Employment, Poverty & Human Development: previous-year questions

Answer: (B) High taxation

The unorganised (informal) sector, which employs around nine-tenths of India's workforce, suffers from low productivity, poor technology, low and irregular wages, job insecurity and no social security. High taxation is not one of its problems: its units are small, mostly unregistered and largely outside the direct tax net, so B is the odd one. Government measures to know: the Unorganised Workers' Social Security Act, 2008, the e-Shram portal (2021) for a national database of such workers, PM Shram Yogi Maandhan (pension), and the Code on Social Security, 2020. The Arjun Sengupta Commission (NCEUS) studied this sector.

Answer: (B) Price Index

The Human Development Index, published by the UNDP since 1990 and devised by Mahbub ul Haq with Amartya Sen, is the geometric mean of three dimension indices: Health (life expectancy at birth), Education (mean years and expected years of schooling) and Income (GNI per capita in PPP terms). A price index such as the CPI or WPI measures inflation and has no place in it, so B is the answer. Countries are grouped into very high, high, medium and low human development; India is in the medium category (ranked 130th in the 2025 report). Other UNDP indices: Inequality-adjusted HDI, Gender Inequality Index, Gender Development Index and the Multidimensional Poverty Index.

Answer: (D) All of the above

Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (2001) aimed at universal elementary education, bridging gender and social gaps in enrolment and ensuring education of satisfactory quality. All three are among its stated goals, so no single option is complete.

Answer: (A) Textile and garment industry

The textile and garment industry is the largest employer of women in Indian manufacturing, especially in garment making, spinning and handloom. Jute, sugar and paper employ far fewer women.

Answer: (B) Ayushman Bharat Yojana

Ayushman Bharat is a health-insurance and health-infrastructure scheme rather than a poverty alleviation programme. IRDP, the National Rural Livelihood Mission and the rural housing scheme (PMAY-G) are classed as poverty alleviation programmes.

Answer: (B) STEP

STEP (Support to Training and Employment Programme for Women) gives skills and employment support only to women. ICDS serves children as well as mothers, MGNREGA is open to all rural adults, and NRHM serves the whole rural population.

Answer: (A) MGNREGA Scheme

MGNREGA guarantees 100 days of wage employment to rural households and is India's main poverty alleviation (wage employment) programme. Bharat Nirman is a rural infrastructure plan, SSA an education programme and NRHM a health mission.

Answer: (D) All of the above

Answer as of 2023 — this may have changed since.

India has long been far more populous than the USA and Indonesia, and in 2023 UN estimates showed it overtaking China to become the world's most populous country (about 142.9 crore). So India's population exceeds all three.

Answer: (C) 93 per cent

Answer as of 2023 — this may have changed since.

Commonly cited estimates (for example of the National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector) put about 93% of India's workforce in the informal or unorganised sector. The lower figures understate its size, and 90% is a round approximation rather than the standard estimate.

Answer: (D) All of the above

The 2016 Act bans employment of children below 14 in all occupations and processes — domestic work included — except helping in family enterprises after school, and bans adolescents of 14–18 from hazardous occupations. All three statements describe it, so (D) is the complete answer.

Answer: (B) 2021

Answer as of 2023 — this may have changed since.

The keyed answer is (B) 2021, the year in which the decennial Census was due after 2011. Note: the 2021 Census was postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic and had not been held when this examination took place in August 2024, so the last Census actually undertaken was that of 2011, option (A); 2010 was only its house-listing phase. PSC answer key given Option B.

Answer: (B) Agricultural sector

Answer as of 2023 — this may have changed since.

Agriculture and allied activities still employ the largest share of India's workforce, around 45% by the PLFS surveys, even though their share of GDP is under a fifth. Services contribute most to GDP but employ fewer people than agriculture.

Answer: (A) where all people participate and benefit equitably.

Inclusive growth means broad-based growth in which all sections of society take part and share the benefits equitably — the theme of the Eleventh Plan. Financial or social inclusion are only parts of it, and it does not mean that the poor alone receive all benefits.

Answer: (A) Madhya Pradesh

Answer as of 2023 — this may have changed since.

Sample Registration System bulletins of recent years show Madhya Pradesh with the highest infant mortality rate among major States (about 43 per 1,000 live births in 2020). Uttar Pradesh and Odisha follow, while West Bengal's rate is far lower.

Answer: (B) 1938

The Employment of Children Act, 1938 was the first law specifically addressing child labour in India. The Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act came in 1986 and was amended in 2016, and 1950 is the year the Constitution came into force.

Answer: (A) Agriculture

Census and survey data show that most child workers in India are in agriculture — as cultivators and agricultural labourers — mainly in rural areas. Manufacturing, construction and hotels employ far fewer children.

Answer: (D) All of the above

In 2019–20 Parliament consolidated 29 labour laws into four codes: the Code on Wages, 2019, the Industrial Relations Code, 2020, the Code on Social Security, 2020 and the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, 2020. All three listed are among them.

Answer: (B) Arunachal Pradesh

Answer as of 2023 — this may have changed since.

Arunachal Pradesh has the lowest population density of any Indian State — 17 persons per sq km in the 2011 Census. Sikkim (86), Himachal Pradesh (123) and Madhya Pradesh (236) are all denser. The question says '2021 Census', but the 2021 Census was not held; the figures are from the 2011 Census.

Answer: (D) 33 per cent

Schedule II of MGNREGA requires that at least one-third of the beneficiaries be women, which is rounded to 33 per cent. 50 per cent is the share of Panchayat seats reserved for women in many States, not the MGNREGA mandate.

Answer: (B) Quinary

Economic activities are graded as primary (extraction: farming, mining), secondary (manufacturing), tertiary (ordinary services such as trade and transport), quaternary (knowledge-based services such as IT, research and information) and quinary. Quinary activities are the highest level: top decision-makers and policy-makers such as senior executives, government officials, research scientists and legal and financial consultants, often called "gold-collar" professions. That makes quinary the most modern and developed tier of the service sector. Collar colours: red – primary, blue – secondary, pink – tertiary, white – quaternary, gold – quinary. (The booklet spells quaternary as "Quarternary".)