SSC CGL Reading Comprehension Questions & Solutions

A sample of real SSC CGL Reading Comprehension past-year questions, each with a worked solution and the correct answer highlighted. AthenaPrep has 1282 Reading Comprehension questions in all — sign up free to practise them timed.

Passage
Read the given passage and answer the questions that follow.

Early written symbols were based on pictographs (pictures which resemble what they signify) and ideograms (symbols which represent ideas). Ancient Sumerian, Egyptian, and Chinese civilizations began to adapt such symbols to represent concepts, developing them into logographic writing systems. Pictographs are still in use as the main medium of written communication in some non-literate cultures in Africa, the Americas, and Oceania. Pictographs are often used as simple, pictorial, representational symbols by most contemporary cultures.
Pictographs can be considered an art form, or can be considered a written language and are designated as such in Pre-Columbian art, Native American art, Ancient Mesopotamia and Painting in the Americas before Colonization. One example of many is the Rock art of the Chumash people, part of the Native American history of California.
An early modern example of the extensive use of pictographs may be seen in the map in the London suburban timetables of the London and North Eastern Railway, 1936-1947, designed by George Dow, in which a variety of pictographs was used to indicate facilities available near each station. Pictographs remain in common use today, serving as pictorial, representational signs, instructions, or statistical diagrams. Because of their graphical nature and fairly realistic style, they are widely used to indicate public toilets, or places such as airports and train stations. Because they are a concise way to communicate a concept to people who speak many different languages, pictograms have also been used extensively at the Olympics since 1964 Summer Olympics, and are redesigned for each set of games.
Pictographs can often transcend languages in that they can communicate to speakers of a number of tongues and language families equally effectively, even if the languages and cultures are completely different. This is why road signs and similar pictographic material are often applied as global standards expected to be understood by nearly all.
A standard set of pictographs was defined in the international standard ISO 7001: Public Information Symbols. Other common sets of pictographs are the laundry symbols used on clothing tags and the chemical hazard symbols as standardised by the GHS system. Pictograms have been popularised in use on the web and in software, better known as ‘icons’ displayed on a computer screen in order to help users navigate a computer system or mobile device.
Q1.SSC 2021
Early civilisations used symbols to represent:
- art
- facilities
- concepts
- culture
Show solution
Early civilizations used symbols to represent concepts, as stated in the passage. The other options (art, facilities, culture) do not encompass the primary function of these symbols.

— worked solution by Athena AI
Passage
Read the following passage and answer the questions.
Passage:

The Chinese have been drinking tea for health and enjoyment for more than 5000 years. No one knows what drew them to the glossy, green leaves of Camellia sinensis, but a popular legend fills the gap in our knowledge. According to legend, ShenNong, an early emperor required that all drinking water be boiled. One summer day while visiting a distant region of his kingdom, he stopped to rest because he felt very tired. The servants began to boil water for the king and his ministers to drink. Dried leaves from a nearby bush fell into the boiling water, turning it into a brown liquid. The Emperor drank some of the new liquid. He felt fresh and much better after drinking the liquid. And thus, tea was created. According to an Indian legend a Buddhist monk, on one of his travels about 2000 years ago, swore not to sleep during the nine years of his journey. However, by the end of the third year, he was so fatigued he almost fell asleep. That is when he accidentally stumbled upon a wild tree and picked a few leaves from its top. He chewed on the leaves and soon recovered. Thanks to these leaves, he was able to stay awake during the next six years of his mission. The Japanese version of this legend is slightly different. The monk had vowed to meditate for 7 years without sleep. One night however, he fell asleep. He was so angry with himself that he cut off his eyelids and threw them to the ground. A few years later, passing by the same spot, he noticed a strange-looking bush. He tasted its leaves, and realized that they gave him the power to keep his eyes open. This story soon spread, and tea bushes are often seen in Buddhist places of worship.
Q2.SSC 2019
In all the three legends. the leaves help the person who eats it to recover. This suggests that the leaves :
- are endowed with some magical powers
- can refresh and rejuvenate a person.
- have medicinal powers that can heal.
- can provide energy and capability.
Show solution
The leaves help the person who eats them to recover, suggesting that they can refresh and rejuvenate a person. Option A implies magic, which is not supported by the text. Option C suggests medicinal powers, which is not explicitly stated, and D implies energy, which is less accurate than B.

— worked solution by Athena AI
Passage
Read the passage carefully and select the best answer to each question out of the given four alternatives.
Passage:

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.
Q3.SSC 2019
From where did the Europeans explorers first arrive?
- The West
- The East
- The North
- The South West
Show solution
European explorers first arrived from the West, as stated in the passage: "It was from the west that Europeans explorers first arrived." Therefore, the correct answer is A.

— worked solution by Athena AI
Passage
Improve the bracketed part of the sentence.
Q4.SSC 2019
Eastern North American tribes historically (smoked) tobacco both socially and ceremonially, to seal a peace treaty or trade agreement.
- smokes
- has smoked
- was smoking
- No improvement
Show solution
The sentence requires no improvement as it correctly uses the past tense 'smoked' to indicate a historical action. Other options suggest incorrect verb forms.

— worked solution by Athena AI
Passage
Read the following passage and answer the questions given after it.
Passage:

Sedentary lifestyles are killing us — we need to build activity into our everyday lives, not just leave it for the gym. Google searches relating to physical fitness peak in January. Many people even trawl the web to find out about “desk exercises” and “workouts on the go” in case they are too busy to use their new gym memberships.

Our relationship with exercise is complicated. Reports from the UK and the US show it is something we persistently struggle with. As the new year rolls around, we anticipate having the drive to behave differently and become regular exercisers, even in the knowledge that we will probably fail to do so. Why do we want to exercise? What do we expect it to do for us? We all know we are supposed to be exercising, but hundreds of millions of us can’t face actually doing it. It is just possible that the problem lies at the heart of the idea of exercise itself.

Exercise is movement of the muscles and limbs for a specific outcome, usually to enhance physical fitness. As such, for most of us, it is an optional addition to the working day — yet another item on a long list of responsibilities alongside the fulfilment of parental duties or earning money to put food on the table. But because the principal beneficiaries of exercises are we ourselves, it is one of the easiest chores to Shirk. At the end of the working day, millions of us prefer to indulge in sedentary leisure activities instead of what we all think is good for us: a workout.

Fitness crazes are like diets: if any of them worked, there wouldn’t be so many. CrossFit, the intensely physical, communal workout incorporating free weights, squats, pull-ups and so forth, is still less than 20 years old. Spin classes — vigorous group workouts on stationary bikes — have only been around for about 30. Aerobics was a craze about a decade before that, although many of its highenergy routines had already been around for a while. Before that, there was the jogging revolution, which began in the US in the early 19605. The Joggers Manual, published in 1963 by the Oregon Heart Foundation, was a leaflet of about 200 words that sought to address the postwar panic about sedentary lifestyles by encouraging an accessible form of physical activity, explaining that “jogging is a bit more than a walk”. The jogging boom took a few years to get traction, hitting its stride in the mid- to late-80s, but it remains one of the most popular forms of exercise, now also in groups.

The exercise craze that dominated the 19505 was, oddly, not even an exercise. The vibrating exercise belt promised users could achieve effortless weight loss by having their midriffs violently jiggled. It didn’t work, but you can still find similar machines available for purchase today.
Q5.SSC 2019
Which of the following does not classify as an exercise?
- High-energy Aerobics routines
- Using midriff vibrating belt
- Workouts on stationary bikes
- Squats and pull-ups
Show solution
The vibrating exercise belt does not classify as an exercise because it does not involve active movement of muscles for fitness; it merely jiggles the body. Therefore, option B is correct.
Options A, C, and D all involve active physical engagement, which qualifies them as exercises.

— worked solution by Athena AI
Passage
In the following questions, you have eight brief passage with 5/10 questions following each passage. Read the passages
carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four alternatives.
Passage II:

Time was when people looked heavenward and prayed, “Ye Gods, given us rain, keep drought away,” Today there are those who pray. “Give us rain, keep EI Nino away.”

El Nino and its atmospheric equivalent, called the Southern Oscillation, are together referred to as ENSO, and are household words today. Meteorologists organize it as often being responsible for natural disaster worldwide. But this wisdom dawned only after countries suffered, first from the lack of knowledge, and then from the lack of coordination between policy making and the advance in scientific knowledge.

Put simply, El Nino is a weather event restricted to certain tropical shores, epically the Peruvian coast. The event has diametrically opposite impacts on the land and sea. The Peruvian shore is a desert. But every few years, an unusually warm ocean current - El Nino - warms up the normally cold surface-waters of the Peruvian coast, causing very heavy rains in the early half of the year.

And then, miraculously, the desert is matted green. Crops like cotton, coconuts and banana grow on the other wise stubbornly barren land. These are the Peruvians’ anos de adundencia or years of abundance. The current had come to be termed El Nino, or the Christ Child because it usually appears as an enhancement if a mildly warm current that normally occurs here around every Christmas.

But this boon on land is accompanied by oceanic disasters. Normally, the waters off the South American coast are among the most productive in the world because of a constant upswelling of nutrient rich cold waters from the ocean depths. During an El Nino, however waters are stirred up only from near the surface. The nutrient-crunch pushes down primary production, disrupting the food chain. Many marine species, including anchoveta (anchovies) temporarily disappear.

This is just one damming effect of El Nino. Over the years its full impact has been studied and what the Peruvians once regarded as manna, is now seen as a major threat.
Q6.SSC 2019
Meteorologist took time to understand El Nino because
- It was neither a disaster nor a boon for the people living in desert areas.
- They recognized it as an atmospheric equivalent and hence called it Southern Oscillation.
- They suffered from lack of knowledge about El Nino as they were not scientifically advanced.
- All of the above.
Show solution
Meteorologists took time to understand El Nino due to a lack of knowledge about it, as stated in the passage. Thus, option C is correct. Options A and B are not accurate representations of the reasons provided in the text.

— worked solution by Athena AI
Passage
Read the following passage and answer the questions given after it.
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”.
Q7.SSC 2019
Which of the following states were not covered by the Belagavi centre?
- Karnataka and Kerala
- UTs of Puducherry, Lakshadweep and AN Islands
- Telangana and Andhra Pradesh
- Maharashtra and Goa
Show solution
The correct answer is D: Maharashtra and Goa. The passage states that the Belagavi centre catered to candidates from specific southern states and Union Territories, but does not mention Maharashtra and Goa. Options A, B, and C are all included in the regions covered by the Belagavi centre.

— worked solution by Athena AI
Passage
Read the given passage carefully and select the best answer to each question out of the four given alternatives.
The children should be taught with the basic emotions since their childhood. The affection, love and care should be properly imparted into the child's moulding mind.
They should be explained the virtues of goodness and badness. The child should be able to feel other's pain and emotion, in order to handle the relationships in life
carefully. The teenager should be made aware of the physical and physiological changes in the human structure in a decent and delicate manner, which could
provide them the details with the words of mildness without tingling their emotions. The brutality and violent behavior of the child should be controlled in the first
instance, so as not to let them grow these virtues in the phase of life. A child should be taught the social behavior and basic manners. These are very much required
to lead a respectable life. A child should be made aware of the incidences in the society, along with its impact on the victims and their near and dear ones. These
small pieces of information slowly mould their mind and they start learning how to respect others' feelings and emotions. In the development of a child, the role of
parents and teachers is very crucial. The parents teach their child at home with their behavior towards their family members and outsiders. A teacher in the same
way spreads the virtue of goodness by their way of conversation and interaction within the campus of the institute and in the outside world.
Q8.SSC 2018
According to the passage, which of the following statements is TRUE?
- A teacher should make kids aware of the physical and physiological changes when they become a teenager.
- Children should be explained the virtues of goodness and badness by the government.
- Proper education and money are very much required to lead a respectable life.
- The child should be able to feel other’s pain and emotion.
Show solution
Option D is true as the passage explicitly states that the child should be able to feel others' pain and emotion. Options A, B, and C are either not mentioned or misrepresent the content of the passage.

— worked solution by Athena AI
Passage
A passage is given with 5 questions following it. Read the passage carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four alternatives.
My coat's pretty warm, even though it cost £9.99 and came from the flea market. It had a label in it, CHRISTIN BIOR, but I cut it out as soon as I got home. You can't work where I work and have CHRISTIN BIOR in your coat. You could have a genuine vintage Christian Dior label. Or something Japanese. Or maybe no label because you make your clothes yourself out of retro fabrics that you source at Alfies Antiques. But not CHRISTIN BIOR.
As I get near Catford Bridge, I start to feel a knot of tension. I really don't want to be late today. My boss has started throwing all sorts of hissy fits about people "swanning in at all times," so I left an extra twenty minutes early, in case it was a bad day. I can already see: It's a god-awful day. They've been having a lot of problems on our line recently and keep cancelling trains with no warning. Trouble is, in London rush hour, you can't just cancel trains. What are all the people who were planning to get on that train supposed to do? Evaporate?
Q9.SSC 2017
What has been the problem with London trains lately?
- The trains have become awful.
- There are more trains during rush hour.
- People are late to work because of train delays.
- Trains are cancelled without prior intimation.
Show solution
The passage indicates that trains are being cancelled without prior notice, which is the main issue affecting London trains lately. Therefore, the correct answer is D. The other options do not accurately reflect the problem described.

— worked solution by Athena AI
Passage
A passage is given with 5 questions following it. Read the passage carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four alternatives and click the button corresponding to it.

The snowstorm was getting worse. White flakes whirled around us as we fought our way against the wind. I had almost given up hope of sheltering, when we found an abandoned log cabin in front of us.

I squeezed through the door of the cabin and stepped cautiously inside with Jane close behind me. It was dark and musty-smelling, but at least it was sheltered and dry.

Glad to be out of the storm, we settled down on the dusty floor to wait for a break in the weather."What's this?" asked Jane curiously. Her hand closing over something shiny. She held it up to the weak ray of light that pierced the gloom. A gold necklace glittered and shone. Its ruby pendant was a lustrous wine-red in the faint beam. Strangely, there was no dust on the necklace. It was almost as though it had dropped from the throat of its owner moments ago.

We gazed at each other speechlessly. What strange mystery had we accidently stumbled upon?
Q10.SSC 2016
What had the writer given up hope?
- To be able to withstand this snowstorm
- To be able to fight her way against the wind
- That the snowstorm would improve
- To find shelter from the wind
Show solution
The writer had almost given up hope of finding shelter from the storm, as indicated by the phrase 'I had almost given up hope of sheltering'. The other options do not accurately reflect the writer's feelings about finding shelter.

— worked solution by Athena AI
Passage
In the following questions, you have two passages with 5 questions in each passage. Read the passages carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four alternatives.

Stop reading this passage for a few seconds and look around the room you’re in. Without any perceived effort at all on your part, your brain will register everything within the scope of your vision. But where does all that information known as sensory memory So what if you want to hold on to these fleeting memories for longer ? The answer is obvious you need to pay conscious attention to the sensory input we are receiving. By focusing on it, you can take the information to the next memory level, and turn it into working remember the words you’ve just read so that what follows makes overall sense. True to its name, short-term memory lasts for only a few seconds to a few minutes, but it plays a vital role in our daily lives, allowing us to write down doctor’s appointment, make everyday decisions or have a conversation (think about it you have to recall what someone said to you five seconds ago in order to respond). Of course, there is some information you need to keep for days, months or even years. What you need here is long-term memory. With this, the potential is there to remember something forever.
Q11.SSC 2014
Short-term memory allows us to
- remember events for many years
- remember an event during childhood
- remember simple things like appointments
- remember plenty of dates and numbers
Show solution
Short-term memory is described as allowing us to remember simple, immediate tasks like appointments, which aligns with option C. Options A and B refer to long-term memory, while option D is too broad and not specifically mentioned in the passage.

— worked solution by Athena AI
Passage
Directions : In these questions you have a passage with 10 questions. Read the passage carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four.
The postmaster first took up his duties in the village of Ulapur. Though the village was a small one, there was an indigo factory nearby and the propritor, an Englishman, had managed to get a post office established. Our postmaster belonged to Calcutta. He felt like a fish out of water in this remove village. His office and living-room were in a dark thatched shed, not far from a green, silmy pond, surrounded on all sides by a dense growth. The men employed in the indigo factory had no leisure, moreover they were hardly desirable companions for decent folk. Nor is a Calcutta boy an adept in the art of associating with others. Among strangers he appears either proud or ill at ease. At any rate the postmaster had but little company, nor had he much to do. At times he tried his hand at writing a verse or two. That the movement of the leaves and clouds of the sky were enough to fill life with joy - such were the sentiments to which he sought to give expression. But God knows that the poor fellow would have felt it as the gift of a new life, if some genie of the Arabian Nights had in one night swept away the trees, leaves and all, and replaced them with a macadamised road, hiding the clouds from view with rows of tall houses.
Q12.SSC 2013
What does the phrase 'ill at ease' in the passage mean?
- Forward
- Disease
- Comfortable
- Uneasy
Show solution
The phrase 'ill at ease' means feeling uncomfortable or anxious. Therefore, the correct answer is D. Uneasy. Options A (Forward), B (Disease), and C (Comfortable) do not convey the same meaning.

— worked solution by Athena AI

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SSC CGL Reading Comprehension previous year questions with solutions — AthenaPrep

SSC CGL Reading Comprehension Questions & Solutions

Passage

Read the given passage and answer the questions that follow.

Early written symbols were based on pictographs (pictures which resemble what they signify) and ideograms (symbols which represent ideas). Ancient Sumerian, Egyptian, and Chinese civilizations began to adapt such symbols to represent concepts, developing them into logographic writing systems. Pictographs are still in use as the main medium of written communication in some non-literate cultures in Africa, the Americas, and Oceania. Pictographs are often used as simple, pictorial, representational symbols by most contemporary cultures.

Pictographs can be considered an art form, or can be considered a written language and are designated as such in Pre-Columbian art, Native American art, Ancient Mesopotamia and Painting in the Americas before Colonization. One example of many is the Rock art of the Chumash people, part of the Native American history of California.

An early modern example of the extensive use of pictographs may be seen in the map in the London suburban timetables of the London and North Eastern Railway, 1936-1947, designed by George Dow, in which a variety of pictographs was used to indicate facilities available near each station. Pictographs remain in common use today, serving as pictorial, representational signs, instructions, or statistical diagrams. Because of their graphical nature and fairly realistic style, they are widely used to indicate public toilets, or places such as airports and train stations. Because they are a concise way to communicate a concept to people who speak many different languages, pictograms have also been used extensively at the Olympics since 1964 Summer Olympics, and are redesigned for each set of games.

Pictographs can often transcend languages in that they can communicate to speakers of a number of tongues and language families equally effectively, even if the languages and cultures are completely different. This is why road signs and similar pictographic material are often applied as global standards expected to be understood by nearly all.

A standard set of pictographs was defined in the international standard ISO 7001: Public Information Symbols. Other common sets of pictographs are the laundry symbols used on clothing tags and the chemical hazard symbols as standardised by the GHS system. Pictograms have been popularised in use on the web and in software, better known as ‘icons’ displayed on a computer screen in order to help users navigate a computer system or mobile device.

Q1.SSC 2021

Early civilisations used symbols to represent:

art
facilities
concepts
culture

Show solution

Early civilizations used symbols to represent concepts, as stated in the passage. The other options (art, facilities, culture) do not encompass the primary function of these symbols.

— worked solution by Athena AI

Passage

Read the following passage and answer the questions.
Passage:

The Chinese have been drinking tea for health and enjoyment for more than 5000 years. No one knows what drew them to the glossy, green leaves of Camellia sinensis, but a popular legend fills the gap in our knowledge. According to legend, ShenNong, an early emperor required that all drinking water be boiled. One summer day while visiting a distant region of his kingdom, he stopped to rest because he felt very tired. The servants began to boil water for the king and his ministers to drink. Dried leaves from a nearby bush fell into the boiling water, turning it into a brown liquid. The Emperor drank some of the new liquid. He felt fresh and much better after drinking the liquid. And thus, tea was created. According to an Indian legend a Buddhist monk, on one of his travels about 2000 years ago, swore not to sleep during the nine years of his journey. However, by the end of the third year, he was so fatigued he almost fell asleep. That is when he accidentally stumbled upon a wild tree and picked a few leaves from its top. He chewed on the leaves and soon recovered. Thanks to these leaves, he was able to stay awake during the next six years of his mission. The Japanese version of this legend is slightly different. The monk had vowed to meditate for 7 years without sleep. One night however, he fell asleep. He was so angry with himself that he cut off his eyelids and threw them to the ground. A few years later, passing by the same spot, he noticed a strange-looking bush. He tasted its leaves, and realized that they gave him the power to keep his eyes open. This story soon spread, and tea bushes are often seen in Buddhist places of worship.

Q2.SSC 2019

In all the three legends. the leaves help the person who eats it to recover. This suggests that the leaves :

are endowed with some magical powers
can refresh and rejuvenate a person.
have medicinal powers that can heal.
can provide energy and capability.

Show solution

The leaves help the person who eats them to recover, suggesting that they can refresh and rejuvenate a person. Option A implies magic, which is not supported by the text. Option C suggests medicinal powers, which is not explicitly stated, and D implies energy, which is less accurate than B.

— worked solution by Athena AI

Passage

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

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.

Q3.SSC 2019

From where did the Europeans explorers first arrive?

The West
The East
The North
The South West

Show solution

European explorers first arrived from the West, as stated in the passage: "It was from the west that Europeans explorers first arrived." Therefore, the correct answer is A.

— worked solution by Athena AI

Passage

Improve the bracketed part of the sentence.

Q4.SSC 2019

Eastern North American tribes historically (smoked) tobacco both socially and ceremonially, to seal a peace treaty or trade agreement.

smokes
has smoked
was smoking
No improvement

Show solution

The sentence requires no improvement as it correctly uses the past tense 'smoked' to indicate a historical action. Other options suggest incorrect verb forms.

— worked solution by Athena AI

Passage

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

Sedentary lifestyles are killing us — we need to build activity into our everyday lives, not just leave it for the gym. Google searches relating to physical fitness peak in January. Many people even trawl the web to find out about “desk exercises” and “workouts on the go” in case they are too busy to use their new gym memberships.

Our relationship with exercise is complicated. Reports from the UK and the US show it is something we persistently struggle with. As the new year rolls around, we anticipate having the drive to behave differently and become regular exercisers, even in the knowledge that we will probably fail to do so. Why do we want to exercise? What do we expect it to do for us? We all know we are supposed to be exercising, but hundreds of millions of us can’t face actually doing it. It is just possible that the problem lies at the heart of the idea of exercise itself.

Exercise is movement of the muscles and limbs for a specific outcome, usually to enhance physical fitness. As such, for most of us, it is an optional addition to the working day — yet another item on a long list of responsibilities alongside the fulfilment of parental duties or earning money to put food on the table. But because the principal beneficiaries of exercises are we ourselves, it is one of the easiest chores to Shirk. At the end of the working day, millions of us prefer to indulge in sedentary leisure activities instead of what we all think is good for us: a workout.

Fitness crazes are like diets: if any of them worked, there wouldn’t be so many. CrossFit, the intensely physical, communal workout incorporating free weights, squats, pull-ups and so forth, is still less than 20 years old. Spin classes — vigorous group workouts on stationary bikes — have only been around for about 30. Aerobics was a craze about a decade before that, although many of its highenergy routines had already been around for a while. Before that, there was the jogging revolution, which began in the US in the early 19605. The Joggers Manual, published in 1963 by the Oregon Heart Foundation, was a leaflet of about 200 words that sought to address the postwar panic about sedentary lifestyles by encouraging an accessible form of physical activity, explaining that “jogging is a bit more than a walk”. The jogging boom took a few years to get traction, hitting its stride in the mid- to late-80s, but it remains one of the most popular forms of exercise, now also in groups.

The exercise craze that dominated the 19505 was, oddly, not even an exercise. The vibrating exercise belt promised users could achieve effortless weight loss by having their midriffs violently jiggled. It didn’t work, but you can still find similar machines available for purchase today.

Q5.SSC 2019

Which of the following does not classify as an exercise?

High-energy Aerobics routines
Using midriff vibrating belt
Workouts on stationary bikes
Squats and pull-ups

Show solution

The vibrating exercise belt does not classify as an exercise because it does not involve active movement of muscles for fitness; it merely jiggles the body. Therefore, option B is correct.
Options A, C, and D all involve active physical engagement, which qualifies them as exercises.

— worked solution by Athena AI

Passage

In the following questions, you have eight brief passage with 5/10 questions following each passage. Read the passages
carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four alternatives.
Passage II:

Time was when people looked heavenward and prayed, “Ye Gods, given us rain, keep drought away,” Today there are those who pray. “Give us rain, keep EI Nino away.”

El Nino and its atmospheric equivalent, called the Southern Oscillation, are together referred to as ENSO, and are household words today. Meteorologists organize it as often being responsible for natural disaster worldwide. But this wisdom dawned only after countries suffered, first from the lack of knowledge, and then from the lack of coordination between policy making and the advance in scientific knowledge.

Put simply, El Nino is a weather event restricted to certain tropical shores, epically the Peruvian coast. The event has diametrically opposite impacts on the land and sea. The Peruvian shore is a desert. But every few years, an unusually warm ocean current - El Nino - warms up the normally cold surface-waters of the Peruvian coast, causing very heavy rains in the early half of the year.

And then, miraculously, the desert is matted green. Crops like cotton, coconuts and banana grow on the other wise stubbornly barren land. These are the Peruvians’ anos de adundencia or years of abundance. The current had come to be termed El Nino, or the Christ Child because it usually appears as an enhancement if a mildly warm current that normally occurs here around every Christmas.

But this boon on land is accompanied by oceanic disasters. Normally, the waters off the South American coast are among the most productive in the world because of a constant upswelling of nutrient rich cold waters from the ocean depths. During an El Nino, however waters are stirred up only from near the surface. The nutrient-crunch pushes down primary production, disrupting the food chain. Many marine species, including anchoveta (anchovies) temporarily disappear.

This is just one damming effect of El Nino. Over the years its full impact has been studied and what the Peruvians once regarded as manna, is now seen as a major threat.

Q6.SSC 2019

Meteorologist took time to understand El Nino because

It was neither a disaster nor a boon for the people living in desert areas.
They recognized it as an atmospheric equivalent and hence called it Southern Oscillation.
They suffered from lack of knowledge about El Nino as they were not scientifically advanced.
All of the above.

Show solution

Meteorologists took time to understand El Nino due to a lack of knowledge about it, as stated in the passage. Thus, option C is correct. Options A and B are not accurate representations of the reasons provided in the text.

— worked solution by Athena AI

Passage

Read the following passage and answer the questions given after it.
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”.

Q7.SSC 2019

Which of the following states were not covered by the Belagavi centre?

Karnataka and Kerala
UTs of Puducherry, Lakshadweep and AN Islands
Telangana and Andhra Pradesh
Maharashtra and Goa

Show solution

The correct answer is D: Maharashtra and Goa. The passage states that the Belagavi centre catered to candidates from specific southern states and Union Territories, but does not mention Maharashtra and Goa. Options A, B, and C are all included in the regions covered by the Belagavi centre.

— worked solution by Athena AI

Passage

Read the given passage carefully and select the best answer to each question out of the four given alternatives.
The children should be taught with the basic emotions since their childhood. The affection, love and care should be properly imparted into the child's moulding mind.
They should be explained the virtues of goodness and badness. The child should be able to feel other's pain and emotion, in order to handle the relationships in life
carefully. The teenager should be made aware of the physical and physiological changes in the human structure in a decent and delicate manner, which could
provide them the details with the words of mildness without tingling their emotions. The brutality and violent behavior of the child should be controlled in the first
instance, so as not to let them grow these virtues in the phase of life. A child should be taught the social behavior and basic manners. These are very much required
to lead a respectable life. A child should be made aware of the incidences in the society, along with its impact on the victims and their near and dear ones. These
small pieces of information slowly mould their mind and they start learning how to respect others' feelings and emotions. In the development of a child, the role of
parents and teachers is very crucial. The parents teach their child at home with their behavior towards their family members and outsiders. A teacher in the same
way spreads the virtue of goodness by their way of conversation and interaction within the campus of the institute and in the outside world.

Q8.SSC 2018

According to the passage, which of the following statements is TRUE?

A teacher should make kids aware of the physical and physiological changes when they become a teenager.
Children should be explained the virtues of goodness and badness by the government.
Proper education and money are very much required to lead a respectable life.
The child should be able to feel other’s pain and emotion.

Show solution

Option D is true as the passage explicitly states that the child should be able to feel others' pain and emotion. Options A, B, and C are either not mentioned or misrepresent the content of the passage.

— worked solution by Athena AI

Passage

A passage is given with 5 questions following it. Read the passage carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four alternatives.
My coat's pretty warm, even though it cost £9.99 and came from the flea market. It had a label in it, CHRISTIN BIOR, but I cut it out as soon as I got home. You can't work where I work and have CHRISTIN BIOR in your coat. You could have a genuine vintage Christian Dior label. Or something Japanese. Or maybe no label because you make your clothes yourself out of retro fabrics that you source at Alfies Antiques. But not CHRISTIN BIOR.
As I get near Catford Bridge, I start to feel a knot of tension. I really don't want to be late today. My boss has started throwing all sorts of hissy fits about people "swanning in at all times," so I left an extra twenty minutes early, in case it was a bad day. I can already see: It's a god-awful day. They've been having a lot of problems on our line recently and keep cancelling trains with no warning. Trouble is, in London rush hour, you can't just cancel trains. What are all the people who were planning to get on that train supposed to do? Evaporate?

Q9.SSC 2017

What has been the problem with London trains lately?

The trains have become awful.
There are more trains during rush hour.
People are late to work because of train delays.
Trains are cancelled without prior intimation.

Show solution

The passage indicates that trains are being cancelled without prior notice, which is the main issue affecting London trains lately. Therefore, the correct answer is D. The other options do not accurately reflect the problem described.

— worked solution by Athena AI

Passage

A passage is given with 5 questions following it. Read the passage carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four alternatives and click the button corresponding to it.

The snowstorm was getting worse. White flakes whirled around us as we fought our way against the wind. I had almost given up hope of sheltering, when we found an abandoned log cabin in front of us.

I squeezed through the door of the cabin and stepped cautiously inside with Jane close behind me. It was dark and musty-smelling, but at least it was sheltered and dry.

Glad to be out of the storm, we settled down on the dusty floor to wait for a break in the weather."What's this?" asked Jane curiously. Her hand closing over something shiny. She held it up to the weak ray of light that pierced the gloom. A gold necklace glittered and shone. Its ruby pendant was a lustrous wine-red in the faint beam. Strangely, there was no dust on the necklace. It was almost as though it had dropped from the throat of its owner moments ago.

We gazed at each other speechlessly. What strange mystery had we accidently stumbled upon?

Q10.SSC 2016

What had the writer given up hope?

To be able to withstand this snowstorm
To be able to fight her way against the wind
That the snowstorm would improve
To find shelter from the wind

Show solution

The writer had almost given up hope of finding shelter from the storm, as indicated by the phrase 'I had almost given up hope of sheltering'. The other options do not accurately reflect the writer's feelings about finding shelter.

— worked solution by Athena AI

Passage

In the following questions, you have two passages with 5 questions in each passage. Read the passages carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four alternatives.

Stop reading this passage for a few seconds and look around the room you’re in. Without any perceived effort at all on your part, your brain will register everything within the scope of your vision. But where does all that information known as sensory memory So what if you want to hold on to these fleeting memories for longer ? The answer is obvious you need to pay conscious attention to the sensory input we are receiving. By focusing on it, you can take the information to the next memory level, and turn it into working remember the words you’ve just read so that what follows makes overall sense. True to its name, short-term memory lasts for only a few seconds to a few minutes, but it plays a vital role in our daily lives, allowing us to write down doctor’s appointment, make everyday decisions or have a conversation (think about it you have to recall what someone said to you five seconds ago in order to respond). Of course, there is some information you need to keep for days, months or even years. What you need here is long-term memory. With this, the potential is there to remember something forever.

Q11.SSC 2014

Short-term memory allows us to

remember events for many years
remember an event during childhood
remember simple things like appointments
remember plenty of dates and numbers

Show solution

Short-term memory is described as allowing us to remember simple, immediate tasks like appointments, which aligns with option C. Options A and B refer to long-term memory, while option D is too broad and not specifically mentioned in the passage.

— worked solution by Athena AI

Passage

Directions : In these questions you have a passage with 10 questions. Read the passage carefully and choose the best answer to each question out of the four.
The postmaster first took up his duties in the village of Ulapur. Though the village was a small one, there was an indigo factory nearby and the propritor, an Englishman, had managed to get a post office established. Our postmaster belonged to Calcutta. He felt like a fish out of water in this remove village. His office and living-room were in a dark thatched shed, not far from a green, silmy pond, surrounded on all sides by a dense growth. The men employed in the indigo factory had no leisure, moreover they were hardly desirable companions for decent folk. Nor is a Calcutta boy an adept in the art of associating with others. Among strangers he appears either proud or ill at ease. At any rate the postmaster had but little company, nor had he much to do. At times he tried his hand at writing a verse or two. That the movement of the leaves and clouds of the sky were enough to fill life with joy - such were the sentiments to which he sought to give expression. But God knows that the poor fellow would have felt it as the gift of a new life, if some genie of the Arabian Nights had in one night swept away the trees, leaves and all, and replaced them with a macadamised road, hiding the clouds from view with rows of tall houses.

Q12.SSC 2013

What does the phrase 'ill at ease' in the passage mean?

Forward
Disease
Comfortable
Uneasy

Show solution

The phrase 'ill at ease' means feeling uncomfortable or anxious. Therefore, the correct answer is D. Uneasy. Options A (Forward), B (Disease), and C (Comfortable) do not convey the same meaning.

— worked solution by Athena AI

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