IFS General English Previous Year Question Paper

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IFS 2005 

GENERAL ENGLISH Question Paper

PAPER - I

SECTION - A

1. Write an essay, in about 800 to 1000 words, on any one of the following:
   (100 marks)
   1. Global Warming: Its Causes and Effects
   2. Tenth Five-Year Plan: Priorities and Prospects
   3. Justice Delayed in Justice Denied
   4. Our Future Wars will be Wars for Water
   5. The Pleasures of Reading.
   
   
2. Write a report on measures taken by your country to prevent the spread of AIDS.
   (50 marks)
   (or)
   Write a letter (signing yourself as ‘X’) to the Editor of a national daily demanding severe checks on the increasing noise pollution in the metropolises of the country.
   
   
3. Attempt a precis of the following passage in your own words, using no less than 215 and no more than 240 words. The exact number of the words used must be mentioned. If the precis is not written on the special precis sheet, it shall be marked down:
   (75 marks)
   
   
   Science affects the average man and woman in two ways. He or she benefits by its applications, driving in a motor car or omnibus instead of a horse-drawn vehicle, being treated for disease by a doctor or surgeon rather than a priest or a witch, and being killed with an automatic pistol or a shell in place of a dagger or a battle-axe. It also affects his or her opinions. Almost everyone believes that the earth is round, and the heavens nearly empty, instead of solid. And we are beginning to believe in our animal ancestry and the possibility of vast improvements in human nature by biological methods. But science can do something far bigger for the human mind than the substitution of one set of beliefs for another, or the inculcation of scepticism regarding accepted opinions. It can gradually spread among humanity as a whole the point of view that prevails among research workers and has enabled a few thousand men and a few dozen women to create the science on which modern civilisation rests. For if we are to control our own and one another’s actions as we are learning to control nature, the scientific point of view must come out of the laboratory and be applied to the events of daily life. It is foolish to think that the outlook which has already revolutionised industry, agriculture, war and medicine will prove useless when applied to the family, the nation, or the human race.
   Unfortunately, the growing realisation of this fact is opening the door to innumerable false prophets who are advertising their own pet theories in sociology as scientific. Science is continually telling us through their mouths that we are doomed unless we give up smoking, adopt—or abolish—birth control, and so forth. Now it is not my object to support any scientific theory, but merely the scientific standpoint. What are the characteristics of that standpoint? In the first place, it attempts to be truthful and, therefore, impartial. And it carries impartiality a great deal further than does the legal point of view. A good judge will try to be impartial between Mr. John Smith and Mr. Chang Sing. A good scientist will be impartial between Mr. Smith, a tape-worm, and the solar system. He will leave behind him his natural repulsion of the tape-worm, which would lead him to throw it away instead of studying it as carefully as a statue or a symphony, and This awe for the solar system, which led his predecessors either or worship its constituents, or at least to regard them as inscrutable servants of the Almighty, too exalted for human comprehension.
   Such an attitude leads the scientist to a curious mixture of pride and humility. The solar system turns out to be a group of bodies rather small in comparison with many of their neighbours, and executing their movements according to simple and easily intelligible laws. But he himself is a rather aberrant member of the same order as the monkeys, while his mind is at the mercy of a number of chemical processes in his body which he can understand but little and control hardly at all.
   Insofar as it places all phenomena on the same emotional level, the scientific point of view may be called the God’s-eye view. But it differs profoundly from that which religions have attributed to the Almighty in being ethically neutral. Science cannot determine what is right and wrong, and should not try to. It can work out the consequences of various actions, but it cannot pass judgement on them. The bacteriologist can merely point out that pollution of the public water supply is likely to cause as many deaths as letting off a bomb in the public street. But he is no better equipped than anyone else in possession of the knowledge he has gained, for determining whether these two acts are equally wrong. The enemies of science alternately abuse its exponents for being deaf to moral considerations and for interfering in ethical problems which do not concern them. Both of these criticisms cannot be right.
   
   
4. Rewrite the following sentences correctly, choosing the appropriate words given below:
   (15 marks)
   official, expunged, generalities, advancement, guard, reciprocal.
   1. So far no ............................. announcement has been made.
   2. The remarks were offensive and.............................
   3. He talked in ............................. instead of focusing on specific examples.
   4. The............................. of technical education must be given priority.
   5. India cannot lower her............................. till she has overcome the crisis.
   
   
5. Rewrite as directed (without hanging the meaning):
   (30 marks)
   1. She (discover) to her horror that she (swallow) a fly.
      (Supply the correct past tense of the verbs)
   2. The child has seen a tiger.
      (Insert ‘never’ at the right place)
   3. She is very weak. She cannot walk.
      (Make a simple sentence by using an infinitive)
   4. Mumbai is the biggest city in India.
      (Restructure the sentence by using the positive degree of the adjective)
   5. They loudly cheered the Prime Minister’s speech.
      (Turn the sentence into passive voice)
   6. She is very tall. She can reach that picture.
      (Make a simple sentence by using ‘enough)
   7. My daughter’s birthday coincides ............ mine.
      (Use the appropriate preposition)
   8. I wish that I were a king.
      (Change into an exclamatory sentence)
   9. What though the field be lost?
      (Transform into an assertive sentence)
   10. The river (overflow) its banks a week ago.
       (Use the correct tense of the verb)
   
   
6. Supply ‘a(n)’, ‘some’ or ‘the’ where necessary:
   (12 marks)
   1. As ............. writer she is ............... class of her own.
   2. The ship has been at .............. sea for .......... long time.
   3. ............. tea is very sweet, you must put .......... milk in it.
   4. I must get ................ food with ............... glass of milk.
   5. Take .............. umbrella with you when you go to ............ office to attend to your duties.
   6. We will have ............. picnic in ......... forest, next week.
   
   
7. Rewrite the following after correcting the errors, if any:
   (18 marks)
   1. No sooner the sun rose, he was off again.
   2. You cannot leave the place until he does not come back.
   3. He has bought a new car last week.
   4. If I am you, I should agree.
   5. It cannot be anything else than pride,
   6. I am laid down with fever.