Aptitude
APTITUDE SAMPLE PAPER







Passage-1

The poor especially in market economies, need the strengthen that collectivities offer for creating more economic, social and political space for themselves, for enhancing their socio-economic well-being and voice, and as a protection against free market individualism. It has been argued that a group approach to farming, especially in the form of bottom up agricultural production collectivities, offers substantial scope for poverty alleviation and empowering the poor as well as enhancing agricultural productivity. To realize this potential, however, the groups would need to be voluntary in nature, small in size, participative in decision making and equitable in work sharing and benefit distribution. There are many notable examples of such collectivities to be found in varied contexts, such as in the transition economies. All of the bear witness to the possibility of successful cooperation under given conditions. And although the gender impact of the family cooperatives in the transition economies are uncertain, the Indian examples of women-only groups farming offer considerable potential for benefiting women.

1.   Agricultural collectivities such as group based farming can provide the rural poor.

          1.   Empowerment
          2.   Increased agricultural productivity.
          3.   Safeguard against exploitative markets.
          4.   Surplus production of agricultural commodities.

Select the correct answer using the codes given below:

(a) 1, 2, 3 and 4 (b) 1, 2 and 3 only
(c) 2 and 4 only (d) 1, 3 and 4 only




2. What does the author imply by “gender impact”?

(a) Women are doubtful participants in cooperatives.
(b) Family cooperatives may not include women.
(c) Women benefiting from group farming.
(d) Women’s role in transition economies is highly restrictive.


3. Consider the following assumptions:

  1. It is imperative for transition economies to have agricultural collectivities.
  2. Agricultural productivity can be increased by group approach to farming.


With reference to the above passage, which of these assumptions is/are valid?

(a) 1 only                 (b) 2 only
(c) Both 1 and 2 (d) Neither 1 nor 2


Passage 2

In a typical Western liberal context, deepening of democracy invariably leads to consolidation of ‘liberal values’. In the Indian context, democratization is translated into greater involvement of people not as ‘individuals’ which is a staple to liberal discourse, but as communities or groups. Individuals are getting involved in the public sphere not as ‘optimized’ individuals but as members of primordial communities drawn on religious or caste identity. Community-identity seems to be the governing force. It is not therefore surprising that the so-called peripheral groups continue to maintain their identities with reference to the social groups (caste, religion or sect) to which they belong while getting involved in the political processes despite the fact that their political goals remain more or less identical. By helping to articulate the political voice of the marginalized, democracy in India has led to ‘a  loosening of social structures’ and empowered the peripherals to be confident of their ability to improve the socio-economic conditions in which they are placed. This is a significant political process that had led to a silent revolution through a meaningful transfer of power from the upper caste elites to various subaltern groups within the democratic framework of public governance.


4. According to the passage, what does “deepening of democracy” mean in the Western context?

(a) Consolidation of group and class identities.
(b) Democratization translated as greater involvement of people.
(c) Democratization as greater involvement of  ‘atomized’ individuals in the public sphere.
(d) None of the statements (a), (b) and (c) given above  is correct in this context.


5. Greater democratization in India has not necessarily led to

(a) The dilution of caste and communal identities in the public sphere.
(b) Irrelevance of community identity as a governing force in Indian politics.
(c) Marginalization of elite groups in society.
(d) Relative unimportance of hereditary identities over class identities.





6. What is the “silent revolution” that has occurred in the Indian democratic process?

(a) Irrelevance of caste and class hierarchies in political processes.
(b) Loosening of social strictures in voting behavior and patterns.
(c) Social change through transfer of power from upper caste elites to subaltern groups.
(d) All the statements (a), (b) and (c) given above are correct in this context.





Directions for the following 5 (five) items:

Examine the information given in the following paragraph and answer the items that follow:

Guest lectures on five subjects viz., Economics, History, Statistics, English and Mathematics have to be arranged in a week from Monday to Friday. Only one lecture can be arranged on each day. Economics cannot be scheduled on Tuesday. Guest faculty for History is available only on Tuesday. Mathematics lecture has to be scheduled immediately after the day of Economics lecture. English lecture has to be scheduled immediately before the day of Economics lecture.

7. Which lecture is scheduled on Monday?

(a) History                 (b) Economics
(c) Mathematics (d) Statistics





8. Which lecture is scheduled between Statistics and English?

(a) Economics         (b) History
(c) Mathematics (d) No lecture


9. Which lecture is the last one in the week?

(a) History                 (b) English
(c) Mathematics (d) Economics


10. Which lecture is scheduled on Wednesday?

(a) Statistics (b) Economics
(c) English (d) History




11. Which lecture is scheduled before the Mathematics lecture?

(a) Economics (b) History
(c) Statistics (d) English


12. Two glasses of equal volume are respectively half and three-fourths filled with milk. They are then filled to the brim by adding water. Their contents are then poured into another vessel. What will be the ratio of milk to water in this vessel?

(a) 1:3 (b) 2:3
(c) 3:2 (d) 5:3


13. Consider the following statements:

1.   All machines consume energy.
2.   Electricity provides energy.
3.   Electrically operated machines are cheap to maintain.
4.   Electrically operated machines do not cause pollution.


Which one of the following inferences can be drawn from the above statements?

(a) All machines are run by electric energy.
(b) There is no form of energy other than electricity.
(c) Most machines are operated on electric energy.
(d) Electrically operate machines are preferable to use.


14. Examine the following statements:

1. None but the rich can afford air-travel.
2. Some of those who travel by air become sick.
3. Some of those who become sick required treatment.

Which one of the following conclusions can be drawn from the above statements?

(a) All the rich persons travel by air. (b) Those who travel by air become sick.
(c) All the rich persons become sick. (d) All those who travel by air are rich.


15. In five flats, one above the other, live five professionals. The professor has to go up to meet his IAS officer friend. The doctor is equally friendly to all, and has to go up as frequently as go down. The engineer has to go up to meet this MLA friend above whose flat lives the professor’s friend.

From the ground floor to the top floor, in what order do the five professionals live?

(a) Engineer, Professor, Doctor, IAS officer, MLA
(b) Professor, Engineer, Doctor, IAS officer, MLA
(c) IAS officer, Engineer, Doctor, Professor, MLA
(d) Professor, Engineer, Doctor, MLA, IAS officer


Passage-3

Education, without a doubt, has an important functional, instrumental and utilitarian dimension. This is revealed when one asks questions such as ‘what is the purpose of education?’. The answers, too often, are ‘to acquire qualifications for employment/upward mobility’, ‘wider/higher (in terms of income) opportunities’, and ‘to meet the needs for trained human power in diverse fields for national development’. But in its deepest sense education is not instrumentalist. That is to say, it is not to be justified outside of itself because it leads to the acquisition of formal skills or of certain desired psychological - social attributes. It must be respected in itself. Education is thus not a commodity to be acquired or possessed and then used, but a process of inestimable importance to individuals and society, although it can and does have enormous use value. Education then, is a process of expansion and conversion, not in the sense of converting or turning students into doctors or engineers, but the widening and turning out of the mind — the creation, sustenance and development of self-critical awareness and independence of thought. It is an inner process of moral - intellectual development

16. What do you understand by the ‘instrumentalist’ view of education?

(a) Education is functional and utilitarian in its purposes.
(b) Education is meant to fulfil human needs.
(c) The purpose of education is to train the human intellect.
(d) Education is meant to achieve moral development.



17. According to the passage, education must be respected in itself because:

(a) It helps to acquire qualifications for employment.
(b) It helps in upward mobility and acquiring social status.
(c) It is an inner process of moral and intellectual development.
(d) All the (a), (b) and (c) given above are correct in this context.


18. Education is a process in which:

(a) Students are converted into trained professionals.
(b) Opportunities for higher income are generated.
(c) Individuals develop self-critical awareness and independence of thought.
(d) Qualifications for upward mobility are acquired.


Passage-4


Chemical pesticides lose their role in sustainable agriculture if the pests evolve resistance. The evolution of pesticide resistance is simply natural selection in action. It is almost certain to occur when vast numbers of a genetically variable population are killed. One or a few individuals may be unusually resistant (perhaps because they possess an enzyme that can detoxify the pesticide). If the pesticide is applied repeatedly, each successive generation of the pest will contain a larger proportion of resistant individuals. Pests typically have a high intrinsic rate of reproduction, and so a few individuals in one generation may give rise to hundreds or thousands in the next, and resistance spreads very rapidly in a population. 

This problem was often ignored in the past, even though the first case of DDT (dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane) resistance was reported as early as 1946. There is exponential increase in the numbers of invertebrates that have evolved resistance and in the number of pesticides against which resistance has evolved. Resistance has been recorded in every family of arthropod pests (including dipterans such as mosquitoes and house flies, as well as beetles, moths, wasps, fleas, lice and mites) as well as in weeds and plant pathogens. Take the Alabama leafworm a moth pest of cotton, as an example. It has developed resistance in one or more regions of the world to aldrin, DDT, dieldrin, endrin, lindane and toxaphene.

If chemical pesticides brought nothing but problems, — if their use was intrinsically and acutely unsustainable — then they would already have fallen out of widespread use. This has not happened. Instead, their rate of production has increased rapidly. The ratio of cost to benefit for the individual agricultural producer has remained in favour of pesticide use. In the USA, insecticides have been estimated to benefit the agricultural products to the tune of around $5 for every $1 spent. Moreover, in many poorer countries, the prospect of imminent mass starvation, or of an epidemic disease, are so frightening that the social and health costs of using pesticides have to be ignored. In general the use of pesticides is justified by objective measures such as ‘lives saved’, ‘economic efficiency of food production’ and ‘total food produced’. In these very fundamental senses, their use may be described as sustainable. In practice, sustainability depends on continually developing new pesticides that keep at least one step ahead of the pests — pesticides that are less persistent, biodegradable and more accurately targeted at the pests.

19. “The evolution of pesticide resistance is natural selection in action.” What does it actually imply?

(a) It is very natural for many organisms to have pesticide resistance.
(b) Pesticide resistance among organisms is a universal phenomenon.
(c) Some individuals in any given population show resistance after the application of pesticides.
(d) None of the statements (a), (b) and (c) given above is correct.



20. With reference to the passage, consider the following statements:

1. Use of chemical pesticides has become imperative in all the poor countries of the world.
2. Chemical pesticides should not have any role in sustainable agriculture.
3. One pest can develop resistance to many pesticides.

Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

(a) 1 and 2 only (b) 3 only
(c) 1 and 3 only (d) 1, 2 and 3







Where to use this questions and answer 


E&OE (errors and omissions excepted)