• A Meagre growth in Exports Registered
• SEBI Issued Regulations KYC
• Separate Category of NBFC’s for MFI Sector
• Two Significant Oil Discoveries for ONGC
• Additional Funds under the Interest Subsidy Scheme approved
• Two Online Initiatives by IRDA
• World Health Organisation’s update on HIV/AIDS
• GDP Growth to 7.3%
• GDP Forecast to 7.8% by CMIE
• E-commerce Market to be $24 billion
• 26 per cent FDI in Domestic Airlines Proposed
• Exploration of Shale Gas During the 12th Plan

A Civil Servant should be well-versed in concepts of Square Root & Cube Root. In the Civil Services Aptitude Test Paper 2, in Basic Numeracy, certainly there will be asked some questions fromsquare roots and cube roots of number to test fast calculation skills of a candidate.

Square Root

The square root of a number is that number the product of which itself gives the given number, ie, the square root of 400 is 20, the square root of 625 is 25.

• UNHRC Condemned
• EU Increased Sanctions on Syria
• UK Shut Down the Iranian Embassy
• Hindu Property Restoration Act Approved in Bangladesh
• Kuwait’s PM & Cabinet Resigned
• PJD Won in Morocco
• Saleh Agreed to Step down
• India in UN’s JIU
• New Labour Laws in Oman
• China Signed a Contract with ISA

• Adultery Law Biased Against Men
• Awards by Lok Adalat to be Implemented
• Mullaperiyar Dam Issues
• Tripartite Peace Agreement
• No Compromise Deals in Serious Offences
• Divorced Woman to Remain in Home
• Prohibition of Unfair Practices in Universities Approved
• National Child Rights Index
• Anti-measles Vaccination Drive

Such type of questions consist of a Statement followed by certain arguments in favour of or against the Statement. Candidates would be required to distinguish between the strong and weak arguments.

‘Strong’ arguments are those which are both important and directly related to the question. ‘Weak’ arguments are those which are of minor importance and also may not be directly related to the question or may be related to a trivial aspect of the question. A weak argument is very simple, superfluous, ambiguous and long drawn one.

Following points should be taken into consideration while choosing a strong argument

1. A strong argument should give the realistic diagnosis of the situation described in the Statement.
2. A strong argument should give the deep analysis of the topic deal within the Statement.
3. A strong argument should relate with the Statement and be supported up by facts or established notions.
4. A strong argument should not be mere reiteration of the situation given in the Statement.

Following examples will help the students to have an understanding of the logic used to solve these questions.

Types of Questions that could be Asked in CSAT

There are two types of questions which may be asked.

Type 1 Two Arguments Based

In these questions a Statement is followed by two arguments. Candidates are required to distinguish between the strong and weak arguments. Generally both the arguments are contrary to each other and refer to positive and negative results.

Directions (Q. Nos. 1 to 2) Study the instructions carefully and answer the questions that follows. In making decisions about important question it is desirable to be able to distinguish between “strong” and “weak” argument so far as they relate to the questions. “Weak” arguments may not be directly related to the question and may be of minor importance or may be related to the trivial aspect of the question. Each question below is followed by two arguments numbered I and II. You have to decide which of the arguments is a `strong’ argument and which is a `weak’ argument. Give answer (a) if only argument I is strong, (b) if only argument II is strong, (c) if neither I nor II is strong and (d) if both I and II are strong.

Whatever the original impulse behind Occupy Wall Street, or the speculation of what the movement might become, this much is true: The groups of protesters, now camping or hanging out in many U.S. cities, and the police agencies that have responsibility for public safety and order, are both shifting into new postures of action and response. Whether that evolving chemistry will push things toward more confrontation remains unclear. But the combination new participants, new police tactics is clearly opening an uncertain chapter in a story that from its inception has embraced the notion of unplanned, unscripted civil action.

The Occupy movement is an international protest movement which is primarily directed against economic and social inequality. The first Occupy protest to be widely covered was Occupy Wall Street in New York City, taking place on September 17, 2011. By October 9, Occupy protests had taken place or were ongoing in over 95 cities across 82 countries, and over 600 communities in the United States. As of December 1 the Meetup page "Occupy Together" listed 2,686 Occupy communities worldwide. The movement was initiated by the Canadian activist group Adbusters, and partly inspired by the Arab Spring, especially Cairo's Tahrir Square protests, and the Spanish Indignants. The movement commonly uses the slogan We are the 99%, the Occupy hashtag format, and organizes through websites such as "Occupy Together". According to the Washington Post, the movement, which has been described as a "democratic awakening" by Cornel West, is difficult to distill to a few demands.

On May 30, 2011, a leader in the Spanish Indignants movement, inspired by the Arab Spring, made a call for a worldwide protest on October 15. In mid-2011, the Canadian-based group Adbusters Media Foundation, best known for its advertisement-free anti-consumerist magazine Adbusters, proposed a peaceful occupation of Wall Street to protest corporate influence on democracy, address a growing disparity in wealth, and the absence of legal repercussions behind the recent global financial crisis. "One of the inspirations for the movement was the Democracy Village set up in 2010, outside the British Parliament in London. The first protest was held at Zuccotti Park in New York City on September 17, 2011. The phrase "The 99%" is a political slogan used by protesters of the Occupy movement. It was originally launched as a Tumblr blog page in late August of 2011. It refers to the concentration of wealth among the top 1% of income earners compared to the other 99 percent; the top 1 percent of income earners nearly tripled after-tax income over the last thirty years according to a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report.

The Union cabinet on 24 November 2011 approved 51 per cent foreign direct investment (FDI) in multi-brand retail. The Cabinet also decided to raise the cap on foreign investment in single-brand retailing to 100 per cent from 51 per cent. An estimated Rs 30-lakh-crore retail sector was thus opened to foreign investors by clearing a bill that allows 51 per cent investment in multi-brand retail.The decision being perceived as game-changer for the estimated USD 590 billion (Rs 29.50 lakh crore) retail market was taken at the meeting of the Cabinet presided over by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

India currently allows 51 percent foreign investment in single-brand retailers and 100 percent for wholesale operations but no FDI in multi-brand retail.
The major provisions for FDI investment include that the minimum investment will have to be $100 million. Retail stores will only be allowed in cities with more than one million people. Also it will be mandatory for retailers to source a minimum 30 per cent of the value of manufactured goods, barring food products, from small and medium enterprises. Investment up to 50 per cent will have to be in storage and back-end infrastructure. India being a signatory to World Trade Organisation’s General Agreement on Trade in Services, which include wholesale and retailing services, had to open up the retail trade sector to foreign investment. There were initial reservations towards opening up of retail sector arising from fear of job losses, procurement from international market, competition and loss of entrepreneurial opportunities. FDI in cash and carry or wholesale trade, was allowed way back in 1997 during the United Front Government. Foreign investment of up to 51 per cent in single brand retailing came to India in January 2006.

The Union government further asserted that 30 per cent sourcing under FDI in multi-brand retail has been made mandatory from Indian MSEs only. The government highlighted that the 30 per cent obligation before the global players is limited to India. The government’s explanation came amidst protests from the opposition and the micro and small enterprises (MSEs).According to government’s previous stand, the overseas players have to do 30 per cent of their sourcing from MSEs which, however, can be done from anywhere in the world and is not India-specific. The only condition placed was that these MSEs must not have more than $1 million [Rs.5 crore] investment in plant and machinery.

In 2004, The High Court of Delhi defined the term ‘retail’ as a sale for final consumption in contrast to a sale for further sale or processing (i.e. wholesale), A sale to the ultimate consumer. Thus, retailing can be said to be the interface between the producer and the individual consumer buying for personal consumption. This excludes direct interface between the manufacturer and institutional buyers such as the government and other bulk customers Retailing is the last link that connects the individual consumer with the manufacturing and distribution chain. A retailer is involved in the act of selling goods to the individual consumer at a margin of profit.

Issue : December 2011
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Table of Contents:

Articles:

• FDI in Retail
• Occupy Movement

Current Affairs:

• National Issues

• International Issues

• Economy

• India & The World

• Science & Technology

• Sports

• Awards & Prizes

• Persons in News

Study Material

• SCRA Exam Solved Practice Paper

In our speech, we often speak to the other person of some thing that was said to us by somebody. In other words, we often report a speech whether ours or someone else’s. We do this in two ways. We either report the speech exactly as we had heard or said it without making any change. This is called Direct Speech.

Example: The girl said to her mother, “My plate is empty.”

Or we may change the sentence that we had heard or said without changing its meaning and then report it. This is called Indirect Speech.

Example: The girl said to her mother that her plate was empty.

In the first example, the first part of the sentence which is before the comma, is referred to as reporting verb and the part which is within inverted commas is called the reported speech.

Note: While transforming from direct into indirect, we have made several changes in the sentence above :

1. We have removed the comma in the indirect sentence and put that in its place.
2. We have removed the inverted commas of the reported speech.
3. We have changed the my of the reported speech into her.
4. We have not used any capital letter in between the sentence unlike in the direct form where the reported speech always begins with a capital letter.

Now, in order to bring about these changes while converting from direct into indirect or vice-versa, there are several important but simple rules that need to be observed. They are :

1. Changes in Tense and Verb: While changing from direct to indirect we have to make different changes regarding tenses, verbs or helping verb. A short list is given below to have a look on those changes:

(a) If the reporting verb, i.e. the main verb in the first part of the sentence before comma is in the present or the future tense, the tense of the verbs in the reported speech will not change.

Examples:

• Direct : Mummy says, “I shall write a letter.”
• Indirect : Mummy says that she will write a letter.

(b) If the reporting verb is in the past tense, the tense of the verbs in the reported speech will be changed into their corresponding past tense.

Examples:

• Direct : The boy said to his friend. “I write everyday.” (Present Indefinite)
• Indirect : The boy said to his friend that he wrote everyday. (Past Indefinite)
• Direct : The boy said to the teacher, “I am going there everyday.” (Present Continuous)
• Indirect : The boy said to the teacher that he was going there everyday. (Past Continuous)

(a) If the reporting verb is in the past tense, the simple past In the reported speech may become the past perfect in the Indirect.

Examples:

• Direct : He said, “The horse died in the night.” (Simple Past)
• Indirect : He said that the horse had died in the night. (Past Perfect)
• Direct : He said, “The man came at six.” (Simple Past)
• Indirect : He said that the man had come at six. (Past Perfect)

(b) If the reporting verb is in the past tense, the past continuous in the reported speech changes into the past perfect continuous.

Examples

• Direct : He said, “The man was coming.” (Past Continuous)
• Indirect : He said that the man had been coming. (Past Perfect Continuous)
• Direct : He said, “Rain was falling yesterday.” (Past Continuous)
• Indirect : He said that rain had been failing the previous day. (Past Perfect Continuous)

3. Change of person: The persons of the pronouns and of the verbs In the reported speech undergo changes when converted Into indirect form. Thus :

(a) First person pronouns in the direct reporter speech change according to the subject of the reporting verb. The other changes are given in the table below :

• Direct : He says, “I am going to Delhi.
• Indirect : He says that he is going to Delhi.
• Direct : Mummy says, “I will have to go.”`
• Indirect : Mummy says that she will have to go.

In our day-to-day life, we get plenty of data in form of powers of numbers. To have a feeling of what they measure we need to have an exact idea of indices and surds. There may be some kit items in CSAT, specifically designed to test proficiency of candidates in indices and surds.

Indices:

In the expression Xⁿ, n is called the exponent or index and x is called the base and Xⁿ is read as ‘x to the power of n’ or ‘x raised to the power n’.

eg,

1. 3⁶ = 3 × 3 × 3 × 3 × 3 × 3 = 729
4³ = 4 × 4 × 4 = 64

A fraction is a part of the whole (object, thing, region). It forms the part of basic aptitude of a person to have and idea of the parts of a population, group or territory. Civil servants must have a feel of ‘fractional’ thinking. eg,

5/12 , here ‘12’ is the number of equal part into which the whole has been divided, is called denominator and ‘5’ is the number of equal parts which have been taken out, is called numerator.

Example1: Name the numerator of 3/7 and denominator of 5/13.

Solution: Numerator of 3/7 is 3.

Denominator of 5/13 is 13.

Lowest Term of a Fraction:

Dividing the numerator and denominator by the highest common element (or number) in them, we get the fraction in its lowest form.

eg, To find the fraction 6/14 in lowest form Since ‘2’ is highest common element in numerator 6 and denominator 14 so dividing them by 2, we get 3/7 Which is the lowest form of 6/14.

Equivalent Fractions:

If numerator and denominator of any fraction are multiplied by the same number then all resulting fractions are called equivalent fractions.

eg, 1/2, 2/4, 3/6, 4/8 all are equivalent fractions but 1/2 is the lowest form.

A Civil Servant should be well-versed in basics of Number System. In the Civil Services Aptitude Test Paper 2, in Basic Numeracy, certainly there will be asked some questions based on types of, and operations on numbers.

In Indian system, numbers are expressed by means of symbols 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, called digits. Here, 0 is called insignificant digit whereas 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 are called significant digits. We can express a number in  two ways.

Notation: Representing a number in figures is known as notation as 350.

The word ‘Syllogism’ is also referred to ‘Logic’. Syllogism is an important section of logical reasoning and hence, a working knowledge of its rules is required on the part of the candidate. Hence, it can be expressed as the ‘Science of thought as expressed in language’. The questions based on syllogism can be solved by using Venn diagrams and some rules devised with the help of analytical ability. With this unique characteristic, this test becomes an instrument of teaching the candidates to follow the rules and work as per the instructions without an error. Here, only the basic concept and rules, which have a bearing on reasoning faculty could alone help. There are some terminology which are used in syllogism.

Proposition:

It is also referred to as ‘Premises’. It is a sentence which asserts that either a part of, or the whole of, one sets of objects-the set identified by the subject term in the sentence expressing that sentence either is included in, or is excluded from, another set-the set identified by the predicate term in that sentence.

Types of Proposition:

Categorical Proposition There is relationship between the subject and the predicate without any condition.

Example : I. All beams are logs.
II. No rod is stick.

Hypothetical Proposition: There is relationship between subject and predicate which is asserted conditionally.

Example : I. If it rains he will not come.
II. If he comes, I will accompany him.

Disjunctive Proposition In a disjunctive proposition the assertion is of alteration.

Example : I. Either he is brave or he is strong.
II. Either he is happy or he cannot take revenge.

Parts of Proposition:

It consists of four parts.

1. Quantifier: In quantifier the words, ‘all’, ‘no’ and ‘some’ are used as they express quantity. ‘All’ and ‘no’ are universal quantifiers because they refer to every object in a certain set. And quantifier ‘some’ is a particular quantifier because it refers to at least one existing object in a certain set.

2. Subject: It is the word about which something is said.
3. Predicate: It is the part of proposition which denotes which is affirmed or denied about the subject.
4. Copula: It is the part of proposition which denotes the relation between the subject and predicate.

Analogy means ‘Similar items’. There is three types of Analogy
(a) Number Analogy
(b) Letter Analogy
(c) Word Analogy

In questions based on analogy, a pair of numbers/letters/words is given that have certain relationship between them. This pair is followed by a third numbers/letters/words. The candidate is required to identify the relationship between the pair of numbers/letters/words given and find out the FOURTH numbers/letters/wore such that the relationship between the third and the fourth numbers/letters/words is similar to the relationship that exists between the first and the second numbers/letters/words.

Typical relationships between the numbers in a given pair can be any of the following :

• One number is a multiple of the other.
• One number is the square or square root of the other.
• One number is the cube or cube root of the other.
• The two numbers can be consecutive, even, odd or prime numbers.

Example 1: 3 : 81 : : 6 : ?
(a) 1296
(b) 1269
(c) 1692
(d) 1926

Solution. (a) n : n4 relation here (3) and (3)4 = (81)
Similarly, (6) and (6)4 = 1296

Example 2: Find the missing term 10 : 100 : : ? : 121
(a) 10
(b) 11
(c) 12
(d) 13

Solution. (b) Square of first term is the second term.
102 = 100, so 112 = 121

The questions based on letter analogy are similar to number analogy. Here, the questions are based on the relationship between two groups of letters on each side of the sign : : . Normally, three pairs of letters are given followed by a question mark where the fourth pair of letters is supposed to come.

Example 3 : Find the missing term : YWZX : USVT : : MKNL : ?
(a) IGGH
(b) IGJH
(c) IGJJ
(d) IGHH

Solution. (b) Alphabets are used in reverse order. In the first term, the order of alphabet is 2, 4, 1 and 3 and in the second term, the order is 6, 8, 5 and 7. So, the missing term is IGJH.

(Debar Notification For The Post of Social Welfare Warden of 282 Posts)

The eight north eastern states of India are characterized by their unique cultures, diversity of ethnic groups, rich natural resources and flora and fauna. Flanked by hills and the mighty Brahmaputra river slashing a central path from north to south, the north east is constituted by the States of Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Tripura, Assam and Sikkim. The NE region covers an area of 2.62 lakh sq.km and accounts for 7.9 of the total geographical area of the country. This region is land-locked with long international borders and only a chicken neck corridor connecting it with mainland India.

Due to its peculiar physical, economic and socio-cultural characteristics, the economy of the North East has a distinctive identity. Despite its rich natural endowments, this region represents one of the least developed - economically and industrially -regions of the country.

APPOINTED

• Nabam Tuki
• Gurbachan Singh
• Pulok Chatterjee
• D. Shivakumar
• Sudhir Vasudeva
• S. V. Arumugam

• 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics
• 2011 Nobel Prize in Chemistry

CRICKET

• Megavirus Chilensis
• Fat being the Fuel Reserve of the Body
• Causes of Tears