Questions

In each of the questions, four alternatives are given for the Idiom/Phrase. Choose the alternative which best expresses the meaning of the Idiom/Phrase and click the button corresponding to it.

Face the music

Read the passage carefully and select the best answer to each question out of the given four alternatives.

The Amazon basin has been continuously inhabited for at least 10, 000 years, possibly more. Its earliest inhabitants were stone-age peoples, living in hundreds of far-flung tribes, some tiny, others numbering in the tens of thousands. It was from the west that Europeans explorers first arrived. In 1541 a Spanish expedition from Quito, led by Gonzalo Pizarro, ran short of supplies while exploring east of the Andes in what is today Peru. Pizarro’s cousin Francisco de Orellana offered to take 60 men along with the boats from the expedition and forage for supplies. De Orellana floated down the Rio Napo to its confluence with the Amazon, near Iquitos (Peru), and then to the mouth of the Amazon. Along the way his expedition suffered numerous attacks by Indians; some of the Indian warriors, they reported, were female, like the Amazons of Greek mythology, and thus the world’s greatest river got its name. No one made a serious effort to claim this sweaty territory, however, until the Portuguese built a fort near the mouth of the river at Belém in 1616, and sent Pedro Teixeira up the river to Quito and back between 1637 and 1639. During the 17th and 18th centuries, Portuguese bandeirantes (groups of roaming adventurers) penetrated ever further into the rain forest in pursuit of gold and Indian slaves, exploring as far as present-day Rondônia, and the Guaporé and Madeira river valleys. Amazonian Indians had long used the sap from rubber trees to make waterproof bags and other items. European explorers recognized the potential value of natural latex, but were unable to market it because it tended to grow soft in the heat, or brittle in the cold, and thus had limited appeal outside the rain forest. However, in 1842 American Charles Goodyear developed vulcanization (made natural rubber durable) and in 1890 Ireland’s John Dunlop patented pneumatic rubber tires. Soon there was an unquenchable demand for rubber in the recently industrialized USA and Europe, and the price of rubber on international markets soared. As profits skyrocketed, so did exploitation of the seringueiros, or rubber tappers, who were lured into the Amazon, mostly from the drought-stricken northeast, by the promise of prosperity only to be locked into a cruel system of virtual slavery dominated by seringalistas (owners of rubber-bearing forests). Rigged scales, hired guns, widespread illiteracy among the rubber tappers, and monopoly of sales and purchases all combined to perpetuate the workers’ debt and misery. In addition, seringueiros had to contend with jungle fevers, Indian attacks and all manner of deprivation.

Seringalistas refers to

A sentence/a part of the sentence is underlined. Four alternatives are given to the underlined part which will improve the sentence. Choose the correct alternative and click the button corresponding to it. In case no improvement is needed, click the button corresponding to “No improvement”.

Would you feel safe if you have to walk through a street alone at midnight?

In the following question, a sentence has been given in Active/Passive voice. Out of the four alternatives suggested, select the one which best expresses the same sentence in Passive/Active voice.

The class is required to watch a video tutorial every day.

Out of the four alternatives, choose the one which can be substituted for the given words/sentences and click the button corresponding to it.

A place where soldiers live

In the question given below, three paragraphs are given, which are jumbled. Find the correct sequence of these paragraphs so that they form a meaningful passage.
A. The power of compounding works the way it does because you are reinvesting the interest that you earn back into the instrument, besides giving it time to grow. Let’s simplify it further. Say in the first year you invest ₹100 and you get 10% annual return of ₹10. Next year, along with ₹110 (the first year principal amount and the interest amount), you will put another ₹100. The ₹10 you earned as interest gets reinvested, helping you grow your money faster.

B. To get a perspective, let’s turn to some numbers. Say you started investing ₹3,000 a month when you were 25, and go on till you are 60. At an average annual rate of 7% returns, your corpus will grow to ₹53.24 lakh. If you decide to start investing at the age of 35 years, even if you put aside double the amount— ₹6,000 per month — till the age of 60, the value of your corpus will be only ₹48.72 lakh. The example shows that you would need half the amount to get more in returns if you start investing early.
C. Adulting can’t wait when it comes to savings and investing. Why you may ask? If you delay your investments, how will you see the magic of compounding? When it comes to investing, you need to start early. In fact, you should start saving and investing as soon as you start earning. Compounding allows you to build a bigger corpus with a smaller amount.

In the following question, out of the four alternatives, select the alternative which will improve the bracketed part of the sentence. In case no improvement is needed, select "no improvement".

This unresponsive attitude by people must (has hurt) him.

In the following question, some part of the sentence may have errors. Find out which part of the sentence has an error and select the appropriate option. If a sentence is free from error, select 'No Error'.

Her behaviour (1)/ around him (2)/ was a little oddly. (3)/ No error (4)