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(Paper) IES General English Previous Year Paper (2000)
Paper : IES General English Previous Year Paper (2000)
1. Write an essay on one of the following topics in
1000-1200 words: (40)
(a) Discipline without freedom is tyranny; freedom without discipline is
chaos.
(b) How TV programmes in India can be made more socially responsible?
(c) How far has the common man benefited from economic liberalization in India?
(d) What success means to you?
(e) The importance of forests.
(f) More than anything else, it is a sense of humors which makes life bearable.
2. Write a precis of the following passage in about 200 Words, Using your own
words as far as possible. Please state the number of words used in your precise.
(20)
(Note: The precis must be written only on the special sheets Provided for the
purpose — one word ineach block — and these sheets should be fastened
securely inside the answer book)
What is prejudice? Its characteristics and origins have by now been carefully
studied by psychologists and sociologists so that today we know a good deal
about how it is transmitted from one person to another.
Preudice is a false generalization about a grbup of People or things — which
is held on to despite all facts to the contrary. Some generalizations, of
course, are true and useful — often neededto put people and things into
categories. The statement that Negroes have darkly pigmented skin and nearly
always curly hair, isn’t a prejudice but a correct generalization about
Negroes Ignorance isn’t the same as prejudice, either. Many people believe
that Negroes are basically less intelligent than white people because they’ve
heard this and never been told otherwise. These people would be prejudiced if
they persisted in this belief after they knew thefacts! Well documented studies
show that when Negroes and whites are properly matched in comparable groups,
they have the same intelligence.
Prejudiced thinking is rarely, probably never, confined to any one subject.
Those prejudiced against one group of people are nearly always prejudiced
againstothers. Prejudice, then, could be said to be a disorder of thinking a
prejudiced person makes fully generalizations by applying to a whole group what
he has learned from one or a few of its members. Sometimes doesn’t even draw
on his own experiences but bases his attitudes on what he has heard from others.
Then he behaves toward a whole group as if there were no individual differences
among its members.
Few people would throw out a whole box of strawberries because they found one or
two bad berries at the top — yet this is the way prejudiced people think and
act.
The first important point about how children learn prejudice is that they do.
They aren’t born that way, though some people think prejudice is innate and
like to quote the old saying “you can’t change human nature.’ But you can
change it. We now know that very small children are free of prejudice. Studies O
school children have shown that prejudice is slight or. Absent among children in
the first and second grades. It increases thereafter, building to a peak usually
among children in the fourth and fifth grades. After this, it may fall off again
in adolescence. Other studies have show that, on the average, young adults are
much freer of prejudice than older ones. In the early stages of picking up
prejudice, children mix it with ignorance which, as I’ve said, should be
distinguished from prejudice. A child as he begins to study the world around him
tries to organize his experiences.
Doing this, he begins to classify things and people and begins to form
connection — or what psychologists call associations. He needs to do this
because he saves time and effort by putting things and people into categories.
But unless he classifies correctly, his categories will mislead rather than
guide him. For example, if child learns that “all fires are hot and
dangerous,” fires have been put firmly into the category of things to be
watched carefully — and thus he can save himself from harm. But if he learns a
category like “Negores are lazy” or “foreigners are fools,” he’s
learned generalization that mislead because they’re unreliable. The thing is
that, when we use categories we need to remember the exceptions and differences,
the individual variations that qualify the usefulness of all generalizations.
Some fires, for example, are hotter and more dangerous than others. If people
had avoided all fires as dangerous, we would never have had cooking or central
heating. School can help undo the damage. Actual personal experience with,
children of other groups can show a child directly, immediately and concretely
that not all members of a group are blameworthy, stupid, dirty or dishonest. In
addition, unprejudiced teachers can instruct children in the ways of clear
thinking that underlie tolerance There is definite evidence that education
reduces prejudices, It’s been found, for example, that college graduates are
less prejudice on the whole than people with less education. Direct instruction
about different groups and cultures, another Study shows, reduced prejudice in
those who were taught.
Fortunately, we seem today to be making progress in direction of less prejudiced
belief and behavior. Today, parents treat children with greater respect for them
as individuals short, with less prejudice. This will continue to exert a
hea1th’ influence on the next generation. In fact, one survey has shown that
it already has! College students of our generation; it demonstrates, are less
prejudiced than college students of the last generation.
But since prejudice against members of a minority group o the peoples of other
countries is a luxury we can increasingly ill afford — no parent should relax
his vigilance in guarding against sowing the seeds of intolerance.
(10)
3. Write a single paragraph, in about 200 words, on one of the following
topics : (10)
(a) Man spoils mattes much more by speech than by silence
(b) When all think alike ‘no one thinks very much.
(c) A traffic jam.
(d) Scene in an examination hail before the beginning of th examination.
4. Use the following words in sentences so as to bring their meaning clearly.
Do not change the form of the word. No mark will be given for a vague or
ambiguous sentence (10)
(a) potential
(b) legacy
(c) interpret
(d) elaborate
(e) environments
5. Supply the correct forms, of verbs given in parentheses in the following
passage. Please write correct verb forms in your answer book against numbers
given in parentheses; do not reproduce the entire passage:
(10)
Albert Camus, an Algerian writer who --
(i die) some time age
(ii note), for his symbols of the absurd hero. When he
(iii write). Camus
(iv thaw) upon mythology, history, fiction, and drama in order
(v illustrate) his absurdism. Camus
(vi choose) Sisyphus as the absurd hero in classic form. According to legend,
Sisyphus
(vii accuse) by the gods of
(viii steal) their secrets. The gods condemned him to an eternity of (ix
push) a rock to the top of a hill and (x see) it roll down the slope again.
6. Correct the following sentences without changing their meaning. Please do
not make unnecessary changes in the sentences. (10)
(a) I am believing what you tell me.
(b) I like Rita because she is too helpful.
(c) What a fine weather:
(d) Coffee keeps person awake.
(e) I want you and her to help me.
(f) Hardly he had left the house when the storm broke.
(g) He was very too much happy to know that he had won a lottery.
(h) They demanded that the manager is dismissed.
(I) ‘Didn’t you meet Kailash? “Yest, I didn’t.”
(j) The party comprises of Dinesh, Ramesh and Mohan.