Famous Personalities Questions and Answers

Answer: D

The father of India's space programme is Vikram Sarabhai.

Vikram Sarabhai persuaded the government to set up the Indian National Committee for Space Research in 1962, established the Thumba rocket launching station in 1963 and founded ISRO in 1969. He chaired it until his death in 1971.

A.P.J. Abdul Kalam led the SLV-3 project and later India's missile programme. G. Madhavan Nair was ISRO chairman from 2003 to 2009, and Nambi Narayanan was a scientist who worked on liquid propulsion.

Answer: B

The translator was C. Achutha Menon.

C. Achutha Menon, Chief Minister of Kerala from 1969 to 1977, was also a writer, and among his works is a Malayalam translation of H.G. Wells' A Short History of the World.

E.M.S. Namboodiripad wrote widely on Kerala's history and Marxism, E.K. Nayanar wrote memoirs and political essays, and P.K. Vasudevan Nair was a journalist, but the Wells translation is Achutha Menon's.

Answer: A

The "Missile Man of India" is Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam.

Kalam led the development of SLV-3, India's first satellite launch vehicle, at ISRO, and then headed the Integrated Guided Missile Development Programme at DRDO, which produced the Agni and Prithvi missiles. He was also central to the Pokhran-II nuclear tests of 1998 and served as President of India from 2002 to 2007.

Homi J. Bhabha is the father of India's nuclear programme, C.V. Raman won the 1930 Nobel Prize in Physics for the Raman effect, and Vikram Sarabhai is the father of the Indian space programme. None of them is called the Missile Man.

Answer: B

The editor of Lokmat was Pt. Dwarika Prasad Mishra.

Dwarka Prasad Mishra, freedom fighter and later Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, was also a journalist. He edited the Hindi newspaper Lokmat and the journal Sarathi, and wrote the epic Krishnayan.

Makhanlal Chaturvedi edited Karmaveer and Prabha, Ravishankar Shukla was the first Chief Minister of the new State, and Bhavaniprasad Mishra was a poet.

Answer: D

The personality not related to Gwalior is Ustad Amir Khan.

Ustad Amir Khan, founder of the Indore gharana of Hindustani classical music, was associated with Indore.

The other three belong to Gwalior. Tansen, the great musician of Akbar's court, trained in Gwalior and his tomb is there. Pandit Shankar Rao Pandit and Raja Bhaiya Poonchhwale were leading singers of the Gwalior gharana, the oldest khayal gharana.

Answer: B

Hitendra Desai was known in politics.

He was Chief Minister of Gujarat from 1965 to 1971, the state's third, and later a Union Minister.

Answer: B

Kim Campbell was the first woman Prime Minister of Canada.

She took office in June 1993 and served for about four months, losing the general election that October. She remains Canada's only woman Prime Minister.

Answer: A

Subhas Chandra Bose is credited with founding the Azad Hind Fauj.

Captain Mohan Singh raised the first Indian National Army in 1942 from prisoners taken at Singapore, but it was dissolved that December. Bose revived and reorganised it in 1943, added the Rani of Jhansi regiment, and led it to Imphal.

Answer: B

Lal Bahadur Shastri was the first posthumous recipient of the Bharat Ratna.

It was conferred in 1966, the year he died at Tashkent, hours after signing the agreement ending the war with Pakistan. He had given the country the slogan 'Jai Jawan Jai Kisan'.

Answer: A

It was Antonio Guterres.

The former Prime Minister of Portugal and UN High Commissioner for Refugees was recommended by the Security Council in October 2016 and took office on 1 January 2017, succeeding Ban Ki-moon.