Questions

Read the passage carefully and select the best answer to each question out of the given four alternatives.

The Amazon basin has been continuously inhabited for at least 10, 000 years, possibly more. Its earliest inhabitants were stone-age peoples, living in hundreds of far-flung tribes, some tiny, others numbering in the tens of thousands. It was from the west that Europeans explorers first arrived. In 1541 a Spanish expedition from Quito, led by Gonzalo Pizarro, ran short of supplies while exploring east of the Andes in what is today Peru. Pizarro’s cousin Francisco de Orellana offered to take 60 men along with the boats from the expedition and forage for supplies. De Orellana floated down the Rio Napo to its confluence with the Amazon, near Iquitos (Peru), and then to the mouth of the Amazon. Along the way his expedition suffered numerous attacks by Indians; some of the Indian warriors, they reported, were female, like the Amazons of Greek mythology, and thus the world’s greatest river got its name. No one made a serious effort to claim this sweaty territory, however, until the Portuguese built a fort near the mouth of the river at Belém in 1616, and sent Pedro Teixeira up the river to Quito and back between 1637 and 1639. During the 17th and 18th centuries, Portuguese bandeirantes (groups of roaming adventurers) penetrated ever further into the rain forest in pursuit of gold and Indian slaves, exploring as far as present-day Rondônia, and the Guaporé and Madeira river valleys. Amazonian Indians had long used the sap from rubber trees to make waterproof bags and other items. European explorers recognized the potential value of natural latex, but were unable to market it because it tended to grow soft in the heat, or brittle in the cold, and thus had limited appeal outside the rain forest. However, in 1842 American Charles Goodyear developed vulcanization (made natural rubber durable) and in 1890 Ireland’s John Dunlop patented pneumatic rubber tires. Soon there was an unquenchable demand for rubber in the recently industrialized USA and Europe, and the price of rubber on international markets soared. As profits skyrocketed, so did exploitation of the seringueiros, or rubber tappers, who were lured into the Amazon, mostly from the drought-stricken northeast, by the promise of prosperity only to be locked into a cruel system of virtual slavery dominated by seringalistas (owners of rubber-bearing forests). Rigged scales, hired guns, widespread illiteracy among the rubber tappers, and monopoly of sales and purchases all combined to perpetuate the workers’ debt and misery. In addition, seringueiros had to contend with jungle fevers, Indian attacks and all manner of deprivation.

Seringalistas refers to

In the following question, a sentence has been given in Active/Passive voice. Out of the four alternatives suggested, select the one which bestexpresses the same sentence in Passive/Active voice.
 

The movie critic wrote a sarcastic review.

In the following question, some part of the sentence may have errors. Find out which part of the sentence has an error and select the appropriate option. If a sentence is free from error, select 'No Error'.

Freedom fighters laboured (1)/ to the good of (2)/the poor enslaved masses.(3)/No Error (4)

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.

Targeting inflation comes from a belief that policy should be _________ and transparent, so that the private sector can factor this ___________ their decision-making. The question that this ________ is: are there more "complicated" policies which _________ better? I just note that one such policy is called "nominal income targeting". _____________ it is more complicated and the private sector is deemed to be intellectually challenged.

policy should be _________ and transparent,

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.

While language as the medium ___________ thought may be compared to air as the medium of the sun's influence, in other _____________ it is like the skin of the body; a scurvy skin shows bad blood within, and a scurvy language shows inaccurate thought ___________ a confused mind. And as a disease once fixed on the skin reacts and poisons the blood in turn as it has first been poisoned by the blood, so careless use of language __________ indulged reacts on the mind to make it permanently and increasingly _____________, illogical, and inaccurate in its thinking.

increasingly _____________, illogical, and

In the following question, a sentence has been given in Direct/Indirect speech . Out of the four alternatives suggested, select the one which best expresses the same sentence in Indirect/Direct speech.

The boss said, "Please give me the latest reports."

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.

To know ______ reality, the powers of the mind need to be turned back upon itself. With concentration, the mind can ______ its innermost secrets, just as the darkest places reveal their secrets to the penetrating rays of light. We can then ______ soul truths, whether life exists for five minutes or for ______, and whether there is a God. To go beyond the mind and our present reality, we need to use the mind itself as a tool. Patanjali, in his Hatha Yoga Pradipika, stated, “Yoga is the ______ of the modifications of the mind.”

To know ______ reality,

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.

Photography is the _____________ we can get to stopping time. The camera is our pause button, the cork we use to stop time from running out. And the photo album is the most potent time machine ever ____________, one that transports you to a curated past where everything exists ________ you choose to remember it,one that lets you revisit ________ just people and places and ages, but the hidden crannies of ________ own memory and the strange landscape of emotions that lies beyond.

Photography is the _____________ we can get to stopping time.