CAT 2000 VARC | Previous Year CAT Paper

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

Options 1 and 4 are important issues as can be deciphered from the following extract, “The current debate on TRIPs in India - as indeed elsewhere echoes wider concerns about ‘privatisation’ of research and allowing a free field for MNCs in the sphere of biotechnology and agriculture.”
Option 3 is an important issue mentioned in the first paragraph. The paragraph mentions the relative roles of the public and private sectors as one of the important issues being raised in the current debate on IPRs.
Option 2 is not an important issue in the context of the passage. The first paragraph mentions “... the strategy and policies for building a more dynamic national agricultural research system ...” and not ‘the strategy and policies for building an IPR regime for Indian agriculture’ as being one of these issues.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

Option 2 is vague and is therefore not the correct option. The passage mentions that breakthroughs in fundamental research on DNA is available to the public free of cost. The ‘beneficial effects’ of fundamental research on DNA have not been highlighted in the passage.
Options 3 and 4 do not answer the question stem as to why ‘deciphering the structure and functioning of DNA has become a public good’. The options ascribe the ‘public good’ to mean that DNA research should be restricted to public sector research institutions or that they should be made available to such institutions. This distorts the meaning of the word ‘public good’.
The passage mentions, “The deciphering of the structure and functioning of DNA forms the basis of much of modern biotechnology. But this fundamental breakthrough is a ‘public good’ freely accessible in the public domain and usable free of any charge.” This resonates with option 1.
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

Options 1 and 2 do not answer the question stem as to the respective roles of the public and private sectors in the national research system. The correct answer option should specify their respective roles.
Option 4 can be eliminated. As discussed by the author, especially in the fourth and fifth paragraphs, the author opines that knowledge repositories are for public use.  From paragraph 4: “Moreover, as is increasingly recognised, accumulated stock of knowledge does not reside only in the scientific community and its academic publications, but is also widely diffused in traditions and folk knowledge of local communities all over”.
The passage mentions, “The public sector must therefore continue to play a major role in the national research system. It is both wrong and misleading to pose the problem in terms of public sector versus private sector or of privatisation of research. We need to address problems likely to arise on account of the public-private sector complementarily, and ensure that the public research system performs efficiently.”
Option 3 mentions the complementary roles of public and private sector research which resonates with the above extract.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

Adverse consequences of biotechnology will mostly affect the end-user- the farmers. As the author puts in the second paragraph- “On the other hand, high-pressure advertising and aggressive sales campaigns by private companies can seduce farmers into accepting varieties without being aware of potential adverse effects and the possibility of disastrous consequences for their livelihood if these varieties happen to fail. There is no provision under the laws, as they now exist, for compensating users against such eventualities.” Therefore, if laws exist as mentioned in option 4, the users may benefit.
 The agribusiness MNCs have been lobbying for an IPR regime, so, they would be more interested in ‘marketing’ profitable products than highlighting adverse consequences. Therefore, options 1 and 2 can be ruled out.
Option 3 mentions patenting innovations but that has not been given as a solution or as providing an incentive to address the problem of potential consequences of biotechnology. Thus, we can do away with option 3.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

The following extract from the second paragraph mentions, “Moreover, corporations, driven by the profit motive, will necessarily tend to underplay, if not ignore, potential adverse consequences, especially those which are unknown and which may manifest themselves only over a relatively long period.” Therefore, option 2 is given in the paragraph and can be eliminated.
The following extract from the third paragraph mentions, “In our own experience, some of the early high yielding varieties (HYVs) of rice and wheat were found susceptible to widespread pest attacks; and some had problems of grain quality.” Option 3 can also be ruled out. Paragraph 2 also refers to the same problem.
The following extract from the second paragraph mentions, “high-pressure advertising and aggressive sales campaigns by private companies can seduce farmers into accepting varieties without being aware of potential adverse effects and the possibility of disastrous consequences for their livelihood if these varieties happen to fail. There is no provision under the laws, as they now exist, for compensating users against such eventualities.” Hence, there is a need for such provisions under the laws and they need to be addressed. Option 4 can be eliminated as well.
Option 1 is not a consequence since it mentions that ‘Development of newer and newer varieties will lead to increase in biodiversity’ while the passage states just the opposite, i.e. “The larger, longer-term consequences or reduced biodiversity that may follow from the use of specially bred varieties are also another cause for concern.”
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

Refer to the first paragraph. The agribusiness MNCs were lobbying for a worldwide IPR regime, therefore, they cannot be going against their own point and say that we need to address problem of adverse consequences of genetically engineered crops. Thus, option 1 can be eliminated.
 There is no reference to fulfilling a WTO requirement. Consequently, we can do away with option 2 as well.
On the same lines, option 4 too can be eliminated. There is no mention of ‘giving credibility to innovations’ especially in the field of pharmaceuticals in the agreement. To quote from the paragraph, “TRIPs, for the first time, seeks to bring innovations in agricultural technology under a new worldwide IPR regime.” The paragraph further says, “The argument was that incentives are necessary to stimulate innovations, and that this calls for a system of patents which gives innovators the sole right to use (or sell/lease the right to use) their innovations for a specified period and protects them against unauthorised copying or use.” That sums up what is given in option 3, intellectual property has to be protected from unauthorised copying and incentives are to be provided for that.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

The passage mentions, “Public research, which is not driven by profit, is better placed to take corrective action.” This makes option 1 correct.
The passage also mentions, “but whether they choose to do so depends crucially on the extent of the loss in market for their original introductions on account of the above factors and whether the companies are financially strong enough to absorb the ‘losses’, invest in research to correct the deficiencies and recover the lost market.” This makes option 2 correct as well.
The following extract, “Knowledge and techniques for resource management are not ‘marketable’ in the same way as those inputs. Their application to land, water and forests has a long gestation and their efficacy depends on resolving difficult problems such as designing institutions for proper and equitable management of common pool resources. Public or quasi-public research institutions informed by broader, long-term concerns can only do such work.” This makes option 3 correct as well.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

It is clear from the passage that the instead of the private, public institutions are better placed in terms of research. The following extract, “Knowledge and techniques for resource management are not ‘marketable’ in the same way as those inputs. Their application to land, water and forests has a long gestation and their efficacy depends on resolving difficult problems such as designing institutions for proper and equitable management of common pool resources. Public or quasi-public research institutions informed by broader, long-term concerns can only do such work. The public sector must therefore continue to play a major role in the national research system.”
Option 1 although correct and important is not as significant as what option 2 says.
Option 3 is not correct, the passage nowhere implies that private companies are incapable of building products based on traditional or folk knowledge.
Option 4 has not been explicitly stated in this context.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

Paragraphs 1 and 2 throw light on this matter. In paragraph 1, it is stated how abstractionism has failed to engage creatively with the radical change in human experience in recent decades. That eliminates option 1.
In the same paragraph, the author further says, “It has, seemingly, been unwilling to re-invent itself in relation to the systems of artistic expression and viewers' expectations that have developed under the impact of the mass media.” Since it has not re-invented, it hasn’t considered the developments in recent artistic expressions. Therefore, we can do away with option 2.
The sentence also helps us to eliminate option 4, as it also says that viewers expectations have not been met or responded to.
The passage mentions “Like all revolutions, whether in politics or in art, abstractionism must now confront its moment of truth: having begun life as a new and radical pictorial approach to experience, it has become an entrenched orthodoxy itself.” This implies that abstractionism has taken the same path as politics and art and not a different one as stated in option 3.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

Refer to the last paragraph.  It says that Abtractionism is not a universal language and hence it can be deduced that it cannot be understood by most members of society. This eliminates option 1.
The paragraph highlights what has been said in option 2. According to the passage - “Abstractionism is not a universal language; it is an art that points up the loss of a shared language of signs in society. And yet, it affirms the possibility of its recovery through the effort of awareness.”
Options 3 and 4 have not been mentioned in this context. It is one of the characteristics of the work of some abstractionists that they invoke a wistful, delicate beauty. This is not the role of abstractionism. Although abstractionism began through the dialectic between two motives, one revolutionary and the other conservative, its role is not to highlight these two contradictory trends.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

In the second paragraph it is mentioned that most abstractionists have not “... improvised any solutions beyond the ones that were exhausted by the 1970s ....” Thus, option 1 characterises the crises being faced by abstractionism.
The same paragraph mentions that abstractionism “... has become an entrenched orthodoxy itself.” Thus, option 2 also describes this crisis.
In the first paragraph it is suggested that the systems of artistic expressions have developed under the impact of the mass media, but that abstractionism has not availed of these systems. Thus, option 3 also elaborates on this crisis.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

Option 1 is incorrect because it refers to art in general, not abstractionism in particular.
Option 3 has not been mentioned in the passage nor can it be implied.
Option 4, while true in itself was not ‘revolutionary’ for abstractionism.
The passage mentions, “It led art towards the exploration of the subconscious mind, the spiritual quest and the possible expansion of consciousness. Indian painting entered, into a phase of self-inquiry, a meditative inner space where cosmic symbols and non-representational images ruled.”
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

The passage mentions, “At the same time, Indian abstractionists have rarely committed themselves wholeheartedly to a non-representational idiom. They have been preoccupied with the fundamentally metaphysical project of aspiring to the mystical-holy without altogether renouncing the symbolic. This has been sustained by a hereditary reluctance to give up the murti, the inviolable iconic form, which explains why abstractionism is marked by the conservative tendency to operate with images from the sacred repertoire of the past.” Options 2,3 and 4 are contained in this extract.
Option 1 is associated with the revolutionary motive, An exploration of the subconscious mind is part of the revolutionary trend mentioned in paragraph 3 and therefore is not a part of the conservative trend.
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

In the fifth paragraph, the author mentions the first idiom to be a contemplation of the decay and regeneration cycle. Therefore, option 1 can be eliminated.
All three idioms have limited reliance on original models as mentioned in option 4 and may use non-representational images as mentioned in option 2.  Therefore, options 2 and 4 can also be eliminated.
But, only the third idiom as the author puts it, is “based on the lyric play of forms guided by gesture or allied with formal improvisations like the assemblage”. Thereby, there is an emphasis on arrangement of forms.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

Option 2, while correct does not answer the question stem.
Option 3 is incorrect because the passage does not mention the ‘The easy identification of obvious points of affinity with European and American abstract art’, merely that Indian abstractionists were attracted to only one school in this category namely the Kandinsky-Klee school.
Option 4 is incorrect because the double edged nature of abstractionism does not refer to ‘identification with mystically-oriented schools’.
The fourth paragraph mentions that the Indian abstractionists are said to have aspired to the mystical-holy without altogether renouncing the symbolic. It was this that led them to be attracted to the ‘more mystically oriented of the major sources of abstractionist philosophy and practice’, such as the Kandinsky-Klee school.
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

Option 1 describes the third idiom of abstractionism. Option 1 could be a consequence of stalling of abstractionism’s progress in an impasse, but it is not a reason and hence it can be eliminated.
Option 2 does not answer the question stem.
Option 3 is a tempting answer but it is incorrect. There have been a series of attempts to avoid the risk of abstraction by resorting to open and near generic symbolism and not avoiding overt and near-generic symbolism. Thus, option 3 can be ruled out. If option 3 was true it would not have led to the impasse in abstractionism.
The following extract, “Uncharitable as it may sound, the history of Indian abstractionism records a series of attempts to avoid the risks of abstraction by resorting to an overt and near-generic symbolism, which many Indian abstractionists embrace when they find themselves bereft of the imaginative energy to negotiate the union of metaphysics and painterliness” resonates with option 4.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

Option 1 is incorrect because volatile and non-volatile memories refer to electronic and magnetic storage technologies respectively.
Option 3 is irrelevant and does not answer the question stem about the two alternative research paths being pursued.
Option 4 mentions the process of magneto-resistance and the functioning of a magnetic microprocessor, but it too does not answer the question stem.
The third paragraph mentions magneto-resistance while the fifth paragraph mentions the approach based on magnetic tunnel-junctions; two alternative research paths in developing magnetic memory chips. This resonates with option 2.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

Option 1 refers to magnetic tunnel-junctions.
Option 2, a capacitor refers to a conventional memory chip.
Option 4 is incorrect because a matrix of wires do not represent a binary digit. They are merely used for transmitting pulses and for magnetisation to take place.
The following extract, “In the NRL’s magnetic design, by contrast, each bit is stored in a magnetic element in the form of a vertical pillar of magnetisable material” makes option 3 the correct answer option.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

Options 3 and 4 are incorrect because aluminium oxide acts merely as a barrier or insulator. It is not polarised. Only magnetic material can be polarised.
The passage mentions, “It turns out that such tunnelling is easier when the two magnetic layers are polarised in the same direction than when they are polarised in opposite directions”. This makes option 2 incorrect.
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

Option 1, while partly true in itself is incomplete. Magnetic memory elements will have to become “sensitive enough to respond when the appropriate wires in the control matrix are switched on” but not so sensitive that “they respond when a neighbouring element is changed”.
Option 2, the thickness of aluminium oxide barriers is not a barrier since a working prototype has already been developed consisting “of a sandwich of two layers of magnetisable material separated by a barrier of aluminium oxide just four or five atoms thick”.
The passage mentions, “... magnetic memory elements will have to become far smaller and more reliable than current prototypes if they are to compete with electronic memory.”
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

Option 1 is incorrect since it refers to the magneto-resistance method.
Option 2 does not answer the question stem since it mentions a characteristic of a magnetic memory’s elements.
Option 3 , while true in itself does not answer the question stem of whether the topmost layer of the magnetised memory element is storing a zero or a one.
The passage mentions, “... by measuring the current that flows through the sandwich, it is possible to determine the alignment of the topmost layer, and hence, whether it is storing a zero or a one.”
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

The passage mentions, “In a paper published last month in Science, Russell Cowburn and Mark Welland at Cambridge University outlined research that could form the basis of a magnetic microprocessor- a chip capable of manipulating (rather than merely storing) information magnetically.” None of these researches have been mentioned in the options.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

The passage mentions, “In place of conducting wires, a magnetic processor would have rows of magnetic dots, each of which could be polarised in one of two directions. Individual bits of information would travel down the rows as magnetic pulses, changing the orientation of the dots as they went. Dr. Cowburn and Dr. Welland have demonstrated how a logic gate (the basic element of a microprocessor) could work in such a scheme.” Thus, options 1,3 and 4 are eliminated.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

Option 2 can be inferred from, “In a modern computer, electronic and magnetic storage technologies play complementary roles.”
The passage mentions, “Most attention in the field is focused on an alternative approach based on magnetic tunnel-junctions (MTJs), which are being investigated by researchers at chip makers such as IBM, Motorola, Siemens and Hewlett-Packard.” This extract combined with “the general consensus is that MTJs are the more promising ideas.” Hence, option (c) can be inferred.
Option 4 can be inferred from, “The NRL researchers plan to commercialise their device through a company called Non-Volatile Electronics.”
The passage mentions, “Electronic memory chips are fast but volatile ...". Therefore option 1 is clearly false and cannot be inferred.
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

Options 1,2 and 4 are inappropriate answers because they assume that the innovation of bereavement counselling has already failed and had negative consequences. However, the author merely predicts that it will fail and have such adverse consequences.
The author, in the passage mentions about various new tools that were invented for agriculture at different periods, every time he describes the invention of a new tool he mentions that the old tool became useless and that led to the invention of the new tool. In the passage he mentions that the iron plow became useless to farm the prairie soil, thus the new plow made of steel was invented. Thus it is a continuous series of inventions. Since all the previous innovations have ‘failed’, the author predicts that the latest innovation, “bereavement counselling” is an innovation that like its predecessors will meet with the same fate.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

Options 1 and 3 describe the new techniques of bereavement counselling, not the traditional method.
Option 4 is not mentioned in the passage.
The passage mentions, “In these final days, the farmers and the townspeople mourn at the death of a mother, brother, son or friend. The bereaved is joined by neighbours and kin. They meet grief together in lamentation, prayer and song. They call upon the words of the clergy and surround themselves in community.” This resonates with option 2.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

Options 1 and 4 have not been mentioned nor can they be implied from the passage.
Option 2 does not answer the question stem, that of bereavement counsellor finding the deserts even in herself, i.e. experiencing failure.
The passage mentions, “And finally, even the bereavement counsellor will see the impossibility of restoring hope in clients once they are genuinely alone with nothing but a service for consolation. In the inevitable failure of the service the bereavement counsellor will find the deserts even in herself.” She will fail to provide bereavement because of the absence of the usual social circuit required. Therefore, she eventually fails in her service and finds deserts in herself.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

Option 1 and 3 are incorrect since the bereavement is neither a kin nor a friend of the bereaved but a formally trained person helping the bereaved handle grief.
Option 2 is irrelevant since the community has not asked for ‘a right to treatment’ anywhere in the passage.
The passage mentions, “‘bereavement counselling’ as an innovative technique which was formed at the great state university to meet the needs of those experiencing the death of a loved one. The counsellor calls the invention a service displaying a diploma and certificate. It is also mentioned that the local clergy will seek technical assistance from her and the people have learned that only the bereavement counsellor knows how to process grief the proper way”. These points highlight that the bereavement counsellor is a formally trained person helping the bereaved, handle grief.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

Option 2 is incorrect because the prairie was not a desert in the true sense of the term.
Options 3 and 4 contradict the passage.
The passage mentions, “When they finally reached the western edge of the place we now call Indiana the forest stopped and ahead lay a thousand miles of the great grass prairie. The Europeans were puzzled by this new environment.” The key words here are ‘new environment’. They were not necessarily shocked by the contrast. The new environment consisted of a thousand miles of the grass prairie covered with centuries of tangled and matted grasses that seemed untillable.
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

Option 1 is correct because of the following extract, “They ignored the traditional ways of the Sauk Indians and used their sod-busting tool for planting wheat. Initially, the soil was generous and the farmers thrived. However, each year the soil lost more of its nurturing power. It was only thirty years after the Europeans arrived with their new technology that the land was depleted. Wheat farming became uneconomic and tens of thousands of farmers left Wisconsin seeking new land with sod to bust. It took the Europeans and their new technology just one generation to make their homeland into a desert.”
Option 2 can be deciphered from the following extract, “The Sauk Indians who knew how to sustain themselves on the Sauk prairie land were banished to another kind of desert called a reservation.”
The following extract, “It will be only one generation between the bereavement counsellor arrives and the community of mourners disappears. The counsellor’s new tool will cut through the social fabric, throwing aside kinship, care, neighbourly obligations and community ways of coming together and going on. Like John Deere’s plow, the tools of bereavement counselling will create a desert where a community once flourished” establishes option 3 also to be correct.
Therefore all the 3 options are correct.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

Option 2 is incorrect and cannot be implied from the passage.
Option 3 is incorrect since it is not mentioned in the passage.
Option 4 is merely an opinion which is not substantiated by the passage.
The passage mentions, “Several people will begin to use the bereavement counsellor because, since the County Board now taxes them to insure access to the technology, they will feel that to fail to be counselled is to waste their money, and to be denied a benefit, or even a right.”
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

Option 1 is mentioned in the passage, “These third and fourth generation farmers and townspeople do not realise, however, that a new settler is coming soon with an invention as powerful as John Deere’s plow.”
Option 3 can be gleaned from the following extract, “It will be only one generation between the bereavement counsellor arrives and the community of mourners disappears. The counsellor’s new tool will cut through the social fabric, throwing aside kinship, care, neighbourly obligations and community ways of coming together and going on. Like John Deere’s plow, the tools of bereavement counselling will create a desert where a community once flourished.”
Option 4 can be validated since the passage mentions John Deere to be from Illinois and the bereavement counsellor to be from the great state university. Therefore both are tools introduced by outsiders into Sauk County, Wisconsin.
Option 2, ‘migration of the communities,’ has not been mentioned by the author in both the cases of the introduction of the steel plow and bereavement counselling.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

Option 1 is incomplete, in that the passage does not mention that the creative output of a genius is always written down and recorded.
Option 2 does not answer the question stem.
Option 4, while true does not answer the question stem.
The following extract, “...the notion of property remains at the heart of the Western conception of ‘genius’, which derives from the Latin gignere or ‘to beget’” conclusively decides the answer option in favour of option 3.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

Refer to the first paragraph where it is given, “…the incarnation of raga and tala as bandish or composition, are passed thus, between guru and shishya by word of mouth and direct demonstration, with no printed sheet of notated music, as it were, acting as a go-between. Saussure’s conception of language as a communication between addresser and addressee is given, in this model, a further instance…” It is in the perspective of word of mouth transmission as mentioned in option 1 that the author speaks of Saussure’s conception.
Options 2, 3 and 4 have been discussed further down the passage and not in this context.
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

Options 1,2 and 3, while true in themselves do not address the question stem as convincingly as option 4. The passage mentions, “... the tape recorder serves as a handy technological slave and preserves, from oblivion, the vanishing, elusive moment of oral transmission.” This resonates perfectly with option 4.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

Option 1 is not the correct answer option as we do not possess enough data to determine whether the efficacy of the guru-shishya system is almost unique.
Option 2 is irrelevant as the earning capacity of North Indian music has not been touched upon at all in the passage.
Option 4 is incorrect because we do not have enough data from the passage to determine whether ‘the ability of an illiterate person to narrate grand and intricate musical compositions’ is almost unique or not.
The passage mentions, “And the oral transmission of North Indian classical music remains, almost uniquely, a testament to the fact that the human brain can absorb, remember and reproduce structures of great complexity and sophistication without the help of the hieroglyph or written mark or a system of notation.”
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

Options 2,3 and 4 do not answer the question stem which is to determine whether the raga remains greater than the artiste who invokes it.
The passage mentions, “...to an aesthetic that privileges the evanescent moment of performance and invocation over the controlling authority of genius and the permanent record. It is a tradition, thus, that would appear to value the performer, as medium, more highly than the composer who presumes to originate what, effectively, cannot be originated in a single person-because the raga is the inheritance of a culture.”
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

Option 1 can be inferred from , “However far the printed sheet of notated music might travel thus from the composer, it still remains his property.”
Option 3 can be inferred from “A piece of music in the Western tradition, at least in its most characteristic and popular conception, originates in its composer, and the connection between the two, between composer and the piece of music, is relatively unambiguous...”.
Option 4 can be inferred from “The genius in Western classical music is, then, the originator, begetter and owner of his work-the printed, notated sheet testifying to his authority over his product and his power, not only of expression or imagination, but of origination”.
The passage mentions, “The conductor is a custodian and guardian of this property.” This implies that the conductor cannot change or modify the music since he is only a custodian or guardian of this property.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

Options 1,2 and 3 cannot be verified to be true from the passage. The passage contains no data for any one of them to be valid.
The passage mentions, “Of course, attempts have been made, throughout the 20th century, to formally codify and even notate this music, and institutions set up and degrees created, specifically to educate students in this “scientific” and codified manner. Paradoxically, however, this style of teaching has produced no noteworthy student or performer; the most creative musicians still emerge from the guru-shishya relationship, their understanding of music developed by oral communication.”
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

Option 1 cannot be the correct answer option because the passage is silent on the structural differences between Western and North Indian classical music.
Options 3 and 4, while true in themselves touch upon peripheral issues of the passage.
The passage mentions that in North Indian classical music the ‘raga’ is unconfined to a single composer or performer, it is greater than the artiste who invokes it whereas in Western classical music, the originator or the genius remains the father of his work, it is his intellectual property. This is the crux of the passage and the last paragraph is an inference derived from this fact.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

The second blank is clearly ‘decide’ because South Koreans cannot ‘clarify’ or ‘understand’ what to make of their North Korean cousins. This eliminates options 2 and 4.
Between ‘reconcile’ in option 1 and ‘make out’ in option 3, reconcile is a better word since the images are conflicting. Reconcile would mean coming to terms with these conflicting images.
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

Though each of the options have a first word that means increasing, ‘spiralling’ goes best with prices. In the context of the main statement which is negative the crime rate can only be on the rise. ‘Soaring’ goes best with crime rates. ‘Booming’ has a positive connotation which is inappropriate in this negative context.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

For the second blank ‘theme’ goes best with “recurrent”. The theme has been explained in the first part of the statement which mentions the “nouveau riche”. This eliminates options 1 and 2.
“The manners and ...” indicate a word similar to manners, certainly no contrasting word to ‘manners’ would fit the first blank. ‘Morals’ goes better with ‘manners’ rather than ‘wealth’. In any case the word “nouveau riche” is present in the statement which signifies wealth.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

The first statement is B since it introduces the topic of the paragraph, the Spartans. This eliminates options 2 and 4.
The E-C link is clear. Statement E mentions the situation at the time of birth and C mentions the young boys being taken away for military training at the age of seven. This eliminates option 3.
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

There is a clear C-D-A link. C mentions a ‘great many images’, D mentions when this started (in 1839) and A expands upon it with ‘this very insatiability’. This eliminates options 1and 2.
B would make for a better introductory statement rather than E since it introduces the topic, while E would make for an effective concluding statement. This eliminates option 4.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

Statement A has to be the introductory statement since it introduces the subject of the paragraph, viz. cultural literacy. This eliminates options 2 and 4.
There is a clear C-B link with the word ‘confined’ in both describing culture as not being confined to the arts in C and neither it being confined to one social class in B.
C will follow E since E mentions the breadth of knowledge required to be culturally literate and C mentions that this knowledge is not confined only to the arts as commonly misunderstood. This eliminates option 3.
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

Statement C is the introductory statement since it introduces the topic of the paragraph, the social cost of theft both for the thief and the potential victim. This eliminates options 1 and 3.
There is a clear C-A link since C mentions the social cost of theft for the thief and the potential victim and A mentions the type of costs incurred by these two ‘parties’. This eliminates option 4.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

Statement D is the introductory statement since it introduces a broad topic. All the other statements are specific in nature. This eliminates options 1 and 2.
There is a clear D-B link. D mentions a strategic problem while statement B mentions one such problem under the gambit of the broad strategic problem mentioned in D.
The B-A link is obvious since both the statements mention motorist and pedestrian and the likelihood of an accident.
Statement C concludes and makes an inference about the subject being described in statements B and A. This eliminates option 3.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

The words “Though” and “also” indicate two contrasting ideas are required. Options 1 and 3 do not express this contrast. The word ‘present’ in both of them for the first blank does not express a contrasting idea for the second blank which is something to do with ‘contemporary’. They both mean the same.
Option 4 has market and popular which do not convey two contrasting ideas.
Only option 2 has this pair, viz is ‘future’ and ‘popular’ which links well with “contemporary”.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

The second blank is only appropriate for ‘poor’ to retain the logical sense of the statement. This eliminates options 1 and 3.
The roaring business is clearly for ‘middlemen’ or ‘touts’. ‘Middlemen’ is not available with ‘poor’ while ‘touts’ is in option 4.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

There is a clear 1-B link. Statement 1 mentions ‘changing colours of a film of oil on water’ while B mentions that the key to that is the light is bouncing off two different surfaces, that of oil and the water layer below it. This eliminates options 1 and 4.
There is a clear B-A link because A continues on the theme of the different surfaces. This eliminates option 3.
The ‘then’ in D indicates that the statement will come after statement A. Statement C is the last statement, as it introduces the part about ‘colours’ which is explained in statement 6. Therefore, the logical sequence is BACD.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

Statement 1 mentions darkened sheds for commercially reared chicken while B mentions its effects, that in ‘low light conditions’ they behave less belligerently. This eliminates options 1,2 and 3.
There is a clear D-C link, the common theme being the ‘enriched environment’ in C which links to the wood shavings in their pens in statement D.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

There is a clear 1-D link since statement 1 mentions the ‘nation state’ having an assumption which statement D debunks as ‘fiction’. This eliminates options 2 and 3.
The D-B link is also clear since B goes on to explain what the fiction in statement D is, i.e. many people living in nation states are not considered to be or do not consider themselves to be members of this ‘hegemonic nation’.
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

There is a 1-C link as statement 1 mentions the fact that research fraud is harshly punished while statement C expands on that subject as to what the punishments are- funding cut off, careers effectively ended. This eliminates options 1 and 2.
There is a C-A link since statement A starts with ‘but’ and expresses a contrasting idea, that in the field of humanities there is no such mechanism of harsh punishment. This eliminates option 4.
Statement B will logically follow A since in both, the subject under discussion is the humanities.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

Statement 1 mentions the ‘poor match’ between horses and communism and statement A explains this ‘poor match’, i.e. the communist party ‘despises’ the ‘nobility’ that horses symbolize. Thus, the 1-A link is clear. This eliminates options 2 and 4.
The D-6 link is obvious, the common theme being the pride that people in that region take in their horses.
This eliminates option 1.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

The report indicates that most children between ages 6 and 10 are enrolled in classes. This has been shown as a high gross enrolment ratio. The author believes this ratio is exaggerated.
Option 1 is tricky. If children above 10 years and below 6 years are not excluded (or rather have been erroneously or otherwise been included), then the number of children counted increases. If that higher number is in the numerator, the ratio becomes higher and it will support the author’s observation that the numbers are inflated. However it is not clear from the data given as to the percentage this constitutes in the inflated number. It may be small or big. It is not clear.
Option 2 states that many children enrolled are not attending classes regularly (are very irregular), but it still means that they are enrolled!
Option 4 is unrelated- even if the number of children in the age group 6-10 is declining there is no mention of what percentage of those are enrolled in classes. Therefore, both options 2 and 4 can be eliminated.
Option 3 is our best bet. It states that 22 percent of enrolled children in class one are below six years of age – that means that the data used to calculate the gross enrolment ratio is erroneous, straight and clear because the data is meant only for children aged between 6 and 10. Option 3 scores over option 1 because it is explicit and precise.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

Szymanski’s suggestion that racism exists in football even today is underlined in all four findings. The author explains about the existence of racism in football clubs by citing the selection of players, their salaries and the final outcome of matches (whether teams win or lose).
Option 4 gives an example that discrimination exists (black players getting lower wage bills than white players) which is not exactly the point.
Similarly, clubs taking advantage of the situation (option 1) is not something Szymanski is immediately concerned with.
Between options 2 and 3, option 2 is better. While option 3 highlights a generic ‘clubs with a history of discrimination’, option 2 is crisp and clear – white players with higher wages still did not perform proportionately well – something which has been explicitly supported in the passage.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

Option 1 could be a likely answer if opinion polls decide the fate of the minister in the next election. But, we do not have enough information to support that.
In option 2- whether the opposition helps or not is a secondary matter. That is not the underlying cause for the minister recommending to the government an amnesty policy. Option 3 can influence the recommendation. But the most logical one is option 4. The author says, ‘the minister in charge of prison fears that tensions may snap’ and that fear could have stemmed from the disturbances reported from 58 prisons.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

Option 4 can strengthen the author’s contention instead of weakening it. The same government with a not-so-good earlier track record seems unlikely to implement it this time as well.
Option 1 is also a proposal, there is no clue on how that will be implemented.
The action lies in options 2 and 3. option 2 states that distribution outlets have opened but option 3 remains the most appropriate one. If many small-scale and joint-sector units have completed trails, it means, the action has started happening and the chances of the implementation are high.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

Options 3 and 4 cannot be substantiated. We need more data to prove these (whether deaf moths are faster or whether the wings can receive and sense pulses!).
Option 1 can be inferred but the ‘but’ in the paragraph is decisive. 96 percent of moths have ears which can listen to pulses emitted by bats whereas the rest 4 percent have higher maneuverability. That means the latter can make frequent changes in their flight direction as mentioned in option 2. It follows therefore, that this characteristic may help them in avoiding bats to a certain extent. 
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option A

Explanation :

If consumer preferences have changed, there is little that a campaign can do to make the earlier product survive. Therefore, option 1 is something that would contribute to less consumption of beef.
Option 2 would affect local packers and processors to a certain extent by making the processed products dependent on imported beef expensive.
If beef production, as mentioned in option 3 is affected, it can again contribute to the failure of the campaign.
Option 4 has little to do with our campaign.
Out of options 1, 2 and 3, option 1 is the strongest reason as consumer demand affects the product’s sales the most.
Hence, the correct answer is option 1.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

Option 1 talks about the rise in the number of cars by purchasing second cars in the 1980s.
Many more cars were added as certain families without a car previously became first time car owners in the mid-1990s as mentioned in option 2.
Further on, post-1993, many people exchanged their 15 year old cars with ‘clean (with catalytic converters)’ cars from open market instead of getting their old cars destroyed, again adding to number of cars in Athens (option 3).
Therefore, all three options support that the measures taken, (cars with odd-even number plate driving on alternate days, destroying old cars etc) did not succeed.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option B

Explanation :

If the role of the Central bank has turned out to be subordinate and advisory in nature, it is unlikely that a decision by its chairman can send shock waves anywhere. Therefore, option 1 is not in line with what is presented in the paragraph.
Option 4 talks about the inability of the government and is unrelated to the argument in hand. Therefore, it can be eliminated.
Option 3 points at an autonomous decision making ability of central bank which is related to monetary policy. This is against what the paragraph says. The author says that it does not have even limited sense of freedom in its right to pursue monetary policy. It needs to coordinate with the central government. Therefore, we can rule out option 3 as well. Option 2 gives an example of how government overruled reservations of Central Bank by resorting to monetization of the debt which shows that the government has an upper hand and that Central Bank has limited freedom to go against it.  That conforms to what the paragraph has put forth.
Hence, the correct answer is option 2.

Answer: Option D

Explanation :

A summary has to outline the important points of a passage. The main points are the umbrella, and not necessarily a white umbrella, symbolizing the common basis of non-theocratic nature of states in India and its range of use.
Option 1 does not underline the significance of placing an umbrella over the ruler’s head and hence is ruled out.
As pointed out earlier, the author starts the discussion with the white umbrella but goes not to generalize for any coloured umbrella over a ruler’s head. Therefore, we can eliminate option 2.
Between options 3 and 4, option 4 is more complete and it also speaks about the ‘varied’ use.
Hence, the correct answer is option 4.

Answer: Option C

Explanation :

From the author’s viewpoint, a game involves strategy and while choosing what action to be taken, a player tries to guess how his/her opponent will react. Also, a game is decisive, one wins while other or others lose. The option which embodies this theme is option 3. A decisive war will have one winner. Plus, fighting a war involves strategy. It is important to be able to have an idea of the enemy’s next move.
Options 1, 2 and 4 have more of fighting against chance or autocracy.
In option 1, Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary have to have some strategy to be able to climb Everest but they are pitted against chance or extreme climate conditions on a huge mountain.
A national level essay competition, as mentioned in option 2 may have several winners. Option 4 is little about strategy, it is a union’s imposition on a larger group.
Hence, the correct answer is option 3.