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CSAT 2025 paper

UPSC CSE CSAT 2025 · Question 21 · Reading comprehension

Which one of the following statements best reflects the corollary to the above passage?

Directions for the following 4 (four) items: Read the following two passages and answer the items that follow the passages. Your answers to these items should be based on the passages only.

Passage—1

One of the dismal realities of the agricultural sector in independent India has been that it never experienced a high-growth phase, unlike the non-agricultural economy. The highest decadal growth (compound annual growth rate or CAGR) for agriculture has been just 3.5% in the 1980s. Also, after experiencing a spurt in decadal growth during the 1980s, agricultural growth suffered relative stagnation thereafter. This is in sharp contrast to non-agricultural growth, which consistently increased from the 1980s to 2000s.

CSAT 2025 · Q21

Reading comprehension Medium

Which one of the following statements best reflects the corollary to the above passage?

Answer & explanation

Answer: (a) The benefit of economic reforms percolates down more slowly to the agriculture sector than in other sectors of the economy.

The passage contrasts agriculture, which peaked at 3.5% growth in the 1980s and then stagnated, with non-agricultural growth that kept rising into the 2000s. The only option that follows from this contrast is that the gains of the reform period reached agriculture more slowly than the rest of the economy.

  • ✓ (a) Non-agricultural growth 'consistently increased from the 1980s to 2000s' — a period spanning the economic reforms — while agriculture 'suffered relative stagnation'. The natural corollary is that the benefits of that period reached agriculture more slowly than other sectors.
  • ✗ (b) The green revolution is not mentioned; the passage in fact records agriculture's best decade in the 1980s and draws no verdict on any programme.
  • ✗ (c) No comparison with other countries or with mechanisation is made. The passage compares agriculture only with India's own non-agricultural economy.
  • ✗ (d) Migration is not discussed. The passage describes the stagnation but does not attribute it to any cause.

Remember · A corollary follows from the facts given; reject options that name a cause (migration, green revolution, other countries) the passage never discusses.

Question and answer: UPSC's official GS Paper II (2025, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 30 Sept 2026 (how we verify). ·

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