CRITICAL REASONING

India’s baffling array of state and national labour laws date to the 1940s: one provides for the type and
number of spittoons in a factory. Another says an enterprise with more than 100 workers needs
government permission to scale back or close. Many Indian businesses stay small in order to remain
beyond the reach of the laws. Big firms use temporary workers to avoid them. Less than 15% of Indian
workers have legal job security. The new government can sidestep the difficult politics of curbing
privileges by establishing a new, simpler labour contract that gives basic protection to workers but
makes lay-offs less costly to firms. It would apply only to new hires; the small proportion of existing
workers with gold-star protections would keep them.

A. More Indian workers can get permanent jobs and legal job security if existing labour laws are reformed.

B. Effective labour law reform can encourage many Indian businesses to grow to more than 100 workers.

C. Outdated Indian labour laws need to be simplified to provide basic protection to workers and curb
privileges.

D. The difficult politics of curbing privileges can be avoided if the changes in the labour law only apply to
the new hires.

A study published in 2006 by Friedrich Schneider on the world’s shadow economies dealt briefly with the
“tax morality” of Germans. According to the study, two-thirds of the Germans surveyed regarded tax
evasion as a “trivial offence,” while only one-third judged stealing a newspaper this way. Indian tax
morality is similar, but it makes a distinction between expatriate illicit money, which is viewed as a
serious crime perpetrated by the very corrupt, and money held within India, which is perceived as a
practical measure.

Which of the following conclusions can be drawn from the above?

A) i, ii, iv

B) i and iv

C) only iii

D) iii and iv
Oklahoma is not perceived as overpopulated because, in spite of a horrendous drought, it is not facing
famine. Famine in Oklahoma is inconceivable because it receives a fair price for its exports, it has not
leased its land to foreign countries, the poorest of the poor receive a helping hand from the government,
and farmers and ranchers receive federal assistance in times of droughts. It is a lack of these factors in
Horn of Africa, plus political insecurity in Somalia, which explain the famine – not overpopulation.

Which of the following options best summarizes the main idea of the paragraph?

A) Hunger is caused by too many people pressing against finite resources.

B) In spite of drought and overpopulation, there is no famine in Oklahoma.

C) Overpopulation and famine are not causally related in the Horn of Africa.

D) Famine in the Horn of Africa is not only due to overpopulation but, more importantly, due to the lack of
government assistance and political insecurity.

Contrary to popular belief, the idea of evolution didn’t originate with Darwin, but was around for
decades before he came along. His accomplishment was to come up with a workable scheme by which it
likely occurred. Darwin, it must be said, had unusual exposure to the enormous diversity of life on earth
for a man living in his time, through his voyage on the Beagle. However, his eureka moment came not
through studying biology, but by reading the paper of an economist, Thomas Malthus, which showed
that populations grow faster than the resources to sustain them. It was then that Darwin realized that
only those best adapted to their environment would survive and pass on their traits to offspring.

What is the main idea of this paragraph?

A) It is impossible to come up with big insights without crossing domains.

B) The idea of evolution did not originate with Darwin.

C) It is Malthus, not Darwin, who should be given credit for the theory of evolution.

D) It was the connections that Darwin uncovered more than the facts themselves that made his work
important.

A holistic reading of the current state of our constitutional jurisprudence would demonstrate that the
right to privacy is firmly embedded in our constitutional scheme as a non-negotiable imperative that
owes no apology to a myopic view of our republican charter. Indeed, considering the fundamental
principles of the nation as “not rules for the passing hour, but principles for an expanding future”, the
apex court, as the ultimate arbiter of constitutional conscience, has given fundamental rights their
meaning in new settings consistent with the aspirations of our people. This is so that we may have a
‘living constitution’ which can protect, preserve and defend sacrosanct libertarian values that remain the
bedrock of the Republic and constitute the core of the Constitution. Rather than deny us our
constitutional right , the Union Government ought to enact a privacy legislation to clearly define the
rights of citizens consistent with the promise of the Constitution.

Which of the following is the author most likely to agree with?

A) Our republican charter has a myopic view of the right to privacy

B) The Supreme Court has been rigid in its interpretation of the Constitution

C) The right to privacy is rooted in our constitutional scheme.

D) A new privacy legislation has to be defined as the right to privacy is not dealt with in the Constitution.

The image of an oral telling may be caught on paper, film or in digital format, but recordings are not the
word shared live. The presence of teller and audience, and the immediacy of the moment are not fully
captured by any form of technology. Unlike the insect frozen in amber, a told story is alive. It always
changes from one telling to the next depending on the voice and mood of the storyteller, the place of its
telling and the response of the audience. The story breathes with the teller’s breath.

Which of the options below conveys the main idea of the paragraph best?

A) Unlike stories in paper, film and digital formats, a told story is alive, and hence more potent.

B) The immediacy and intimacy of live storytelling cannot be captured by recordings.

C) Technology and oral storytelling are separated by a deep divide and one cannot take the place of the
other.

D) The living human presence experienced through oral tradition brings out the true power of stories.