Combined Defence Services Exam (I), 2009
English
Time Allowed: Two Hours M.M. : 100
Synonyms
Each of the following twenty three items consists of a word in capital letters following by four words or groups of words. Select the word or group of words that is most similar in meaning to the word in capital letters.
| 1. GENIAL (a) Generous (b) Wonderful (c) Liberal (d) Friendly and cheerful 2. REVAMP (a) Retreat (b) Reconstruct (c) Retrial (d) Retrace 3. RESCIND (a) Reunite (b) Repeal (c) Reserve (d) Reproach 4. RESPLENDENT (a) Wonderful (b) Dazzling (c) Beautiful (d) Respectful 5. CORPULENT (a) Fleshy (b) Thin (c) Stout (d) Bony 6. ACRIMONY (a) Disagreement (b) Despondency (c) Bitterness (d) Difference 7. CANTANKEROUS (a) Bed tempered (b) Full of contempt (c) Very sick (d) Very envious 8. FELICITY (a) Peace (b) Comfort (c) Faithfulness (d) Great happiness 9. UNRUFFLED (a) Simple (b) Indifferent (c) Sluggish (d) Calm 10. FELINE (a) Feminine (b) Cat-like (c) Ferocious (d) Ugly and clumsy 11. TENUOUS (a) Being tenacious (b) Not substantial (c) Gross (d) Popular 12. EXQUISITE (a) Highly refined (b) Too costly (c) Extemporaneous (d) Exotic | 13. WRESTED (a) Took by force (b) Took away easily (c) Lost narrowly (d) Won easily 14. EXPOSTULATED (a) Requested (b) Quarreled ferociously (c) Remonstrated (d) Appealed with good reason 15. PLACATE (a) Implore (b) Flatter (c) Pacify (d) Compensate 16. PERPETUAL (a) Contagious (b) Continuous (c) Perplexing (d) Perennial 17. DAUNTLESS (a) Praiseworthy (b) Effortless and smooth (c) Fearless and determined (d) Unceasing 18. SEETHING (a) Dissatisfied (b) Be agitated (c) Noisy (d) Soothing 19. STINGY (a) Violent (b) Miserly (c) Cautious (d) Quarrelsome 20. EXULTATION (a) Extinction (b) Anxiety (c) Jubilation (d) Expectation 21. DOUGHTY (a) Dastardly (b) Deceptive (c) Flabby (d) Valiant 22. OBVIATE (a) Delaying the solution of a problem (b) To remove a difficulty (c) Make obstruction (d) Supersede 23. SACRILEGE (a) Offering sacrifice (b) Privilege (c) Blasphemy (d) Being sacred |
COMPREHENSION
Direction (For the 20 items which follow):
In this Section you have Six short passages. After each passage, you will find several question bases on the passage. First, read a passage, and then answer the question based on it. You are required to select your answer on the based on the contents of the passage and opinion of the author only.
Examples ‘I’ and ‘J’ are solved for you.
PASSAGE
In our approach to life, be it pragmatic or otherwise, a basic fact that confronts us squarely and unmistakably is the desire for peace, security and happiness. Different forms of life at different levels of existence make up the teeming denizens of this earth of ours. And, no matter whether they belong to the higher groups such as human beings or to the lower groups such as animals, all beings primarily seek peace, comfort and security. Life is as dear to a mute creature as it is to a man. Even the lowliest insect strives for protection against dangers that threaten its life. Just as each one of us wants to live and not to die, so do all other creatures.
I. The author’s main point is that
(a) Different forms of life are found on earth
(b) Different levels of existence are possible in nature
(c) Peace and security are the chief goals of all living beings
(d) Even the weakest creature struggles to preserve its life
J. Which one of the following assumptions or steps is essential in developing the author’s position?
(a) All forms of life have a single overriding goal
(b) The will to survive of a creature is identified with a desire for peace
(c) All beings are divided into higher and lower groups
(d) A parallel is drawn between happiness and life and pain and death
PASSAGE I
Ah ! whatever could be said was said. All held him guilty. Even his own mother who claimed to understand him the best. All had betrayed him in his hour of need. Yet, there he was, still with a sparkling hope and knew that the truth must prevail. In the cold, dark and damp cell he never for a moment lost faith in God and goodness and was waiting anxiously for an angel to come, plead non guilty for him and free him of his miseries.
24. Three of the following statements indicate that he had a sparkling hope. Which statement does not?
(a) He had never lost faith in God
(b) He was sure there was goodness
(c) He could have evidence in his favour
(d) He knew that the truth must prevail
25. Whatever others said about him, he
(a) Betrayed no one
(b) Thought over the problem
(c) Never lost faith in goodness
(d) Raised his voice against injustice
26. In the dark dungeon he always waited for
(a) His mother
(b) The jailer
(c) The verdict freeing him of his miseries
(d) The angel to come and plead for him
27. The truth must prevail means
(a) He was true
(b) Angel will reveal truth
(c) Truth always wins in the end
(d) We must plead for the truth
Once while travelling by the local bus, I got a seat beside a very strange man. He seemed interested in every passenger aboard. He would stare at a person, scribble some odd mathematical notations on his long notebook and then move on to the next. Being quite interested in what he was doing I asked him what all those notations meant and then carne the startling reply. He saw a man's face not as a single unit but as thousands of squares put together. He was in fact a statistical expert and a budding artist learning the art of graphics.
28. The man was scribbling down
(a) The figures of co-passengers
(b) The details of thousands of squares put together
(c) Some mathematical formulae and calculations
(d) Some mathematical signs
29. The man caught authors attention because
(a) He was sitting next to him
(b) He was staring at every person in the bus
(c) He would stare at every person and then scribble down some mathematical notation
(d) He was a budding artist learning the art of graphics
30. The author found that man’s reply quite startling because
(a) A statistical expert cannot be a budding scientist
(b) A budding artist cannot be a statistical expert
(c) Graphics is still a rare art form and he was learning it while travelling in a bus
(d) The fact that “a man’s face can be analysed as thousand of squares” was a strange concept.
31. From the passage we gather that
(a) The author is very inquisitive
(b) The author tries to poke his nose in other people’s business
(c) The author is interested in mathematical notations
(d) The author wants to talk to fellow passengers in the bus
PASSAGE III
With the inevitable growth of specialization I see the universities facing two great dangers. First, it is very easy to get so involved in the technical details of education that the object of education is lost. And secondly, in an effort to condition a university to the needs of its students and to the needs of the State it may lose its power to make or mould those students into responsible men, capable of thinking for themselves and capable of expressing the results of their thoughts to others.
32. The author calls growth of specialization ‘inevitable’. Which one of the following statements is likely to be the most correct reason for this inevitability?
(a) Universities give grants only to do specialized work in different disciplines
(b) The professors and competent only for specialized work
(c) Specialization helps economic growth of the nation
(d) In an age of science and technology specialization become necessary
33. Which one of the following statements most correctly suggests the central theme of the passage?
(a) The aim of education is specialization
(b) The aim of education is to mould the youth to work for the State
(c) The aim of education is to make the youth capable of independent thought and expression
(d) The aim of education is to enable the youth to earn a comfortable living
34. Which one of the following statements most correctly suggests the warning implied in the passage?
(a) University education should not be concerned with technical details
(b) University education not subordinate themselves to the State
(c) Universities should be concerned only with the need of students
(d) Universities should not go in for any specialization
PASSAGE IV
One December night, a family had gathered around their fireside and piled it high with wood gathered from mountain streams and ruins of great trees that had come falling down the mountain sides. The fire roared and brightened the room with its light. The faces of the father and mother had a quiet gladness; the children laughed; the oldest daughter was the picture of happiness at seventeen; and the aged grandmother who-sat sewing in the warmest place was the picture of happiness grown old.
35. The firewood had been
(a) Brought
(b) Stolen
(c) Collected
(d) Found
36. The parents looked
(a) Serene
(b) Cheerful
(c) Gloomy
(d) Dull
37. The oldest daughter looked
(a) Stupid
(b) Glad
(c) Intelligent
(d) Mournful
PASSAGE V
The unpleasant feeling passed and she glanced guardedly up. at him. He was walking unmarked in moonlight, innocent of her reaction to him. She felt then - this thought had come to her before - that there might be more to him than she had imagined. She felt ashamed she had never thanked him for the help he had given her father.
38. She glanced at him when
(a) He walked alone unnoticed in moonlight
(b) She was sure that she was not being noticed
(c) Her reactions did not have any effect on him
(d) The unpleasant feeling passed
39. Her unpleasant feeling passed when
(a) He did not take any notice of her
(b) The moonlight was beautiful
(c) She realized her sense of shame
(d) She looked carefully at him
40. She was ashamed because
(a) She was spying on him
(b) There was more to him than she had imagined
(c) A recurring thought came back to her
(d) She had never thanked him for his help to her father
As I slung my pack onto my shoulders a big mosquito thudded against my cheek. There had been a few through the day, but it was early in the season - the ice had gone out just two weeks before - and I had scarcely noticed there. But now as I would down the ridge, the last breeze faded, and they were on me. Rising in clouds from the soggy tundra, they
pelted against my face. I reached in my pocket for the repellent, and came up empty.
41. The traveler could not the breeze because
(a) The mosquito had bitten him
(b) He was at the foot of thr ridge
(c) There was no ice on the mountain
(d) There was no breeze on the tundra mountain
42. The traveler carried with him
(a) Mosquito repellent
(b) A pack of food
(c) A sling
(d) A back-pack
43. When he was in the arctic, the time of the year was
(a) Middle of winter
(b) Early autumn
(c) Early spring
(d) Middle of summer