Questions

Read the passage carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four alternatives and click the button corresponding to it.

Ants have been living on the earth for more than 100 million years and can be found almost anywhere on the planet. It is estimated that there are about 20000 different species of ants. For this reason ants have been called Earth's most successful species. If you watch ants for any length of time you will see that they really do communicate with each other and very effectively too. Ants communicate by touching each other with their antennae. Ants also use chemicals called pheromones to leave scent trails for other ants to follow. Ants build many different types of homes. Many ants build simple little mounds out of dirt or sand. Other ants use small sticks mixed with dirt and sand to make a stronger mound that offers protection from rain. Western Harvester ants make a small mound on top, but then tunnels up to 15 feet straight down to hibernate during winter. Ant mounds consist of many chambers connected by tunnels. Different chambers are used for nurseries, food storage, and resting places for the worker ants. Some ants live in wood like termites. Army ants don't make a home at all but travel in a large groups searching for food. Ants are social insects which means they live in large colonies or groups. Some colonies consist of millions of ants. There are three types of ants in each species, the queen, the sterile female workers and males. The male ants only serve one purpose, to mate with future queen ants and do not live very long. The queen grows to adulthood, mates, and then spends rest of her life laying eggs. A colony may have only one queen, or there may be many queens depending on the species. Ants go through four stages of development: egg, larva, pupa and adult.

What kind of homes do the army of ants build ?

In the following question, out of the four alternatives, select the alternative which will improve the bracketed part of the sentence. In case no improvement is needed, select "no improvement".

They loaded their ships with spices and silks and (returns) with the summer monsoon.

In the following question the 1st and the last part of the sentence/passage are numbered 1 and 6. The rest of the sentence/ passage is split into four parts and named P, Q, R and S. These four parts are not given in their proper order. Read the sentence/passage and find out which of the four combinations is correct

1. Suddenly the man heard the low hum of an engine.
P. Instead, it grew louder and louder and seemed to be coming from above.
Q. At first he thought that it must be a car travelling along the road he had recently left.
R. He looked up quickly and saw an aeroplane cutting a crazy, zigzag path across the sky.
S. He expected the noise to fade away in the distance.
6. It disappeared for an instant behind some clouds, then emerged and plunged into the field.

In the following question the 1st and the last part of the sentence/passage are numbered 1 and 6. The rest of the sentence/ passage is split into four parts and named P, Q, R and S. These four parts are not given in their proper order. Read the sentence/passage and find out which of the four combinations is correct.

1. The biggest villain in Deadwood has always been one thing: Fire.

P. In less than an hour the flames were leaping through the tree-tops.

Q. In our own times, a great fire threatened the town yet again.

R. The wind roared through the forest carrying the flames almost to the edge of town.

S. It all began when some waste-paper caught fire at the foot of the valley.

6. Fire-brigades arrived from all parts of the country to save Deadwood.

In the following passage, some of the words have been left out. Read the passage carefully and select the correct answer for the given blank out of the four alternatives.

A saint or a satyagrahi is often put on a ___________, freezing her acts of goodness in time. Goodness acquires an act of fixed quality __________ in amber. Rather than _____________ a living creature, a saint or an icon becomes a hoarding, a permanent spectacle or a redundant quotation. Saintliness or heroism becomes a bundle of pictures in a calendar, a statue __________ inflexibly. Goodness becomes a stencil fixed _________ time.

Goodness becomes a stencil fixed _________ time.

In the following question, out of the four alternatives, select the alternative which best expresses the meaning of the idiom/phrase.

The ball is in your court

In the following questions, one part of the sentence may have an error. Find out which part of the sentence has an error and click the button corresponding to it. If the sentence is free from error, click the “No error” option.

Neither the Captain (A) / nor his men are (B) / afraid of fighting (C) / No Error (D)

A sentence/a part of the sentence is underlined. Four alternatives are given to the underlined part which will improve the sentence. Choose the correct alternative and click the button corresponding to it. In case no improvement is needed, click the button corresponding to "No improvement".

The rays of the sun that is setting glimmer like golden threads.