Instructions:
Read the following passage and answer the questions given after it.

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Comprehension:

Nothing, not even the angry, red eruptions on her face and body, will stop Sneha from aiming for her “dream job”. “I love the Indian Army,” says the 18-year-old, as she sits by herself under one of the canopies at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Stadium of the Maratha Light Infantry Regimental Centre in Belagavi, Karnataka. Outside the enclosure, around 35 women run on the 400-m track.
A day earlier, Sneha had cleared her ground tests — a 1.6-km race that had to be completed in eight minutes or less, high jump and long jump — and physical fitness tests, when she was diagnosed with chickenpox. Now on medication for the pox, she is back at the stadium for a medical examination as part of the recruitment process. As she waits for her turn, isolated from the other women, Sneha, says, “I had no fever when I left home in Kerala. Even when I reached Belagavi and got these pimples, I did not think much of it. So I came for my physical and ground tests.”
Accompanied by her mother and uncle, Sneha, who is pursuing a computer course in her hometown Iritty, about 41 km from Kannur, made the 611-km journey from home to Belagavi spending eight hours in a bus and three hours on a train. She is among the 850-odd women, many of whom have travelled several hundred kilometers, to turn up at the first-ever recruitment rally for women to the Indian Army’s Corps of Military Police.
The recruitment of women as Soldier General Duty (Women Military Police) marks the first time that women will be taken in not only as officers, but as soldiers, giving them an opportunity to be involved in active military duties. As personnel of the military police, the women soldiers will be responsible for investigating offences such as molestation, theft, and rape; “assisting in the maintenance of good order and discipline”; and in custody and handling of prisoners of war — essentially combat-support operations.
The move is part of a slow opening up of avenues for women in the armed forces. In his Independence Day speech last year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said women officers recruited into the armed forces under the Short Service Commission would be given the option of taking up permanent commission — a “gift” to India’s “brave daughters”.

 Following a notification issued by the Army on April 25, around 15,000 women registered for the recruitment rally at Belagavi, the first of five such to be held across India to fill 100 positions in the Military Police. The Belagavi centre catered to candidates from the southern states of Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana and the Union Territories of Lakshadweep, Andaman and Nicobar and Puducherry. Of the 15,000 aspirants, about 3,000 were short-listed on the basis of their Class 10 marks, with the cut-off set at 86 per cent. Of the shortlisted candidates, only about one-third turned up at the Belagavi centre between August 1 and 5 at the date and time assigned to them. Just then, outside the enclosure where Sneha is sitting, a shrill whistle pierces the air and another batch of girls takes off — feet on the wet ground, mostly bare, making a dash for their place in history. “Does everybody understand English?” asks Major Chaudhry and the group of 30 women, sitting on red carpets on the ground, bellows: “Yes”.

131)

Which statement is NOT true according to the passage?

SSC CGL 2019

A)

About one third of the shortlisted candidates turned up at the Belagavi centre.

B)

Women were called on the basis of their class 10 marks.

C)

There are only 100 positions to be filled up.

D)

3000 women registered for the recruitment rally at Belagavi.

Instructions:
Read the following passage and answer the questions given after it.

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Comprehension:
At a number of places in the Kashmir Valley, security forces have put coils of razor wire on roads to enforce restrictions on movement. Concertina wire or razor wire fences are used along territorial borders and in areas of conflict around the world, to keep out combatants, terrorists, or refugees.
The expandable spools of barbed or razor wire get their name from concertina, a hand-held musical instrument similar to the accordion, with bellows that expand and contract. 

Concertina wire coils were an improvisation on the barbed wire obstacles used during World War I. The flat, collapsible coils with intermittent barbs or blades were designed to be carried along by infantry, and deployed on battlefields to prevent or slow down enemy movement.
The Englishman Richard Newton is credited with creating the first barbed wire around 1845; the first patent for “a double wire clipped with diamond shaped barbs” was given to Louis François Janin of France. In the United States, the first patent was registered by Lucien B Smith on June 25, 1867, for a prairie fence made of fireproof iron wire. Michael Kelly twisted razor wires together to form a cable of wires.

 The American businessman Joseph F Glidden is considered to be the father of the modern barbed wire. He designed the wire with two intertwined strands held by sharp prongs at regular intervals.

Barbed wire was initially an agrarian fencing invention intended to confine cattle and sheep, which unlike lumber, was largely resistant to fire and bad weather. An advertorial published in the US in 1885 under the title ‘Why Barb Fencing Is Better Than Any Other’, argued that “it does not decay; boys cannot crawl through or over it; nor dogs; nor cats; nor any other animal; it watches with Argus eyes the inside and outside, up, down and lengthwise; it prevents the ‘ins’ from being ‘outs’, and the ‘outs’ from being ‘ins’, watches at day-break, at noontide, at sunset and all night long…”

 Barbed wire was put to military use in the Siege of Santiago in 1898 during the Spanish- American War, and by the British in the Second Boer War of 1899-1902 to confine the families of the Afrikaans-speaking Boer fighters.
World War I saw extensive use of barbed wire — and German military engineers are credited with improvising the earliest concertina coils on the battlefield. They spun the barbed wire into circles and simply spread it on the battlefield. Without using any support infrastructure like poles etc. this was more effective against the infantry charge by Allied soldiers.
The fence erected by India along the Line of Control to keep out terrorist infiltrators consists of rows of concertina wire coils held by iron angles. They are now commonly seen and are used to secure private properties as well.

132)

What is the main theme of the above passage?

SSC CGL 2019

A)

How barbed wire was patented

B)

The use of barbed wire in Jammu and Kashmir

C)

The use of barbed wire in agriculture

D)

The evolution and use of barbed wire

133)

Who is credited with creating the modern barbed wire?

SSC CGL 2019

A)

Louise Francoise Janin

B)

Joseph F Glidden

C)

Lucien B Smith

D)

Richard Newton

134)

What was the initial purpose of inventing the barbed wire?

SSC CGL 2019

A)

to secure the borders of a country

B)

to keep the dogs and boys out of gardens

C)

to restrict the movement of trouble makers

D)

to confine cattle and sheep within an area

135)

Who first spread the barbed wires on the field without using the poles or any other support system?

SSC CGL 2019

A)

German military engineers

B)

British army

C)

American military

D)

Allied soldiers

136)

Which statement is NOT true according to the passage?

SSC CGL 2019

A)

The fence along the Indian Line of Control consists of rows of concertina wire coils held by iron angles.

B)

In the United States, the first patent was registered by Louis François Janin.

C)

It was Richard Newton, an Englishman, who invented the barbed wire around 1845.

D)

Barbed wire was first put to military use in the Siege of Santiago in 1898 during the Spanish-American War.

Instructions:
Read the following passage and answer the questions given after it.

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Comprehension:
LAST WEEK, scientists from all corners of India descended on Ahmedabad to remember the architect of India’s space programme, a man whom the late president, APJ Abdul Kalam, had famously termed “Mahatma Gandhi of Indian Science”.
They were there to launch celebrations on the birth centenary of Vikram Sarabhai, 47 years after his death at the age of 52, by when he had founded 38 institutions that are now leaders in space research, physics, management and performing arts.
Former director of the Space Applications Centre Pramod Kale was a 19-year old science graduate from MS University of Baroda, besotted by space technology, when he first met Sarabhai. “In May 1960, I went to Ahmedabad to meet Dr. Sarabhai. “I met him and ended up talking for two hours,” Kale says.
By June that year, Kale had done exactly as Sarabhai had advised him and taken up a master’s course at Gujarat University. In 1962, when Sarabhai was looking at studying the magnetic equator, Kale went on to be among the first few to go to NASA to learn radar tracking. 

The room resounded with many such memories. Former ISRO chairman K Kasturirangan remembered how they ran into some trouble at the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL), founded in 1947 by Sarabhai, in their attempts to fly a balloon at 4 am, when in sailed Sarabhai. “He told us had the flight been successful, you would not have learnt even half of what you learnt because of that initial
problem,” said Kasturirangan.
Many of those who had collected in Ahmedabad in Sarabhai’s memory were teenagers when they first met him. Gandhinagar-based entrepreneur K Subramanian was 19 and a student of National Institute of Technology, Tiruchirappalli, working on a summer project at PRL, when a man in a kurta-pyjama walked in and began turning all the wastepaper bins upside down, inspecting their contents and putting them back again. “I asked a colleague who that was and was told it is Dr Vikram Sarabhai. He had come to check how much waste the lab was generating,” laughs Subramanian.

Born to Ambalal and Sarla Devi, Ahmedabad’s leading textile-mill owners, Vikram Sarabhai showed creative promise early. He was 15 when he built a working model of a train engine with the help of two engineers, which is now housed at the Community Science Centre (CSC) in Ahmedabad. The CSC was Vikram’s way of providing other children the privileges he had, of experimental research, says his son Kartikeya, 71, adding how his father wished to work with children at the science centre after he retired.
“He was essentially a researcher, and believed that people, especially children, should be allowed to think freely and come up with solutions on their own,” recalls Kartikeya, who founded the Centre for Environment Education in 1984. Kartikeya is carefully piecing together all the dog-eared notes he is discovering in the recesses of their three grand homes — Shanti Sadan, The Retreat and
Chidambaram.
To inspire the young to dream like Sarabhai, Kartikeya is building a permanent exhibition gallery on the Sabarmati Riverfront, expected to open this November.

137)

What was the occasion for the gathering at Ahmedabad?

SSC CGL 2019

A)

Foundation Day of Community Science Centre

B)

Launch of the celebrations of the Birth Centenary of Vikram Sarabhai

C)

Foundation Day of ISRO

D)

Birth Anniversary of India’s Space Programme

138)

What is Vikram Sarabhai mainly known for?

SSC CGL 2019

A)

for being an entrepreneur in Ahmedabad

B)

for pioneering India’s space programme

C)

for founding 38 different institutions

D)

for establishing Community Science Centre

139)

Among the people who had gathered at Ahmedabad, who was the former chairman of ISRO?

SSC CGL 2019

A)

Kartikeya

B)

K Subramanian

C)

K Kasturirangan

D)

Pramod Kale

140)

Which statement shows that Vikram Sarabhai had a creative mind at an early age?

SSC CGL 2019

A)

He built a working model of a train engine at the age of 15.

B)

He founded the Physical Research Laboratory (PRL).

C)

He told the scientists that they learnt much more from problems than from success.

D)

He checked how much waste the lab was generating.