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CSAT 2022 paper

UPSC CSE CSAT 2022 · Question 34 · Reading comprehension

Which one of the following statements best reflects the crux of the passage?

Passage—2

With steady economic growth, higher literacy and increasing skill levels, the number of Indian middle-class families has gone up exponentially. Direct results of the affluence have been changes in dietary patterns and energy consumption levels. People have moved to a higher protein-based diet like milk products, fish and meat, all of which need significantly more water to produce than cereal-based diets. Increasing use of electronic and electric machines/gadgets and motor vehicles needs more and more energy and generation of energy needs water.

CSAT 2022 · Q34

Reading comprehension Easy

Which one of the following statements best reflects the crux of the passage?

Answer & explanation

Answer: (d) Water management practices in India need to change dramatically in the coming years.

Both changes the passage describes — protein-rich diets that need more water, and more gadgets and vehicles whose energy needs water to generate — end in rising demand for water. The crux is that India must manage water very differently.

  • ✗ (a) The passage describes the move to protein-rich diets; it does not argue for persuading people back to cereal diets.
  • ✗ (b) Farm productivity and energy capacity are not the focus; the passage points to water as the common need behind both trends.
  • ✗ (c) The passage links affluence, not technology, to changing habits, and the change it stresses is the resulting demand for water.
  • ✓ (d) Diets that “need significantly more water” and energy whose “generation… needs water” both point to a growing water demand that current practices must be changed to meet.

Remember · For ‘crux’ items, find the idea every sentence leads to — here each trend ends in ‘water’.

Question and answer: UPSC's official GS Paper II (2022, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 30 Sept 2026 (how we verify). ·

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