Directions :Read the following passage to answer the given questions based on it. Some words/phrases are printed in bold to help you locate them while answering some of the questions.
During the reign of king Veer, there lived a wise magistrate. Haripant’s verdicts were always just and people from all over vast kingdom came to him in ordered to settle their disputes. In the city where Haripant lived, there was a greedy ghee merchant named Niranjan. He always kept twenty barrels of ghee. Of these, fifteen would contain good quality ghee and the remaining could be adulterated. He would mix the two and sell it. This went on for a long time, till finally the people fed up of being cheated, complained to Haripant.
Haripant had the ghee examined and found to it be adulterated. He gave Niranjan a choice of punishment-drink the five barrels of adulterated ghee from his shop, or receive a hundred lashings, or pay a thousand gold coins to the treasury. Niranjan thought for a while. Losing a thousand gold coins was too much and a hundred lashings too painful. So he decided to drink the five barrels of ghee. Though Niranjan sold adulterated goods in his shop, he made sure his own food was of the best quality. So after drinking one barrel of ghee he began to feel sick. By the second barrel, he was vomiting. At this point he decided to opt for the lashings instead. But he was pampered and his body was unused to any harsh treatment. After ten lashes, he started trembling and by twenty he was giddy. ‘Stop!’ he screamed. ‘I will pay the thousand gold coins!’ And he handed them over.
So he ended up suffering all three punishments, something he did not forget in a hurry and the people of the city got to use only the best quality in their food from then on

Why was Sean reluctant to take Luke along ?

Directions: Read the passage given below and answer the questions that follow :
With Lok Sabha speaker Purno Sangma abolishing the discretionary quota for gas and telephone connections enjoyed by members of parliament last week, demands are being made for doing away with the same privilege for Union ministers.
Imposing a fine of Rs. 50 lakh on former petroleum minister Satish Sharma for arbitrarily allotting petrol pumps, the Supreme Court had said last year that absolute discretion was an anathema to the Constitution and advised the ‘judicious’ use of discretionary powers.
Citing the use of the so-called privileges as “prejudicial to public interest and a breach of trust”, HD Shourie of Common Cause has sought the prime minister’s intervention to “stop this practice of discretionary quota for ministers to present to the public an image of clean functioning of the government.”
In a letter written to the Cabinet Secretary, he has drawn the PM’s attention to the misuse of this privilege by more than a dozen ministers. In the railways, discretionary quota covers platform stalls, passes, tickets and berths on trains. In civil aviation and tourism, the largesse includes free international air tickets, out-of-turn seats and stalls in ITDC hotels

“Prejudicial to public interest and a breach of trust” — in this quote prejudicial means

Directions: Read the passage given below and answer the questions that follow :
With Lok Sabha speaker Purno Sangma abolishing the discretionary quota for gas and telephone connections enjoyed by members of parliament last week, demands are being made for doing away with the same privilege for Union ministers.
Imposing a fine of Rs. 50 lakh on former petroleum minister Satish Sharma for arbitrarily allotting petrol pumps, the Supreme Court had said last year that absolute discretion was an anathema to the Constitution and advised the ‘judicious’ use of discretionary powers.
Citing the use of the so-called privileges as “prejudicial to public interest and a breach of trust”, HD Shourie of Common Cause has sought the prime minister’s intervention to “stop this practice of discretionary quota for ministers to present to the public an image of clean functioning of the government.”
In a letter written to the Cabinet Secretary, he has drawn the PM’s attention to the misuse of this privilege by more than a dozen ministers. In the railways, discretionary quota covers platform stalls, passes, tickets and berths on trains. In civil aviation and tourism, the largesse includes free international air tickets, out-of-turn seats and stalls in ITDC hotels

What did the Supreme Court suggest ?

Directions: Read the passage given below and answer the questions that follow :
With Lok Sabha speaker Purno Sangma abolishing the discretionary quota for gas and telephone connections enjoyed by members of parliament last week, demands are being made for doing away with the same privilege for Union ministers.
Imposing a fine of Rs. 50 lakh on former petroleum minister Satish Sharma for arbitrarily allotting petrol pumps, the Supreme Court had said last year that absolute discretion was an anathema to the Constitution and advised the ‘judicious’ use of discretionary powers.
Citing the use of the so-called privileges as “prejudicial to public interest and a breach of trust”, HD Shourie of Common Cause has sought the prime minister’s intervention to “stop this practice of discretionary quota for ministers to present to the public an image of clean functioning of the government.”
In a letter written to the Cabinet Secretary, he has drawn the PM’s attention to the misuse of this privilege by more than a dozen ministers. In the railways, discretionary quota covers platform stalls, passes, tickets and berths on trains. In civil aviation and tourism, the largesse includes free international air tickets, out-of-turn seats and stalls in ITDC hotels

A Union minister has not got the power of

Directions: Read the passage given below and answer the questions that follow :
With Lok Sabha speaker Purno Sangma abolishing the discretionary quota for gas and telephone connections enjoyed by members of parliament last week, demands are being made for doing away with the same privilege for Union ministers.
Imposing a fine of Rs. 50 lakh on former petroleum minister Satish Sharma for arbitrarily allotting petrol pumps, the Supreme Court had said last year that absolute discretion was an anathema to the Constitution and advised the ‘judicious’ use of discretionary powers.
Citing the use of the so-called privileges as “prejudicial to public interest and a breach of trust”, HD Shourie of Common Cause has sought the prime minister’s intervention to “stop this practice of discretionary quota for ministers to present to the public an image of clean functioning of the government.”
In a letter written to the Cabinet Secretary, he has drawn the PM’s attention to the misuse of this privilege by more than a dozen ministers. In the railways, discretionary quota covers platform stalls, passes, tickets and berths on trains. In civil aviation and tourism, the largesse includes free international air tickets, out-of-turn seats and stalls in ITDC hotels

“___he has drawn the PM’s attention ____” In this line ‘He’ refers to

Directions: Read the passage given below and answer the questions that follow :
With Lok Sabha speaker Purno Sangma abolishing the discretionary quota for gas and telephone connections enjoyed by members of parliament last week, demands are being made for doing away with the same privilege for Union ministers.
Imposing a fine of Rs. 50 lakh on former petroleum minister Satish Sharma for arbitrarily allotting petrol pumps, the Supreme Court had said last year that absolute discretion was an anathema to the Constitution and advised the ‘judicious’ use of discretionary powers.
Citing the use of the so-called privileges as “prejudicial to public interest and a breach of trust”, HD Shourie of Common Cause has sought the prime minister’s intervention to “stop this practice of discretionary quota for ministers to present to the public an image of clean functioning of the government.”
In a letter written to the Cabinet Secretary, he has drawn the PM’s attention to the misuse of this privilege by more than a dozen ministers. In the railways, discretionary quota covers platform stalls, passes, tickets and berths on trains. In civil aviation and tourism, the largesse includes free international air tickets, out-of-turn seats and stalls in ITDC hotels

The tone of the speaker in the passage is that of

In each of the following sentences , there are two blank spaces. Below each sentence there are four words denoted by (A), (B), (C), (D), (E). Find out one word that is to be fitted in both the sentences I AND II to make it meaningful. In case no word fits , mark (E)  as your answer.

I. Nurses __________ the newborn babies tightly in blankets to calm them down.
II. Drug dealers began to _________ the narcotics tightly in saran wrap so they wouldn’t be discovered.

In each of the following sentences , there are two blank spaces. Below each sentence there are four words denoted by (A), (B), (C), (D), (E). Find out one word that is to be fitted in both the sentences I AND II to make it meaningful. In case no word fits , mark (E)  as your answer.

I never thought my brother would __________ and allow me to drive his car for a week.
II. After seeing himself on the news, the escaped convict decided to __________ to avoid being shot by a police officer.