Biodiversity, plants & animals

Answer: (d) 3

River dolphins live only in fresh water and cannot pass from one river system to another through the sea. Finding the same kind of dolphin in both the Indus and the Ganga systems was therefore read as proof that the two systems were once joined, with a tributary such as the Yamuna or the Sutlej changing sides in the Pleistocene.

• ✗ 1. The Nadistuti (Nadi) Sukta is a hymn in praise of the rivers of north-west India. It names the rivers in order but says nothing about Pleistocene river courses.
• ✗ 2. Robert Bruce Foote is known for discovering Palaeolithic tools in South India (Pallavaram, 1863), not for exploring the Sutlej and the Yamuna.
• ✓ 3. A freshwater dolphin common to the Indus and the Ganga systems implies an old connection between them, which is exactly what the assertion claims. The Convention on Migratory Species document proposed by India treats the South Asian river dolphin, Platanista gangetica, as one species spread across rivers in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal (the Indus form being a subspecies).
• • Since then The Indus and Ganges dolphins were long treated as one species; since 2021 scientists list them as two species, Platanista minor and Platanista gangetica (Britannica). The old argument used the single-species view.

Remember · The shared South Asian river dolphin of the Indus and Ganga systems is the classic clue that the two drainages were once linked through a shifting tributary.

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Answer: (b) 1 and 2

The western hoolock gibbon, India's only ape, is assessed as Endangered by the IUCN, and Assam's Hollongapar Gibbon Wildlife Sanctuary in Jorhat is named after it. Gibbons are expert brachiators that swing arm over arm through the canopy, but they are small, light apes, not heavily built like gorillas.

• ✓ 1. Hollongapar Gibbon Wildlife Sanctuary (about 21 sq km, Jorhat district, Assam) is named after the hoolock gibbon; the western hoolock (Hoolock hoolock) is listed as Endangered on the IUCN Red List.
• ✓ 2. Gibbons have very long forearms and move mainly by brachiation, swinging from branch to branch and covering more than 3 m in a single swing.
• ✗ 3. Gibbons are the lightest apes, weighing roughly 4–13 kg; the agility comes from a slender, light build, not a heavy gorilla-like body.

Remember · Western hoolock gibbon: India's only ape, IUCN Endangered, Schedule I; Hollongapar Gibbon Sanctuary, Jorhat (Assam); moves by brachiation.

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Answer: (a) 1 only

Amur Falcons stop over in the Doyang area of Wokha district for about a month each October–November on their long migration to southern Africa. Mass hunting in 2012 gave way to protection by villagers, churches, youth groups and the forest department, which is why the roost now thrives. Satellite tags only record their routes; they do not guide the birds, and the falcons do not stay in India.

• ✓ 1. After the 2012 slaughter, local communities around Pangti and Doyang turned protectors, enforcing hunting bans; the safe roost is the product of that sustained community effort.
• ✗ 2. Satellite tagging (from 2013) was used to study the falcons' routes; migratory birds navigate on their own, and tags play no part in guiding them back.
• ✗ 3. The falcons are passage migrants: they spend about a month in Nagaland and then continue to southern Africa, so they have not become permanent residents.

Remember · Amur Falcon: breeds in Siberia–China–Mongolia, stops over in Nagaland (Pangti, Doyang, Wokha) in Oct–Nov, winters in southern Africa; a community-conservation success after 2012.

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Answer: (b) 1 and 3

The foxtail orchid grows perched on trees rather than in soil, and it is the State flower of Arunachal Pradesh and of Assam. It is not a North-east endemic, because the species ranges across South and South-east Asia.

• ✓ 1. The Botanical Survey of India describes Rhynchostylis retusa as an epiphytic herb: it lives on the branches of host trees. NCERT gives an orchid growing on a mango branch as its standard example of an epiphyte.
• ✗ 2. The Botanical Survey of India gives its range as India, Bhutan, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam, so it is not restricted to North-east India.
• ✓ 3. Arunachal Pradesh's official state profile lists the Foxtail Orchid as its State Flower, and the Botanical Survey of India's State Flower sheet for Assam names the same orchid (kopou phul) as Assam's State Flower.

Remember · Foxtail orchid (Rhynchostylis retusa): an epiphyte; State flower of Arunachal Pradesh and Assam; widespread in Asia, not a North-east endemic.

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Answer: (d) II and III

The Gooty (peacock) tarantula, Poecilotheria metallica, is a spider, so it is an arachnid and not a crustacean, and it hunts animal prey rather than being an omnivore. It is a tree-dwelling species restricted to a few forest patches in the Eastern Ghats, so II and III are correct.

• ✗ I Tarantulas belong to the class Arachnida (order Araneae, family Theraphosidae), not to the crustaceans, and Britannica says they feed mainly at night on insects and occasionally on small frogs, toads and mice, so 'omnivorous crustacean' is wrong on both counts.
• ✓ II The species is endemic to India and is Critically Endangered because it is restricted to a small, highly degraded forest area in the Eastern Ghats (between Nandyal and Giddalur, Andhra Pradesh); a later record extended its range to the Eastern Ghats of Tamil Nadu, but it remains confined to a few forest areas.
• ✓ III Its genus, Poecilotheria, is the only tarantula genus that is specifically arboreal, living in trees in the forests of peninsular India and Sri Lanka.

Remember · Gooty (peacock) tarantula, Poecilotheria metallica: an arboreal spider (arachnid), endemic to a small Eastern Ghats forest area in India; IUCN Critically Endangered.

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Answer: (b) Only three

Cassava (woody shrub), ginger (herb with a pseudostem) and Malabar spinach (climber) are matched correctly. Mint is a herbaceous perennial, not an annual shrub, and papaya is a tree-like herb, not a woody shrub. That makes three correct pairs.

• ✓ I FAO describes cassava as a woody perennial shrub that grows 1 m to 5 m tall.
• ✓ II Ginger is a slender perennial herb; its leafy shoot is a pseudostem formed by the leaf sheaths, not a true stem.
• ✓ III Malabar spinach (Basella) has soft, succulent, branched climbing stems, so it is a herbaceous climber.
• ✗ IV Mint is a herbaceous perennial that spreads by stolons; it is a herb, not a shrub.
• ✗ V FAO calls papaya a fast-growing tree-like herb, so it is not a woody shrub.

Remember · Cassava = woody shrub; ginger = herb with a pseudostem; Malabar spinach = climber; mint = herbaceous perennial; papaya = tree-like herb (not woody).

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Answer: (a) The European Union

The Nature Restoration Law is a European Union law. The Council of the EU adopted it on 17 June 2024 and it entered into force on 18 August 2024, setting binding targets to restore degraded ecosystems across the EU's land and sea areas.

• ✓ (a) The European Commission describes the Nature Restoration Law as a key element of the EU Biodiversity Strategy, with binding restoration targets for habitats and species that should cover at least 20% of the EU's land and sea areas by 2030.
• ✗ (b) The World Bank Group describes its role as providing financial products and policy advice to countries; it is not the body that enacted this law.
• ✗ (c) The OECD describes itself as an international organisation that works to build better policies; it did not enact this law.
• ✗ (d) The FAO describes itself as a specialized agency of the United Nations that leads international efforts to defeat hunger; it did not enact this law.
• • Since then The Commission's page now calls the same law the 'Nature Restoration Regulation'; in 2024 it used 'Nature Restoration Law'. The content and the dates above are unchanged.

Remember · The Nature Restoration Law is a European Union regulation, in force since 18 August 2024, with binding targets to restore ecosystems by 2030 and 2050.

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Answer: (b) Only three

A parasitoid is an insect whose larva lives on or inside a single host and eventually kills it. Almost all parasitoids are wasps and flies, with a smaller number of beetles, including some carabid (ground) beetles. Centipedes are free-living predators and termites are social decomposers, so only three groups qualify.

• ✓ 1. Some carabid beetles are parasitoids: for example, the larvae of Lebia grandis develop on and kill the pupae of the Colorado potato beetle.
• ✗ 2. Centipedes are active predators that kill prey with venomous claws; they do not develop inside a host.
• ✓ 3. Many flies are parasitoids — tachinid and conopid flies, for example, grow inside other insects and kill them.
• ✗ 4. Termites are social insects that feed on wood and plant matter; none lives as a parasitoid.
• ✓ 5. Parasitic wasps are the largest parasitoid group: they lay eggs inside other insects and the host dies, which is why they are used in biological pest control.

Remember · Parasitoids kill their host (unlike true parasites). Main groups: wasps (Hymenoptera), flies (Diptera), some beetles. Used widely for biological pest control.

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Answer: (c) All three

The pea family is Fabaceae (Leguminosae), the legumes — plants that bear pods and host nitrogen-fixing bacteria in root nodules. Groundnut (Arachis hypogaea), horse-gram (Macrotyloma uniflorum) and soybean (Glycine max) are all legumes, so all three belong to it.

• ✓ 1. Groundnut (Arachis hypogaea) is an oilseed legume whose pods ripen underground.
• ✓ 2. Horse-gram (Macrotyloma uniflorum, kulthi) is a drought-hardy pulse legume grown mainly in peninsular India.
• ✓ 3. Soybean (Glycine max) is a legume with the highest protein content among them, grown for oil and food.

Remember · Pea family = Fabaceae/Leguminosae: pulses (gram, horse-gram, lentil, pea) and oilseed legumes (groundnut, soybean) — all fix nitrogen via root nodules.

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UPSC dropped this question from evaluation in its final answer key.

UPSC dropped this question from evaluation in its final answer key. Statement-II is plainly wrong - the Indian flying fox is a fruit bat that eats fruit and nectar, not blood. Statement-I was also out of date by 2024: the 2022 amendment removed the Act's vermin schedule, so none of the four options fits.

• ✗ Statement-I The Wild Life (Protection) Amendment Act, 2022 cut the schedules from six to four and removed the vermin schedule, so by 2024 the statement was out of date. Under the amended section 62, the Central Government may declare a Schedule II animal to be vermin by notification, for a stated area and period.
• ✗ Statement-II The Indian flying fox (Pteropus medius) is one of India's largest fruit bats; it feeds on fruits and nectar and helps pollinate flowers and disperse seeds. Blood-feeding vampire bats live only in the Americas.

Remember · Indian flying fox = fruit bat (fruit, nectar; Nipah virus reservoir). WPA amendment 2022: four schedules, no vermin schedule; the Central Government declares vermin by notification under Section 62.

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Answer: (c) Insects

All three are insects, and all three belong to Hemiptera, the true bugs. The cicada is the loud 'singing' insect of trees, the froghopper (spittlebug) is a small jumping insect whose young hide in blobs of froth on plants, and the pond skater (water strider) runs across the surface film of still water.

• ✓ (c) Cicadas and froghoppers (spittlebugs) are grouped in the Auchenorrhyncha, and water striders (pond skaters) in the Heteroptera; both groups are true bugs (order Hemiptera), and true bugs are insects with six legs and a body in three parts.
• ✗ (b) The pond skater lives on water but never under it: water-repellent hairs on its legs let it stand on the surface, and it breathes air like other insects.
• ✗ (d) 'Froghopper' is only a name for its frog-like leap; it is a small bug, not a reptile or an amphibian.

Remember · Cicada (Cicadidae), froghopper or spittlebug (Cercopidae) and pond skater or water strider (Gerridae) are all insects of the bug group Hemiptera.

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Answer: (d) None

Every pair is shuffled. The indri is a lemur that lives only in Madagascar, the bonobo is an African ape found in the Congo basin forests of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and the elk is a large deer of North America and the cold uplands of Asia; none of them occurs wild in the country it is paired with.

• ✗ 1. The indri (Indri indri), the largest of the lemurs, lives in the eastern rainforests of Madagascar and is Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List. Lemurs do not occur naturally in South America, so Brazil is wrong.
• ✗ 2. The elk (wapiti) is a large deer known from North America, where scientists call it Cervus canadensis, and it is also found in parts of Central and East Asia. Tropical Indonesia has no wild elk.
• ✗ 3. The bonobo, or pygmy chimpanzee, is an African great ape; UNESCO notes it as a threatened species of Salonga National Park in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Madagascar has no apes.

Remember · Indri = Madagascar (largest lemur). Bonobo = DR Congo only (Salonga NP). Elk/wapiti = North America and Central/East Asia. Madagascar has lemurs but no apes.

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Answer: (a) 1 and 2 only

Lions mate at any time of the year, and cheetahs, which are not in the roaring genus Panthera, chirp, purr and growl instead of roaring. Statement 3 fails because male leopards do scent-mark: they hold their territories through boundary scent-marking.

• ✓ 1. Lions have no fixed breeding season. Females give birth about every 20 months if they raise their cubs, and sooner if they lose them, so lions can breed at any time of year.
• ✓ 2. The lion and tiger belong to the roaring genus Panthera (NCERT); the cheetah is the only living species of a separate genus, Acinonyx, and does not roar. It purrs, barks, growls, hisses and chirps.
• ✗ 3. Male leopards maintain their territories through a boundary scent-marking strategy, so they do proclaim territory by scent.

Remember · Roaring cats = genus Panthera (lion, tiger and kin); the cheetah (genus Acinonyx) purrs and chirps, and cannot roar. Lions breed year-round. Male leopards, like lions, scent-mark their territory.

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Answer: (a) Fig

Fig trees and fig wasps are the classic case of coevolved mutualism. Many fig species can be pollinated only by one partner wasp species; the female wasp pollinates the fig inflorescence while looking for a place to lay her eggs, and her larvae feed on some of the developing seeds.

• ✓ (a) NCERT describes a tight one-to-one link between many fig species and their pollinating wasps: a given fig can be pollinated only by its 'partner' wasp, which in turn needs the fig to breed.
• ✗ (b) Mahua's strong-smelling flowers open at night and are a major attraction for bats, which Down To Earth calls essential for its pollination and seed dispersal; it has no single insect partner.
• ✗ (d) The red silk cotton tree (Bombax ceiba) is pollinated by generalist birds, not by one coevolved insect.

Remember · Fig–fig wasp: obligate, coevolved, often one-to-one mutualism. The wasp pollinates the fig inflorescence and lays eggs in the fruit; each depends on the other.

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Answer: (c) All three

Each group includes species that are toxic to eat or touch, a defence that makes predators avoid them. The monarch butterfly stores a poison from the weed its caterpillar eats, many pufferfish carry the deadly nerve toxin tetrodotoxin, and poison frogs secrete toxins through their skin.

• ✓ 1. The monarch butterfly is distasteful and harmful to birds because of a chemical it takes in as a caterpillar feeding on a poisonous weed.
• ✓ 2. Pufferfish carry tetrodotoxin, a potent neurotoxin usually concentrated in the ovaries, liver, intestine and skin; it is not destroyed by cooking, and eating badly prepared fish can be fatal.
• ✓ 3. NCERT notes that some frogs are poisonous and are therefore left alone by predators; the brightly coloured poison dart frogs of Central and South America are the best-known case.

Remember · Poisonous = harmful when eaten or touched (monarch butterfly, pufferfish, poison dart frog); venomous = injects toxin (snake, scorpion). Both are anti-predator defences.

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Answer: (a) Only one

Only red sanders is Indian by origin: it grows wild in a small tract of the southern Eastern Ghats. Cashew and papaya are both American plants brought to India in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, even though India is now a leading grower of both.

• ✗ 1. Cashew (Anacardium occidentale) is a native of eastern Brazil. The Portuguese introduced it to India in the 16th century, first in Goa, from where it spread along the coasts.
• ✗ 2. Papaya came from the New World (the Americas) along with the pineapple, tomato, potato and chilli during the Mughal period, as NCERT's history text notes.
• ✓ 3. Red sanders (Pterocarpus santalinus, 'rakta chandan') is native to southern India, found on dry, rocky hills of the south-eastern peninsula; it is prized and heavily smuggled for its red heartwood.

Remember · Red sanders = native, endemic to the southern Eastern Ghats (mainly Andhra Pradesh). Cashew (Brazil) and papaya (tropical America) were introduced by the Portuguese.

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Answer: (b) Only two

Teak and mahua are typical trees of India's tropical deciduous (monsoon) forests and shed their leaves in the dry season. Jackfruit keeps its leathery leaves all year and is an evergreen tree, so only two of the three are deciduous.

• ✗ 1. Jackfruit is an evergreen tree with glossy, leathery leaves; it does not drop its foliage in a dry season.
• ✓ 2. Mahua is listed among the main species of India's tropical deciduous forests, which shed leaves in the dry months.
• ✓ 3. Teak is the best-known tree of the tropical deciduous (monsoon) forests of India.

Remember · Tropical deciduous (monsoon) forests: teak, sal, shisham, mahua, amla, semul, kusum, sandalwood. Jackfruit is an evergreen tree.

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Answer: (c) Statement-I is correct but Statement-II is incorrect

Pouched mammals (marsupials) occur naturally only in Australia, New Guinea and nearby islands and in the Americas, so none are native to India. But they are not confined to predator-free mountain grasslands: they live in deserts, trees, burrows and even water, often alongside predators.

• ✓ Statement-I About 200 marsupial species live in Australia, New Guinea and neighbouring islands and about 70 in the Americas, mostly South and Central America. India has no native marsupials.
• ✗ Statement-II Marsupials occupy many habitats: burrowing, ground-living, tree-living and semi-aquatic species exist. Wallabies, bilbies and the marsupial mole live in the Australian deserts, where NCERT lists dingoes, cats, foxes and snakes among the predators.

Remember · Marsupials (kangaroo, koala, wombat, opossum) are native only to Australasia and the Americas, in habitats from deserts to trees and water; none are native to India.

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Answer: (a) The International Union for Conservation of Nature

The Invasive Species Specialist Group (ISSG) is one of the expert groups of IUCN's Species Survival Commission, and it built and runs the Global Invasive Species Database (GISD).

• ✓ (a) The GISD was developed and is managed by the ISSG of the Species Survival Commission (SSC) of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
• ✗ (b) UNEP is the UN's environment agency; it does not house the ISSG, which sits inside IUCN's commission structure.
• ✗ (d) WWF is an independent conservation NGO; the ISSG and its database are part of IUCN, the body that also publishes the Red List.

Remember · ISSG → IUCN Species Survival Commission → runs the Global Invasive Species Database (GISD). IUCN also compiles the Red List.

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Answer: (a) Only one

UPSC's key counts one animal: the Malabar civet, a secretive night-time carnivore of the Western Ghats. The lion-tailed macaque is a day-active, tree-dwelling monkey. The sambar is not counted: it feeds mainly at dusk and by night but is also seen grazing by day in quiet protected forests, and the key treats this mixed pattern as not 'generally nocturnal'.

• ✗ 1. The lion-tailed macaque, endemic to the evergreen forests of the Western Ghats, is arboreal and diurnal: its troops feed and move through the canopy by day.
• ✓ 2. The Malabar civet is nocturnal and so elusive that researchers have to search for it at night; it is among India's most threatened mammals.
• ✗ 3. The key does not count the sambar. Its activity peaks at dusk and through the night, but in undisturbed forests it is also active by day, and the key treats this crepuscular, mixed pattern as falling short of 'generally nocturnal'.

Remember · Malabar civet: nocturnal, Western Ghats, Critically Endangered. Lion-tailed macaque: diurnal, arboreal, Western Ghats endemic. Sambar: largest Indian deer; most active at dusk and night, also seen by day — not counted as nocturnal in UPSC's key.

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Answer: (c) Honeybees

The waggle dance is the honeybee's way of telling hive-mates where food lies. Karl von Frisch decoded it and shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for this work.

• ✓ (c) A forager returning from a source more than about 50 m away runs a straight line on the vertical comb while wagging her abdomen; the angle of that run shows the direction relative to the sun, and the vigour of wagging signals distance.
• ✗ (d) Wasps are social insects too, but they do not use a symbolic dance to point nestmates to food.
• ✗ (a) Butterflies are solitary foragers and have no dance language for sharing the location of nectar.

Remember · Honeybees: round dance for food close to the hive, waggle dance for food farther away (direction relative to the sun plus distance). Decoded by Karl von Frisch (Nobel 1973).

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Answer: (d) All four

Mushrooms are the fruiting bodies of a very diverse group of fungi, and each property in the list is shown by at least some species: medicine (reishi, turkey tail), mind-altering chemicals (psilocybin), insect-deterring proteins and compounds, and a natural glow.

• ✓ 1. NCERT notes that wild edible mushrooms have high nutritional and medicinal values. Medicinal mushrooms such as reishi and turkey tail have been used against infections for centuries in Asia, and for over 30 years have been approved as an add-on to standard cancer treatment in Japan and China.
• ✓ 2. Psilocybin, a hallucinogen found in certain mushrooms ("magic mushrooms"), alters perception, mood and thought.
• ✓ 3. Some mushrooms are rarely attacked by insects; studies of their fruit bodies have found insecticidal proteins and antifeedant compounds that are being explored for pest control.
• ✓ 4. Several gilled mushrooms glow in the dark through a luciferin–luciferase reaction.

Remember · Fungi, including mushrooms, give medicines (reishi), psychoactive psilocybin, insecticidal proteins and bioluminescence (luciferin–luciferase light).

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Answer: (b) Only two

The three-striped palm squirrel, a common Indian squirrel, nests in treetops, not in burrows. Like other squirrels it buries nuts and seeds to eat later, and its diet mixes fruit and nuts with insects, larvae and eggs, so it is omnivorous. So statements 2 and 3 are right.

• ✗ 1. The three-striped palm squirrel builds its nest in treetops out of grass and branches, not in burrows in the ground.
• ✓ 2. Squirrels bury nuts and seeds and return to some of these caches later; the nuts they forget can grow into trees.
• ✓ 3. The palm squirrel eats mainly fruit and nuts but also takes insects, larvae, eggs and small birds, so it is omnivorous.

Remember · Indian palm squirrel: tree-nesting (not burrowing), buries nuts and seeds, omnivorous (fruit, nuts, insects, eggs).

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Answer: (c) All three

Microbes live in places no other life can: hot vents, snow and ice, and strongly acidic sites. Such extremophiles (thermophiles, psychrophiles, acidophiles) make all three statements true.

• ✓ 1. Hyperthermophiles thrive in hydrothermal vents. Under high pressure, the methanogen Methanopyrus kandleri strain 116 has multiplied at 122 °C in the laboratory, above water's normal boiling point of 100 °C.
• ✓ 2. Cold-loving microbes (psychrophiles) live in permafrost, sea ice and under thick snow, where they stay active below 0 °C in films of salty, unfrozen water.
• ✓ 3. Acidophiles grow in highly acidic places such as acid mine drainage and acidic hot springs; some archaea grow best at a pH below 1.

Remember · Extremophiles: thermophiles (up to 122 °C under pressure), psychrophiles (below 0 °C), acidophiles (pH < 3), halophiles (salt).

📘 Read it in NCERT: Class 12 Biology, Ch 8 (practise this chapter)

Question and answer: UPSC's official GS Paper I (2023, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 30 Sept 2026 (how we verify). Permalink · Report an error

Answer: (b) Orangutan

Among the options, only the orangutan, a great ape, fashions tools from sticks: some wild orangutan populations modify small sticks and use them to probe tree trunks for food such as honey.

• ✓ (b) Some wild orangutan populations modify small sticks and probe tree trunks with them for food such as honey; Sumatran orangutans also modify sticks to open Neesia fruits.
• ✗ (d) The sloth bear eats termites and ants, but it digs them out with its long curved claws and sucks them up; it is not known to make tools.
• ✗ (c) Otters are not known for making stick tools to scrape insects out of wood.

Remember · Orangutan: stick tools to probe tree trunks for food such as honey. Sloth bear: claws and suction to eat termites, no tools.

Question and answer: UPSC's official GS Paper I (2023, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 1 Oct 2026 (how we verify). Permalink · Report an error

Answer: (a) Collecting DNA samples from air in a habitat at one go

Aerial metagenomics means collecting DNA from the air in a habitat and sequencing it all together to see which organisms are present. Metagenomics studies the combined genetic material of many organisms in one bulk sample, and here the sample is air.

• ✓ (a) Air carries tiny particles (bioaerosols) shed by microbes, plants and animals. Sampling that air and sequencing the DNA in it at one go reveals the species around, without catching or disturbing any animal.
• ✗ (b) This describes genetic study of birds only. Metagenomics covers a whole mixed community of organisms in one sample, not one group such as avian species.
• ✗ (d) Drones collecting physical plant and animal samples from land and water are a sampling method, not a study of DNA collected from air.

Remember · Metagenomics reads the DNA of a whole community from one bulk sample. In aerial metagenomics that sample is air, giving a snapshot of the species around.

Question and answer: UPSC's official GS Paper I (2023, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 1 Oct 2026 (how we verify). Permalink · Report an error

Answer: (c) Both 1 and 2

Both statements are correct. The Nagoya Protocol is about fair sharing of benefits from genetic resources, and in India the Biological Diversity Act, 2002 gives village-level Biodiversity Management Committees (BMCs) a say in access decisions and the power to levy collection fees.

• ✓ 1. The Nagoya Protocol aims at fair and equitable sharing of benefits from genetic resources. India's law for this, the Biological Diversity Act, 2002, requires the National Biodiversity Authority and State Biodiversity Boards to consult the local BMC before decisions on using resources in its area, which makes BMCs the local channel for access and benefit sharing.
• ✓ 2. Section 41(3) of the Act says BMCs may levy charges by way of collection fees from any person accessing or collecting biological resources for commercial purposes from their territorial jurisdiction.

Remember · BMCs are set up by local bodies under Section 41 of the Biological Diversity Act, 2002. They are consulted on access to local biological resources and can levy collection fees, which is India's ground-level route to Nagoya-style benefit sharing.

Question and answer: UPSC's official GS Paper I (2023, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 30 Sept 2026 (how we verify). Permalink · Report an error

Answer: (c) 1 and 2

Statements 1 and 2 are correct. Gucchi is the morel mushroom (genus Morchella), an edible fungus that grows wild in Himalayan forests such as those of Jammu & Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh. It is gathered from the forest; Indian research describes commercial cultivation as unsuccessful, and it is not farmed in north-eastern India.

• ✓ 1. Gucchi is a mushroom of the genus Morchella, which belongs to the fungal group Ascomycota (family Morchellaceae).
• ✓ 2. Gucchi grows on the ground in coniferous and mixed coniferous forests; in J&K and Himachal Pradesh it is collected from forests.
• ✗ 3. Gucchi is a wild-collected forest produce of the western Himalaya. ICAR's Mushroom Research journal notes that commercial cultivation of Morchella has not succeeded, and no source shows it being farmed in north-eastern India.

Remember · Gucchi = morel (Morchella), a wild Himalayan forest fungus from J&K and Himachal; hand-collected, not commercially farmed.

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

Answer: (a) Golden Mahseer

Golden Mahseer is a fish, not a bird. Tor putitora is a freshwater fish of Himalayan rivers, assessed Endangered by the IUCN. The nightjar, spoonbill and ibis are all birds.

• ✓ (a) The Wildlife Institute of India lists the Golden Mahaseer (Tor putitora) in class Actinopterygii, the ray-finned fishes, and calls it a column-feeding freshwater fish.
• ✗ (b) The Indian Nightjar (Caprimulgus asiaticus) is a bird; it appears in the bird checklist of an Indian Ramsar wetland.
• ✗ (c) Spoonbills, such as the Eurasian Spoonbill (Platalea leucorodia), are wading birds of class Aves.
• ✗ (d) The White Ibis is a wading bird. Ibises belong to the same family, Threskiornithidae, as the spoonbills.

Remember · Golden Mahseer (Tor putitora) is a Himalayan freshwater fish, IUCN Endangered. Nightjar, spoonbill and ibis are birds.

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

Answer: (b) 2 only

Only statement 2 is correct. Under the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972, a listed animal is protected from hunting wherever it is, inside or outside protected areas. But only some wild animals become Government property, and a mere fear of danger does not justify killing or capturing one.

• ✗ 1. Section 39 makes only certain animals Government property, such as those hunted under a permit, kept or hunted against the Act, or found dead. It does not make every wild animal the sole property of the government.
• ✓ 2. Section 9 bars hunting of any animal listed in the Schedules, and the rule is not tied to protected areas. The protection applies inside or outside sanctuaries and parks.
• ✗ 3. Section 11 lets the Chief Wild Life Warden permit hunting only if satisfied that the animal has actually become dangerous to human life (or is beyond recovery), and, since 2003, that it cannot be captured, tranquilised or translocated. Fear of danger alone is not enough.

Remember · Under the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972, hunting of scheduled animals is barred everywhere. A dangerous animal may be killed only as a last resort, on the Chief Wild Life Warden's written order.

📘 Read it in NCERT: Class 10 Contemporary India – II, Ch 2 (practise this chapter)

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