English Test for NIACL 2018 Prelim Exam Set – 2

Directions: In each question a sentence is given followed by a blank. Each blank is followed by three options and you have to determine which option can be used in place of blank to make it a meaningful sentence and mark it as your answer.

1. AFSPA is a draconian law that has no place in a democracy. No organ of the state should have the __________________ to kill or maim citizens without establishing culpability of the kind for which such penalties have been specified in the law. Ideally, AFSPA should be removed from the statute book. As things stand, the law exists and is operative in several parts of the northeast and in Kashmir.
   a. jaunted power
   b. emancipated control
   c. unfettered authority
   Both a & b
   Both b & c
   Both c & a
   Only c
   All are Correct
   Option B
   

    

2. The court had ordered status quo at and around the disputed site till the Allahabad High Court had disposed of the relevant title suits before it. The court is seized of the dispute again, and is probably months away from delivering a judgment. The government would be well-advised, as also other parties, to make it abundantly clear that the court’s verdict _____________________.
   a. could be honoured
   b. would be honoured
   c. should be honoured
   Both a & b
   Both b & c
   Both c & a
   Only b
   All are Correct
   Option D
   

    

3. That Atal Bihari Vajpayee was born on Christmas Day, could be seen as being quite portentous, considering that among India’s long roster of politicians, the sobriquet of ‘Santa’ probably suits him the best. This was a man who, both as a politician and later as a statesman, understood that bearing a sense of humour — and being public about it — in no way diminished the serious job at hand. Even as PM — especially as PM — his mirth, encapsulated in his trademark chuckle, gave proof to the fact that a wise man ______________________ lightly.
   a. jades his knowledge
   b. carries his sagacious
   c. wears his wisdom
   Both a & b
   Both b & c
   Both c & a
   Only c
   All are Correct
   Option D
   

    

4. Atal Bihari Vajpayee was the first non-Congress prime minister to hold office for more than five years. He was also the first to lead a ____________________ at the Centre to provide a stable government. Vajpayee, BJP’s founding president, had risen from the ranks of the Rashtriya Sawayamsevak Sangh to president of the Jan Sangh after Deendayal Upadhyaya. His NDA government ended BJP’s political untouchability, paving the way for its subsequent rise to absolute majority under Narendra Modi in 2014.
   a. diverse coalition
   b. distinct union
   c. variant association
   Both a & b
   Both b & c
   Both c & a
   Only a
   All are Correct
   Option E
   

    

5. It is the privilege of an incumbent prime minister to launch his re-election campaign from the ramparts of the Red Fort, in the course of delivering the final Independence Day address of his term. Prime Minister Narendra Modi used that _______________________. He counted his government’s achievements, asserted that governments before his had badly underperformed, attributed his government’s success to decisive leadership and, in subtle and non-subtle ways, presented himself as the leader the country needs to continue the good work, at least till 2022, the year in which Independent India would turn 75 and see farmer incomes double.
   a. entreat for his snag
   b. prerogative to his advantage
   c. privilege of his benefit
   Both a & b
   Both b & c
   Both c & a
   Only b
   All are Correct
   Option D
   

    

6. Trading income has fallen, a sign of the _____________________; harder bond yields, marked to market, have dented income. Loans have shrunk 3% quarter on quarter, unexpectedly. Textiles, where one single borrower is in the red for .`2,000 crore, and power, where the bank’s exposure is .`17,000 crore, are still sputtering — the latter is resisting banks’ attempts to enforce new bankruptcy proceedings to recover debt.
   a. reduction in the economy
   b. drag in the economy
   c. deduction in the economy
   Both a & b
   Both b & c
   Both c & a
   Only b
   All are Correct
   Option D
   

    

7. The Uttarakhand High Court’s judgment of August 10 on a petition against illegal slaughter of cows serves as an example of judicial overreach, in which the court goes far beyond clarifying legal principle and directs the executive to act in a particular manner with regard to the state’s cattle and other animals that would corner a large part of the state’s budget and make a mockery of the legislature’s ____________________ how to spend the state’s resources.
   a. ability to determine
   b. competence to regulate
   c. proficiency to guess
   Both a & b
   Both b & c
   Both c & a
   Only c
   All are Correct
   Option A
   

    

8. Ankara has kept interest rates ___________________ even after IMF’s April warning that capacity was overstretched, inflation soaring and the current account deficit widening. Turkey straddles Europe and Asia. Unsurprisingly, acrashing lira has spread contagion worldwide. Over the last two days, the rupee has been accompanied on its slide against the greenback by the Chinese yuan, Singapore’s and Taiwan’s dollars, Indonesian rupiah, South Korean won and Thai baht.
   a. artificially low
   b. significantly low
   c. very low
   Both a & b
   Both b & c
   Both c & a
   Only a
   All are Correct
   Option D
   artificially low -= The idea of “natural” vs “artificial” is just an idea. A notion. A concept. A way of looking at it. Artificially low could be because a law or regulation demands a cap on the interest rate when the market cost of funds has a much higher interest rate for the same type of loan.

    

9. Capital markets regulator Sebi’s reported move to limit investors’ exposure to shares and equity derivatives in line with their net worth is hare-brained. Those who invest in the stock markets directly should be _____________________ the ability to take rational risks. Savvy and smarts, not an inherited fortune, should be the qualification for entering the market directly.
   a. equipped with
   b. managed with
   c. endowed with
   Both a & b
   Both b & c
   Both c & a
   Only c
   All are Correct
   Option C
   

    

10. Lobbying is on to shift Asia’s premier defence aviation exhibition, Aero India, from its traditional base in Bengaluru to Lucknow. The government should ____________________ and clarify, without delay, that Aero India will, indeed, take place at the Yelahanka Base, as it has since 1996, when the air show started. Air shows acquire a certain cachet because of their tradition and history. Britain holds its air show at Farnborough, every even-numbered year. It alternates with another premier air show, that of Paris, held, you guessed it, at Paris.
    a. cease the move before it becomes unmanageable
    b. nip this move in the bud
    c. stop the move
    Both a & b
    Both b & c
    Both c & a
    Only b
    All are Correct
    Option A