Indian Culture Questions and Answers

Answer: D

The Hojagiri (printed Hazagiri) dance belongs to the Reang tribe.

Hojagiri is performed by Reang (Bru) women during the Hojagiri festival, held in autumn. The dancers move only the lower half of the body while balancing pitchers, bottles and lamps on their heads and standing on earthen pots, to the music of the bamboo flute and drum.

The other tribes are known for their own dances, such as the Garia dance of the Tripuri and the Bizu dance of the Chakma, but Hojagiri is identified above all with the Reang.

Answer: A

The Tripitakas are sacred books of the Buddhists.

Tripitaka means 'three baskets'. The three are the Vinaya Pitaka (rules for monks and nuns), the Sutta Pitaka (the Buddha's discourses) and the Abhidhamma Pitaka (philosophical analysis). Written in Pali, they form the canon of Theravada Buddhism.

The sacred texts of the Hindus include the Vedas and Upanishads, those of the Jains are the Agamas, and the holy book of Muslims is the Quran.

Answer: A

The Hornbill Festival is a festival of Nagaland.

Held every year from 1 to 10 December at the Naga Heritage Village of Kisama, near Kohima, the festival brings together all the Naga tribes to show their dances, music, crafts and food. It is named after the hornbill, a bird that features widely in Naga folklore and dress.

Assam's best-known festival is Bihu, Tripura's are Kharchi Puja and Ker, and Manipur's tourism festival is the Sangai Festival, named after the brow-antlered deer.

Answer: C

The key describes Ujjayanta Palace as Neoclassical mixed with Mughal elements.

The palace in Agartala was built between 1899 and 1901 for Maharaja Radha Kishore Manikya and designed by the firm of Martin and Co. It combines European neoclassical features, a symmetrical facade and classical columns, with Mughal-style domes and formal Mughal gardens, a blend often described as Indo-Saracenic. It now houses the Tripura State Museum.

'Mughal' and 'Indo-Islamic' each capture only part of the design, missing the strong European element, and nothing about the building is Gothic.

Answer: B

The correct statement is It is the National Song of India.

Vande Mataram, written by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay and included in his novel Anandamath (1882), was adopted as the National Song by the Constituent Assembly on 24 January 1950, with a status equal to that of the National Anthem.

The National Anthem is Jana Gana Mana, by Rabindranath Tagore. The song was adopted in 1950, not 1930, and it was written in Sanskrit and Bengali, not Hindi.

Answer: B

The answer is New paddy, as the Commission's key has it.

Maimita, usually spelled Mamita, is the harvest festival of the Tripuri people and the dance belongs to it. The name is glossed as the eating of rice: after the crop has been threshed and brought home, the family eats the new rice together, and the goddesses of paddy and crops are worshipped. So the word is tied to the new paddy, not to the work of the field.

Harvesting is the nearest wrong option, because the festival comes after the harvest; but it marks the first eating of the new crop, not the cutting of it. Sowing of seeds belongs to the start of the season, and driving away insects from paddy field is not what the festival is about.

Answer: D

The answer is None of these.

Tripura's notified list of 19 Scheduled Tribes includes all three tribes named: the Uchai, the Garo and the Lepcha, along with the Tripuri, Reang, Jamatia, Chakma, Halam, Mog, Kuki, Munda, Lushai, Oraon, Santal, Khasia, Bhil, Bhutia, Chaimal and Noatia.

The Lepcha is the trap: the community is best known from Sikkim and the Darjeeling hills, but it also appears in Tripura's list. Since every named tribe is included, none of them is the answer.

Answer: C

The Torah is the sacred book of Judaism.

The Torah is the first five books of the Hebrew Bible (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy), traditionally ascribed to Moses. In a wider sense the word covers the whole body of Jewish teaching.

Confucianism's classic texts are the Analects and the Five Classics, and Zoroastrianism's sacred book is the Avesta. Since Judaism is offered, 'None of these' is wrong.

Answer: C

The Hornbill Festival is held in Nagaland.

The Government of Nagaland organises the Hornbill Festival from 1 to 10 December every year at the Kisama Heritage Village near Kohima. Begun in 2000, it brings all the Naga tribes together to show their dances, music, crafts, sports and food, and it is named after the hornbill, a bird that features widely in Naga folklore.

Sikkim and Manipur hold their own festivals but not this one, so 'None of these' is also wrong.

Answer: A

The folk dance is Nongkrem.

The Nongkrem dance is performed by the Khasi people during the five-day Ka Pomblang Nongkrem festival, held in autumn at Smit near Shillong as a thanksgiving for the harvest.

Lavani is a folk dance of Maharashtra, and Chhau a masked dance of Odisha, Jharkhand and West Bengal. Since the right dance is listed, 'None of these' is wrong.

The festival is held by the Hima Khyrim, a traditional Khasi state, at Smit, its old capital, and is one of the most important festivals of the Khasi people.