DAY – 62 (InstaTest-62): Insta 75 Days Revision Plan-2022: Topic – ART & CULTURE, PREVIOUS YEAR UPSC PAPER 2010, December 2021 CA

Solution: B

Brihaspati laid the foundation stone for Charvaka School of Philosophy and it was supposed to be one of the earliest schools that developed a philosophical theory.

The word ‘Lokayata’ also meant a keen attachment to the physical and material world (loka). They argued for a complete disregard of any world beyond this world that was inhabited by a person.

Some of their main teachings are:

They argued against Gods and their representatives on the earth – the priestly class. They argued that a Brahman manufactures false rituals so as to acquire gifts (dakshina) from the followers.

Man is the centre of all activities and he should enjoy himself as long as he lives. He should consume all earthly goods and indulge in sensual pleasure.

Solution: D

The finest examples of painting belonging to the first half of the 16^th century are, represented by a group of miniatures generally designated as the “Kulhadar Group”. This group includes illustrations of the ‘Chaurapanchasika’ – “Fifty Verses of the Thief by Bilhan, the Gita Govinda, the Bhagavata Purana and Ragamala.

Solution: D

In the constitution, Hindi was declared as an official language and not a national language. Under Article 343, official language of the Union has been prescribed, which includes Hindi in Devanagari script and English.

The Constitution does not specify the official language to be used by the States for the conduct of official function. States are free to adopt it. The language to be adopted by the States need not be one of those listed in the Eighth Schedule.

The Eighth Schedule to the Constitution consists of the following 22 languages:- (1) Assamese, (2) Bengali, (3) Gujarati, (4) Hindi, (5) Kannada, (6) Kashmiri, (7) Konkani, (8) Malayalam, (9) Manipuri, (10) Marathi, (11) Nepali, (12) Oriya, (13) Punjabi, (14) Sanskrit, (15) Sindhi, (16) Tamil, (17) Telugu, (18) Urdu (19) Bodo, (20) Santhali, (21) Maithili and (22) Dogri. Of these languages, 14 were initially included in the Constitution. Sindhi language was added in 1967. Thereafter three more languages viz., Konkani, Manipuri and Nepali were included in 1992. Subsequently Bodo, Dogri, Maithili and Santhali were added in 2004.

Solution: C

Originated around 300 years ago, Kuruvanji is characterised by classical Tamil poetry and songs.

The first Kuruvanji was composed by Thirukutarajappa Kaviyar. The basic theme revolves around a love-struck heroine. Kuruvanji literally means ‘fortune-teller’ who predicts the fate of the heroine. Kuruvanji is performed in a dance ballet form with Bharatnatyam being the principal dance form in Tamil Nadu.

Naqal or Bhand

It is mimicry based performance, based in Punjab and adjoining areas. The performing artist is often called ‘Behroopiya’ or ‘Naqalchi’ (impersonator). He uses comedy, absurdities, wit and humour to get across the social or political message. It is performed by two artists.

Solution: A

The play, Mudrarakshasa by Vishakhadutta, also facilitated the reader by mentioning the name of various paintings or patas, which are important to understand the different style of paintings and to observe all the principles of paintings. Some of the styles were:

Styles of Paintings Major features

Cauka Pitaka: Isolated framed drawings

Dighala Pitaka: Long scrolls of paintings.

Yama Pitaka: Isolated paintings.

Solution: C

The Panchatantra is an ancient Indian collection of interrelated animal fables in Sanskrit verse and prose, arranged within a frame story. It was written by Vishnu Sharma.

Hitopadesha is an age-old compilation of stories compiled by Narayana Pandit over a thousand years ago. It is an Indian text in the Sanskrit language consisting of fables with both animal and human characters.

Ashtadhyayi is a Sanskrit treatise on grammar written by the Indian grammarian Panini during the 6th to 5th century BCE. This work set the linguistic standards for Classical Sanskrit.

Solution: A

The Carnatic branch creates music that is played in the traditional octave. The music is kriti based and focuses more on the saahitya or the lyric quality of the musical piece. The Kriti is a highly evolved musical song set to a certain raga and fixed tala or rhythmic cycle.

Characteristics of Carnatic Music

• Indigenous
• No freedom to improvise
• Only one particular prescribed style of singing
• More emphasis on vocal music
• Doesn’t adhere to any time.

Solution: C

It is interesting to know that the first discovery of rock paintings was made in India in 1867–68 by an archaeologist, Archibold Carlleyle, twelve years before the discovery of Altamira in Spain. Cockburn, Anderson, Mitra and Ghosh were the early archaeologists who discovered a large number of sites in the Indian sub-continent.

The caves of Bhimbetka were discovered in 1957–58 by eminent archaeologist V.S. Wakankar and later on many more were discovered. Wakankar spent several years in surveying these inaccessible hills and jungles to study these paintings.

Solution: C

Urubhanga is a Sanskrit play written by Bhasa. It focuses on the story of the character Duryodhana during and after his fight with Bhima.

Ratnavali is a Sanskrit drama about a beautiful princess named Ratnavali, and a great king named Udayana. It is attributed to the Indian emperor Harsha. Apart from Ratnavali, Harsha has written two more plays – “Priyadarshika” (union of Udayana and Priyadarshika, daughter of King Dridhavarman) and “Naganand” (story of how prince Jimutavahana gives up his own body to stop a sacrifice of serpents to the divine Garuda).

Amuktamalyada is an epic poem in Telugu composed by Krishnadevaraya of the Vijayanagar Dynasty.

Solution: D

All the statements given above are correct.

Abanindranath Tagore, the nephew of Rabindranath Tagore, was one of the most prominent artists of Bengal school of art in India. He was the first major supporter of swadeshi values in Indian art.

The contribution of Abanindranath Tagore towards Indian art and culture are:

Bengal School of Art:

He first created the ‘Indian Society of Oriental Art’ and later went on to establish Bengal school of art.

He believed that Indian art and its art forms gave importance to spirituality as opposed to the West which stressed on materialism, thus rejecting it.

His idea of modernizing Mughal and Rajput paintings eventually gave rise to modern Indian painting, which took birth at his Bengal school of art.

Most of his works revolved around Hindu philosophy.

In his later works, Abanindranath started integrating Chinese and Japanese calligraphic traditions into his style. The intention behind this move was to construct an amalgamation of the modern pan-Asian artistic tradition and the common elements of Eastern artistic and spiritual culture.

Solution: D

Tappa

In this style the rhythm plays a very important role as the compositions are based on fast, subtle and knotty constructions. It originated from the folk songs of the camel riders of North-West India but it gained legitimacy as a semi-classical vocal specialty once it was brought to the Mughal court of emperor Muhammad Shah.

There is a great use of very quick turn of phrases. Tappa was the genre of choice of the wealthy elite as well as the classes with more modest means.

The “baithaki” style, evolved under the direct patronage of the landed elites of the zamindari classes of the late 19th and early 20th centuries in their baithak-khanas (literally, baithak – assembly, khana – halls or salons) and jalsaghar (literally, halls for entertainment, mujra or nautch halls)

Solution: A

One of the oldest surviving murals of Indian subcontinent, Ajanta caves were carved in 4th century AD out of volcanic rocks. It consists of a set of 29 caves, carved in a horse-shoe shape.

The walls of the caves have both murals and fresco paintings (painted on wet plaster). They use tempera style, i.e. use of pigments. The paintings portray human values and social fabric along with styles, costumes and ornaments of that period. The emotions are expressed through hand gestures. The unique feature of the paintings is that each female figure has a unique hairstyle.

 Even animals and birds are shown with emotions. The common themes of these paintings range from Jataka stories to life of Buddha to elaborate decorative patterns of flora and fauna. Graceful poses of humans and animals adorn the walls of the caves. The medium of painting was vegetable and mineral dyes. The outline of the figures is red ochre, with contours of brown, black or deep red.

Solution: B

Visuddhimagga was written by Buddhagosha is a text of Theravada doctrine which contains discussions on various teachings of Buddha.

The Udanavarga is an early Buddhist collection of “utterances” attributed to the Buddha and his disciples.

Udana was a Buddhist text which contains the famous story of “Blind Men and the Elephant”.

Abhidharmamoksha was written by Vasubandhu in Sanskrit language containing the discussion on Abhidharma.

Solution: B

Situated in Vellore district of Tamil Nadu, these natural caves were converted into Jain temple in 8th century.

Unbaked mud structures are located within the cave, which acted like the place of rest for Jain saints. The beautiful colourful paintings on the walls and roof depict the tales of Astathik Palakas (deities protecting eight corners) and Jainism.

Solution: A

Akbar employed and patronised musical masters like Baba Gopal Das, Swami Haridas and Tansen, who was considered to be one of the Navaratna or nine gems of the Mughal court. It is also speculated that Baiju Bawra sang at the court of Akbar.

Bhendibazaar Gharana: Chhajju Khan, Nazir Khan and Khadim Hussain Khan founded it in the 19th century. They gained popularity and fame as the singers were trained to control their breath for a long period.

Solution: D

Solution:

Solution:  B

Solution:

• Varunastra is ship launched, heavy weight, electrically-propelled anti-submarine torpedo capable of targeting quiet submarines, both in deep and shallow waters in an intense countermeasures environment.
• Varunastra can be fired from all ASW ships capable of firing heavyweight torpedoes. VARUNASTRA was inducted by the Indian Navy in 2016

Solution: D

Solution:

• Brahmos can also be launched from submarines.

• While BRAHMOS continues to maintain its forward trajectory as the world’s best and fastest cruise missile system, rapid revolution in military technology worldwide has paved the way for the development of yet another futuristic weapon – BRAHMOS-NG (Next Generation). BRAHMOS-NG promises to become one of the most potent weapon systems in future, carrying forward the excellent lineage of the existing world-class BRAHMOS.

• The BRAHMOS-NG has been envisioned as a smaller and lighter, yet smarter weapon system having more versatility, lethality and flexibility along with ultra-precision for deployment onboard a wide range of military platforms, aerial as well as naval.

Key features of BRAHMOS-NG would be:

Reduced Dimension & Weight for widespread usage

Advanced next generation stealth

Greater effectiveness against ECCM

Higher versatility in underwater combat applications

Launch readiness from Torpedo tube and vertical orientation

Solution: C

Solution:

• The retrovirus known as human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) causes acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) in humans. HIV is closely related to simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV), a retrovirus found in chimpanzees and gorillas.
• Retrovirus, any of a group of viruses that belong to the family Retroviridae and that characteristically carry their genetic blueprint in the form of ribonucleic acid (RNA). Retroviruses are named for an enzyme known as reverse transcriptase, which was discovered independently in 1971 by American virologists Howard Temin and David Baltimore. Reverse transcriptase transcribes RNA into deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), a process that constitutes a reversal of the usual direction of cellular transcription (DNA into RNA). The action of reverse transcriptase makes it possible for genetic material from a retrovirus to become permanently incorporated into the DNA genome of an infected cell; the enzyme is widely used in the biological sciences to synthesize genes.

Solution: D

Solution:

RTS,S/AS01 (trade name Mosquirix) is a recombinant protein-based malaria vaccine. In October 2021, the vaccine was endorsed by the World Health Organization (WHO) for

Answer C

The world’s largest supercomputer designed to work in the same way as the human brain has been switched on for the first time. The newly formed million-processor-core Spiking Neural Network Architecture (SpiNNaker) machine is capable of completing more than 200 million actions per second, with each of its chips having 100 million transistors.

Answer B

• The mission will facilitate universal and equitable access to broadband services across the country, especially in rural and remote areas.
• It also involves laying an incremental 30 lakh route km of optical fibre cable and increasing tower density from 0.42 to 1 tower per thousand population by 2024.
• The mission also envisages increasing fiberisation of towers to 70% from 30% at present.
• The mission will envisage stakeholder investment of $100 billion (Rs 7 lakh crore) including Rs 70,000 crore from Universal Service Obligation Fund (USOF) in the coming years.
• The mission also involves the development of a Broadband Readiness Index to measure the availability of digital communication infrastructure and foster conducive policy ecosystem within a state/UT.
• It will also strive for the creation of a digital fiber map of the communications network and infrastructure, including optical fiber cables and towers across the country.

Answer D

• NDL is the Single Window Platform that collects and collates metadata from premier learning institutions in India and abroad, as well as other relevant sources.
• It is a digital repository containing textbooks, articles, videos, audio books, lectures, simulations, fiction and all other kinds of learning media.
• It makes quality learning resources available to all learners and has 1.7 Crore content from more than 160 sources, in over 200 languages.

Answer B

The National Communications Policy aims to accomplish the following Strategic Objectives by 2022:

1. Provisioning of Broadband for All
2. Creating 4 Million additional jobs in the Digital Communications sector
3. Enhancing the contribution of the Digital Communications sector to 8% of India’s GDP from ~ 6% in 2017
4. Propelling India to the Top 50 Nations in the ICT Development Index of ITU from 134 in 2017
5. Enhancing India’s contribution to Global Value Chains
6. Ensuring Digital Sovereignty

Answer A

FSO (free space optics) is an optical communication technology in which data is transmitted by propagation of light in free space allowing optical connectivity. There is no requirement of the optical fiber cable. Working of FSO is similar to OFC (optical fiber cable) networks but the only difference is that the optical beams are sent through free air instead of OFC cores that is glass fiber

Immune to electromagnetic interference

Answer : B

The passage is explaining the ways in which social media has transformed the way we consume

news. The focus is on explaining how whatsapp is being used to communicate effectively as

well as reach out to a wider audience. Hence B is the most apt conclusion. A and C are wrong as

it is away from the central theme of the passage. D is not the conclusion but an argument to

further the central point in the passage.

Answer : D

Explanation:

Among given numbers, only when ‘0’ comes at the unit digit, that particular 3 digit number is

divisible by 5. In this condition even that 3 digit number is divisible by 2 also because it ends

with 0.

Now, we can find out the numbers divisible by 2 units place can be occupied by 0, 2, 4, 6 and 8.

Therefore 5 ways Hundred’s place can be occupied by all numbers except ‘0’ i.e., 4 ways

Ten’s place can be occupied by any given number that is, 5 ways.

Therefore, number of numbers with the given condition are,

5×4×5=100.

Answer : D

There are 3 ways the first dice reads odd number i.e. 1, 3 or 5.

When first dice reads, the second dice can read any of the numbers from 1 to 6.

Number of possibilities = 3 × 6 =18.

But the sum of 9 can be obtained on two occasions i.e. (3,6) and (5,4).

Hence, the probability = 2/18 = 1/9.

Answer – A

Since compound interest rate is 50%, then the principle will earn half of it every year.

So, simple interest or compound for the first year = 50% of Rs.1000 = Rs.500

Principle for the second year = Rs.1000 + Rs.500 = Rs.1500

Compound interest for the second year = 50% of Rs.1500 = Rs.750

Principle for the third year = Rs.1500 + Rs.750 = Rs.2250

Compound interest for the third year = 50% of Rs.2250 = Rs.1125.

Answer : B

Let the investments of A, B and C be 3x, 4x and 5x respectively.

The earnings of A = 6% of 3x = 0.18x

The earnings of B = 5% of 4x = 0.2x

The earnings of C = 4% of 5x = 0.2x

B earns Rs.250 more than A i.e. 0.2x – 0.18x = 0.02x = Rs.250

x = 250/0.02 = 12500.

Total earnings = 0.18x + 0.2x + 0.2x = 0.58x = 0.58 = 12500 = Rs.7250.