availability before finacing can be considered, the technical and managerial know-how requirements and associated costs that occur prior to the project often represent a much larger percentage of project costs than in the case of conventional power projects.
Third, entrepreneurs developing small-scale renewable energy projects face the same business and financial risks associated with any enterprise. The viability of any enterprise depends on its ability to build a
business based on solid concepts and competencies in sound contexts that mitigate those risks.
Considering the aforementioned characteristics, the key barriers to development of small-scale renewable energy projects are fourfold. First, rural entrepreneurs do not usually have the knowledge and expertise necessary to write business plans for projects that link renewable energy technologies with productive use of applications, to assess the rewards and risks of the project and estimate the costs to mitigate the associated risks. All of these are necessary inputs before a project is presented to a financier for investment. In addition, the negotiations with financiers may be complex, involving concepts and approaches that are not familiar to the entrepreneur. Second, the paperwork and soft costs associated with identifying and obtaining access to financing for small and medium-scale projects is high relative to the financing needs. Without critical first-stage financing, most of the entrepreneurs interested in developing renewable energy projects will not be able to take the time away from normal business operations to implement renewable energy projects. Third, many of the renewable energy technologies are still relatively new to the market, so the commercial chains, networks, marketing and financial links, and other institutional structures that service traditional energy technologies are not in place to assist the entrepreneur even if she/he has the skills, know-how and capital. Fourth, given the ‘newness’, there is a limited availability of investment capital to finance the high upfront costs associated with the initial stages of developing a renewable energy project.
36. Which of the following is/are the small change/s visible in a few rural areas in terms of usage of RETs?
(1) Biogas systems are being used.
(2) People now use solar powered lights.
(3) Agricultural operations are now carried out by pumping. of water through the use of solar energy.
(A) Only 2
(B) Only 1 and 3
(C) Only 3
(D) Only 1 and 2
(E) All 1, 2 and 3
Ans: (A)
37. Which of the following is/are the reason/s that the programmes implemented by IREDA and MNES have not yet succeeded in making RETs the major alternative source of energy ?
(1) Focus on employment generation.
(2) Emphasis on industrial use of renewable energy.
(3) Interest rate subsidies linking these to Government budgets and political cycles.
(A) Only 2
(B) Only 2 and 3
(C) Only 3
(D) Only 1 and 2
(E) All 1, 2 and 3
Ans: (C)
38. Which of the following is/are the problem/s faced by rural entrepreneurs in the development of small-scale renewable energy projects ?
(1) Lack of technical know-how to implement these projects.
(2) Lack of willingness amongst local for the implementation of such projects.
(3) Inability to deal with intricate details in interactions with financiers of renewable energy projects.
(A) Only 2
(B) Only 1 and 2
(C) Only 3
(D) Only 1 and 3
(E) All 1, 2 and 3
Ans: (C)
39. Which of the following is possibly the most appropriate title for the passage ?
(A) Programmes to Implement Renewable Energy Projects in Rural Areas.
(B) Rural Renewable Energy Projects - The Barries
(C) The Benefits of Alternative Sources of Energy
(D) The Government and Renewable Energy Projects
(E) Taking Forward Renewable Energy Projects in India
Ans: (A)
40. Which of the following is/are the characteristic/s of investment in RETs ?
(1) There are a number of investors willing to invest readily invest in these projects.
(2) These demand more investment of capital over the conventional energy projects.
(3) These involve lesser risk as compared to the conventional energy projects.
(A) Only 1 and 3
(B) Only 1 and 2
(C) Only 2
(D) Only 2 and 3
(E) All 1, 2 and 3
Ans: (C)
41. Why are renewable energy projects termed information-intensive ?
(1) The information on resources required by these projects is specific in terms of the location as well as the time period.
(2) Very little information about renewable energy is available for the implementation of these projects.
(3) Information needed by these projects is mostly confidential and requires a lot of paperwork in order to gain access.
(4) The information required by these projects is far greater than that required by any other project related to energy conservation.
(5) The information required by these projects is very vast and sometimes unrelated to the project at hand.
Ans: (D)
42. Which of the following is true in the context of the passage ?
(1) The renewable energy projects are independent of the government budget.
(2) Renewable energy projects require investments for a longer term than a conventional energy project.
(3) Securing finance for renewable energy projects involves a lot of paperwork.
(A) Only (2)
(B) Only 1 and 2
(C) Only 2 and 3
(D) Only 1
(E) All 1, 2 and 3
Ans: (B)
43. What, according to the passage, is a drawback of renewable energy projects ‘newness’ ?
(A) The unfamiliarity with the concept of renewable energy amongst the locals.
(B) The low risk factor involved in its implementation attracts entrepreneurs who fail to complete these projects in time.
(C) Too many investors willing to invest in these projects thereby creating confusion.
(D) The absence of well-established links for networking, marketing and financing.
(E) These require minimum paperwork thus there are few or no records of these projects being generated for future reference.
Ans: (D)
Directions—(Q. 44–47) Choose the word/group of words which is most similar in meaning to the word/group of words printed in bold as used in the passage.
44. OUTSET
(A) Start
(B) Periphery
(C) Boundary
(D) Culmination
(E) Stage
Ans: (A)
45. VIABILITY
(A) Technicality
(B) Rigidity
(C) Regularity
(D) Commodity
(E) Feasibility
Ans: (E)
46. CRITICAL
(A) Grave
(B) Vital
(C) Dangerous
(D) Final
(E) Severe
Ans: (B)
47. RECOGNIZED
(A) Predictable
(B) Standard
(C) Known
(D) Resembled
(E) Questioned
Ans: (C)
Directions—(Q. 48–50) Choose the word/group of words which is most opposite in meaning to the word/group of words printed in bold as used in the passage.
48. MITIGATE
(A) Aggravate
(B) Anger
(C) Moderate
(D) Alienate
(E) Alleviate
Ans: (E)
49. COMPLEX
(A) Plain
(B) Simple
(C) Undisturbed
(D) Compound
(E) Unilateral
Ans: (B)
50. LIMITED
(A) Boundless
(B) Released
(C) Freed
(D) Seamless
(E) Allowed
Ans: (A)
Thanks for sharing this useful information
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