Social Policy and Planning Questions and Answers

Answer: D

The basis of the welfare state is All the above.

A welfare state is one in which the state takes responsibility for the well-being of its citizens. Writers on the welfare state commonly name three principles. Equality of opportunity means everyone should have a fair start, especially through education and health. Equitable distribution of wealth means narrowing inequality through taxation and social spending. Public responsibility for those who cannot secure a minimum standard by themselves means the state provides social security for the old, sick, disabled and unemployed.

Each of options A, B and C is one of these principles, so choosing any single one leaves out the other two.

Answer: B

The inbuilt components are (a), (b) and (d).

MGNREGA builds in proactive disclosure (records such as muster rolls are to be made public), transparency and accountability, and rights-based entitlements: a household can demand work and must get it within 15 days, or be paid an unemployment allowance, and wages must be paid on time.

Statement (c) is wrong. Social audit under MGNREGA is mandatory: Section 17 of the Act requires the Gram Sabha to conduct regular social audits of all projects in the Gram Panchayat. Any option that includes 'non-mandatory social audit', or leaves out (a) or (d), is incorrect.

Answer: B

The 1979 poverty line was based on about 2100 calories in urban areas and 2400 calories in rural areas.

The Task Force on Projections of Minimum Needs and Effective Consumption Demand, chaired by Y. K. Alagh, defined the poverty line as the monthly per capita expenditure needed to buy a daily intake of 2400 kilocalories in rural areas and 2100 in urban areas. The rural figure is higher because rural work is more physically demanding.

At 1973-74 prices this came to about Rs 49 a month in rural areas and Rs 57 in urban areas. The other options put the wrong numbers on one or both areas.

Answer: A

The report is Our Common Future.

Our Common Future (1987), the report of the World Commission on Environment and Development chaired by Gro Harlem Brundtland, gave the term its classic definition: development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. It is the report textbooks credit with introducing the term, although the phrase had appeared a few years earlier, for example in the World Conservation Strategy of 1980.

The other three titles are not the names of any such landmark report. They are invented distractors.

Answer: C

The correct matching is 1-c, 2-b, 3-d, 4-a.

• The Right to Education Act, 2009 protects children's right to free and compulsory education (c).
• The Hindu Marriage Act, 1955 sets minimum ages for the bride and groom among its conditions for a valid marriage, which is how it is matched with preventing child marriages (b).
• Section 375 of the Indian Penal Code defines rape and treats intercourse with a girl under 18 as rape whatever her consent, protecting a child from sexual exploitation (d).
• The Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act, 1986 prohibits children's engagement in certain employments and regulates their conditions of work in others (a).

Options A, B and D misplace the RTE Act or Section 375.

Answer: A

The Gandhian principles are (a), (b) and (c).

Gandhi's idea of rural development rested on village swaraj: a self-sufficient village economy meeting its basic needs locally, decentralisation of political and economic power to the village, and khadi and village industries to give work and income to rural people.

Total industrialisation is the opposite of the Gandhian model. Gandhi opposed large-scale mechanised industry because he believed it concentrated wealth and displaced labour. So any option including (d), or calling all the statements correct or incorrect, is wrong.

Answer: B

The PURA model was articulated by Dr. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam.

As President, Kalam proposed Provision of Urban Amenities in Rural Areas as a way to develop clusters of villages by linking them through roads, electronic connectivity, knowledge institutions and markets, so that rural people could get urban facilities and livelihoods without migrating to cities. It was taken up as a government scheme in the 2000s.

Atal Bihari Vajpayee (printed 'Vajpai') was Prime Minister in that period but did not devise the model. Verghese Kurien is known for the White Revolution and dairy cooperatives. Since the answer is given, 'None of the above' is wrong.

Answer: C

The Balwantrai Mehta Committee is associated with Community Development.

Appointed in 1957, the team led by Balwantray Mehta studied the Community Development Programme and the National Extension Service. It found that they lacked people's participation and recommended democratic decentralisation through a three-tier Panchayati Raj system: gram panchayat, panchayat samiti and zila parishad. Rajasthan adopted the system first, in 1959.

Community organisation and community practice are social work methods, not the subject of the committee. Community welfare is too general. The committee's terms of reference were specifically the Community Development Programme.

Answer: A

Both (A) and (R) are true and (R) is the correct explanation of (A).

Social policy as an academic field applies the social sciences, such as sociology, economics and political science, to practical questions of welfare and human needs, which is why it is described as an applied social science (A).

It earns that description because it uses the methods of social science to describe, analyse and evaluate policies and their effects (R). The use of social science methods for a practical end is what 'applied social science' means, so (R) explains (A).

Answer: B

The correct matching is 1-(c), 2-(a), 3-(b).

• The First Five Year Plan (1951-56) targeted a growth rate of 2.1 percent a year.
• The Second Plan (1956-61), the Mahalanobis plan, targeted 4.5 percent.
• The Third Plan (1961-66) targeted 5.6 percent.

The targets rose plan by plan, so the lowest rate goes with the First Plan and the highest with the Third. Codes that give the First Plan 4.5 or 5.6 percent reverse that order.