हिंदी

During the Devastating July 2005 Floods that Hit Mumbai, Rajen Dutia Received an Urgent Call from a Relative, Lopa Vyas Late in the Evening. “A Friend’S Mother is Stranded Near Your Home, Rajen. - English

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प्रश्न

During the devastating July 2005 floods that hit Mumbai, Rajen Dutia received an urgent call from a relative, Lopa Vyas late in the evening. “A friend’s mother is stranded near your home, Rajen. Can you please take her home? Her name is Rashmi,” Vyas told him.
Mumbai had come to a halt and people were trapped everywhere. Despite power failure and raging rain, Dutia stepped out and made his way to the spot, where he found Rashmi as well as a dozen other people. They were stranded in the dark, shivering in the rain. They all lived far away and had no place to go for the night.
Rajen took all of them to his one-bedroom flat, where he served them dinner and invited them to spend the night.
"By doing so," says Rajen, "I was simply fulfilling my karma, paying the universe back for the good it had done for me."

"God is kind. My daughter had just started her new job that day, and had gone for her training. She was stranded too. While she was trying to get to our relatives, she almost drowned, but a young stranger saved her. He and his friends even dropped her to my relative's place and phoned me to say she was safe. One good turn deserves another."

A2. Order
Look at the following sentences from the passage and put them in the correct sequence: (2)
(a) He took them to his one-bedroom flat.
(b) Rajen found Rashmi as well as a dozen other people shivering in the rain.
(c) Mumbai had come to a halt and people were trapped everywhere.
(d) Rajen Dutia received an urgent call.

A3

During the devastating July 2005 floods that hit Mumbai, Rajen Dutia received an urgent call from a relative, Lopa Vyas late in the evening. “A friend’s mother is stranded near your home, Rajen. Can you please take her home? Her name is Rashmi,” Vyas told him.
Mumbai had come to a halt and people were trapped everywhere. Despite power failure and raging rain, Dutia stepped out and made his way to the spot, where he found Rashmi as well as a dozen other people. They were stranded in the dark, shivering in the rain. They all lived far away and had no place to go for the night.
Rajen took all of them to his one-bedroom flat, where he served them dinner and invited them to spend the night.
"By doing so," says Rajen, "I was simply fulfilling my karma, paying the universe back for the good it had done for me."

"God is kind. My daughter had just started her new job that day, and had gone for her training. She was stranded too. While she was trying to get to our relatives, she almost drowned, but a young stranger saved her. He and his friends even dropped her to my relative's place and phoned me to say she was safe. One good turn deserves another."

A2. Order
Look at the following sentences from the passage and put them in the correct sequence: (2)
(a) He took them to his one-bedroom flat.
(b) Rajen found Rashmi as well as a dozen other people shivering in the rain.
(c) Mumbai had come to a halt and people were trapped everywhere.
(d) Rajen Dutia received an urgent call.

A3(i). Fill in the blanks :
Select the words given in the passage (1)
(i) Thousands Of pilgrims were …………….. due to the cloud burst in Uttarakhand.
(ii) The tiger was ……………… by the hunter.

(ii). Antonyms:
Select the correct antonyms for the given words from the alternatives :
(1) Please :
(a) unplease (b) displease (c) misplease
(2) Safe: '
(a) insafe (b) safeless (c) unsafe

A4(i) Tags :
Select the correct tag for the alternatives given below :
One good turn deserves another.
(a) Doesn’t it? (b) don’t it (c) does it?

(ii). Guess:
Choose the correct answer : (1)
Rajen can you please take her home? ‘Can’ indicates :
(a) Obligation (b) ability (c) permission

A5. Personal Response :
‘ one good turn
Deserves another.’
Explain with an
example of your own.

एक पंक्ति में उत्तर

उत्तर

A1. Complete:
Effects of Floods:
1. Life comes to a halt.
2. There are power failures.
3. People get trapped and property is damaged.
4. There is a shortage of basic supplies like food and clothing.

A2. Order:
1. (d) Rajen Dutia received an urgent call.
2. (c) Mumbai had come to a halt and people were trapped everywhere.
3. (b) Rajen found Rashmi as well as a dozen other people shivering in the rain.
4. (a) He took them to his one-bedroom flat.

A3. i. Fill in the blanks:
i. Thousands of pilgrims were stranded due to the cloud burst in Uttarakhand.
ii. The tiger was trapped by the hunter.

A3. ii. Antonyms:
(1) (b) displease
(2) (c) unsafe

A4. i. Tags:
One good turn deserves another, (a)doesn’t it?

A4. ii. Guess:
Rajen can you please take her home? ‘Can’ indicates: (a) ‘can’ indicates obligation.

A5. Personal Response:
The expression ‘one good turn deserves another’ means if someone does a good deed to me it is
my duty to return the favour if possible or at least do some good deed to help anyone in need. For
example, if my classmate shares his lunch or stationery with me in school, I should be ready to do
the same for him or for any one else in need.

shaalaa.com
Unseen Passage Comprehension
  क्या इस प्रश्न या उत्तर में कोई त्रुटि है?
2015-2016 (March)

APPEARS IN

संबंधित प्रश्न

It is rare to find someone with good technical and communication skills. You can get far ahead of your colleagues if you combine the two early in your career. People will judge, evaluate, promote or block you based on your communication skills. Since habits form by repeating both good and bad forms of communication, learn to observe great communicators and adopt their styles and traits — in written and verbal forms. The art of listening and learning from each and every interaction is another secret recipe. Develop the subconscious habit of listening to yourself as you speak and know when to pause.

Learning what not to say is probably more important than learning what to say. As your career develops, you will realize that the wise speak less. Speak when you have value to add, else refrain. Poorly constructed emails with grammatical errors are acceptable between friends, but they should be seriously avoided while communicating formally with your seniors. Avoid any communication in an emotional state when might say things you will regret later. One unnecessary word uttered at the wrong time or place can ruin a relationship, career or even your life. Such is the power of words. If such a thing happens, you should immediately apologise, else it may haunt you for life.

Another problem to overcome is speaking too fast. Since our minds are working faster than our speech, we are inclined to speak fast. This does not necessarily mean that the person hearing it will get it any faster. On the contrary, it is always the reverse. So slow down and think before you speak. “When I get ready to speak to people,” Abraham Lincoln said, “I spend two-thirds of the time thinking what they want to hear and one-thirds of the time thinking what they want to hear and one-third thinking what I want to say.” Adding humour and wit is also essential. But realize that not all jokes are funny and observe certain boundaries. Never say anything that could offend. Remember you are not a comedian who must offend as many people as you can to be witty.

2.1 Answer the following questions briefly:

(a) Why is it necessary to have good communication skills?

(b) How can communication skills be developed?

(c) What, according to the writer, should be avoided while communicating?

(d) Why should you be careful when you tend to be humorous?

2.2 Choose the most appropriate meanings of the given words from the options provided:

(a) evaluate (para 1)

(i) estimate
(ii) assume
(iii) punish
(iv) evolve

(b) trait (para 1)

(i) treaty
(ii) trail
(iii) quality
(iv) liberty

(c) utter (para 2)

(i) flatter
(ii) speak
(iii) rot
(iv) unique

(d) haunt (para 2)

(i) hunt
(ii) chant
(iii) trouble
(iv) avoid


Read the passage given below and answer the questions that follow:           

The most alarming of man’s assaults upon the environment is the contamination of air, earth, rivers, and sea with lethal materials. This pollution is for the most part irrevocable; the chain of evil it initiates is for the most part irreversible. In this contamination of the environment, chemicals are the sinister partners of radiation in changing the very nature of the world; radiation released through nuclear explosions into the air, comes to the earth in rain, lodges into the soil, enters the grass or corn, or wheat grown there and reaches the bones of a human being, there to remain until his death. Similarly, chemicals sprayed on crops lie long in soil, entering living organisms, passing from one to another in a chain of poisoning and death. Or they pass by underground streams until they emerge and combine into new forms that kill vegetation, sicken cattle, and harm those who drink from once pure wells.

It took hundreds of millions of years to produce the life that now inhabits the earth and reached a stage of adjustment and balance with its surroundings. The environment contained elements that were hostile as well as supporting. Even within the light of the sun, there were short wave radiations with power to injure. Given time, life has adjusted and a balance reached. For time is the essential ingredient, but in the modern world is no time.

The rapidity of change and the speed with which new situations are created follow the heedless pace of man rather than the deliberate pace of nature. Radiation is no longer the bombardment of cosmic rays; it is now the unnatural creation of man’s tampering with the atom. The chemicals to which life is asked to make adjustments are no longer merely calcium and silica and copper and all the rest of the minerals washed out of the rocks and carried in the rivers to the sea; they are the synthetic creations of man’s inventive mind, brewed in his laboratories, and having no counterparts in nature.

(a) On the basis of your understanding of the above passage make notes on it using headings and sub-headings. Use recognizable abbreviations (wherever necessary-minimum four) and a format you consider suitable. Also supply a title to it.

(b) Write a summary of the passage in about 80 words.


Read the following extract and answer the questions given below:

Now, as I stood on the shore of that desolate Highland loch
I raised my voice in a surge of self-justification : ''By Heavens!
This is my opportunity. Gastric ulcer or no gastric ulcer, I will
write a novel.'' Before I could change 1ny mind I walked straight to the village and bot1ght myself two dozen penny exercise books.
Upstairs in my cold, clean bedroom was a scrubbed deal table and a very hard chair. Next morning, I found myself in this chair, facing a new exercise book open upon the table, slowly' becoming aware that, short of dog-Lati11 prescriptions, I had never composed a significant phrase in all my life. It was a discot1raging thought as I picked 11p my pen and gazed out of the window. Never mind, I would begin. Three hours later Mrs. Angus, the farmer's wife, called me to dinner. The page was still blank.
As I went dow-n to m:y milk and junket-they call this  "curds'' in Tarbert - I felt a dreadful fool. I felt like the wretched poet in Daudet's Jack whose im1nortal masterpiece never progressed beyond its stillborn opening phrase : ''In a remote valley of Pyrenees ..... ". I recollected, rather gri111ly, the sharp advice with which my old schoolmaster had goaded me to action. ''Get it down!'' he had said. ''If it ~tops in your head it will always be nothing.
Get it down.'' And so, after lunch, I went upstairs and began to get it down.

(1) What is the main idea of the extract? (1)
(2) Why did the narrator buy two dozen penny exercise books? (2)
(3) How was the narrator unprepared for writing his novel? (2)
(4) Write in brief about what you will do in your forthcoming vacation. (2)
(5) Rewrite the following sentences in the ways instructed:
(i) I stood on the shore of that desolate Highland loch.
(Rewrite it using 'used to'.) (1)
(ii) I went down to my milk and junket.
(Rewrite it in the Past Perfect Tense.) (1)
(iii) I walked straight to the village and bought myself
two dozen penny exercise books. (Make it simple). (1)
(6) Find out the words from the extract which mean:
(i) chance  (1/2)
(ii) lake   (1/2)


     We were an argrarian people. And my main hobby in my early teens was to wander through paddy field to see the different kinds of birds and how they nest. On the outskirts of the paddy fields, there had been many coconut trees and black palm trees. Beautifully crafted nests of the weaver-birds thookkanaam kuruvikal-would be seen dangling from the ends of palm leaves. Hundreds of these little birds would land on the paddy to squeeze the milk from the tender rice. They would come to the fields when the young stalks come out of the rise-plants. At this stage of the paddy, my father would send me to our field with a tin drum to scare these birds away. But often I have enjoyed the sight of these little birds balancing on the tender stalks and squeezing the milk out of the green rice. When the paddy is ripe enough to harvest, flocks of parrots would land there and cut the ripe stalks with their sharp beaks and fly away with the stalks dangling in their beaks. I have always liked to see this sight also.
       The nest of parrots were neatly crafted holes in the trunks of palm trees. I continued to wonder how they made chose holes on the hard trunks until I saw the patient work of the woodpeckers. They were the carpenters and their long, sharp and strong beaks, chisels. They make the holes (in search of worms inside the weak spots of the trunks) and the parrots occupy them. If I heard the sound tak, tak, tak. I knew it was a woodpeckers chiselling a had trunk. I would go after him. It seems that the woodpecker is the only bird which can walk perpendicularly on the tree trunks! How beautiful the sight was! Its strong legs, red crest, the dark red stripe on the face and black beak and the tak, tak, tak sound used to captivate me

A1. Complete the following table :Choose two sentence that appropriately mention the theme of the passage :

(i) The extract deals with the techniques to scare the birds away.
(ii) The extract depicts how parrots make holes on the tree trunks.
(iii) The extract depicts the writer’s love towards the birds.
(iv) The extract deals with the activities of different birds.

A2. Complete the flow-chart : 

A3. Complete the following table :

A4. Vocabulary -

Match the pairs of the words in column ‘A’ with their meaning in column ‘B’ :

Column ‘A’ Column ‘B’
(i) dangling (a) connected with farming
(ii) squeezing (b) attract the attention
(iii) agrarian (c) hanging freely
(iv) captivate (d) pressing firmly

A5. Personal response - 

Suggest two measures to increase the number of birds.

A6. Grammer -

Rewrite the following sentences in the way instructed
(i) The paddy is ripe enough to harvest
(Remove ‘enough’ and rewrite the sentence.)
(ii) How beautiful the sight was!
(Rewritte as an assertive sentence)


Read the first activity, read the extract and then do all the activities:
The next year Dell enrolled at the University of Texas. Like most first-year students, he needed to earn spending money. Just about everyone on campus was talking about personal computers. At the time, anyone who didn’t have a PC wanted one, but dealers were selling them at a hefty mark-up. People wanted low-cost machines custom-made to their needs, and these were not readily available. Why should dealers get such a big mark-up for so little added value ? Dell wondered. Why not sell from the manufacturer directly to the end user ?
Dell knew that IBM required its dealers to take a monthly quota of PCs, in most cases more than they could sell. He also knew that holding excess inventory was costly. So he bought dealers’ surplus stock at cost. Back in his dormitory room, he added features to improve performance. The improved models found eager buyers. Seeing the hungry market, Dell placed local advertisements offering his customized computers at 15 percent of retail price. Soon he was selling to businesses, doctors’ offices and law firms. The trunk of his car was his store; his room took on the appearance of a small factory.
During a holiday break, Dell’s parents told him they were concerned about his grades. “If you want to start a business, do it after you get your degree,” his father pleaded. Dell agreed, but back in college he felt the opportunity of a lifetime was passing him by. “I couldn’t hear to miss this chance,” he says. After one month he started selling computers again- with a vengeance.

A1. True / False - (2)
Rewrite the following sentences stating against each of them whether they are true or false :
(i) Dell bought computers directly from the IBM company.
(ii) Dealers were selling computers at high prices.
(iii) Dell’s father wanted Dell to get his degree.
(iv) Dealers disagreed to sell the surplus stock of computers to Dell.

A2. Give reasons - (2)
Dell wanted to stait a business of selling computers because :
(i) ____________
(ii) ____________

A3. Guess : (2)
“I couldn’t bear to miss this chance,” Dell says. Guess. which chance Dell did not want to miss”.

A4. Vocabulary - (2)
Find out the words from the extract which mean :
(i) college hall of residence
(ii) large amount added to the cost price
(iii) quantity of good in stock
(iv) with great intensity

A5. Personal response : (2)
Suggest two strategies businessman to become a successful businessman.

A6. Grammar - (2)
Rewrite the following sentences in the ways instructed :
(i) Seeing the hungry market, Dell placed local advertisement. (Make it a compound sentence)
(ii) He added features to improve performance. (Frame ‘Wh’ question to get the underlined part as an answer.)


(A) Read the following extract and answer the questions given below:
       One afternoon in 1977, as his parents and two brothers fished in the Gulf of Mexico, 12-year old Michael Dell sat on the beach. painstakingly putting together a trotline - a maze of ropes to ''which several fish hooks could be attached."You're wasting your time," the rest of the family called to Michael, as they pulled in fish. "Grab a pole and join in the fun."
        Michael kept working. It was dinner time when he finished, and everyone else was ready to call it a day. Still, the youngster
cast the trotline far into the water. anchoring it to a stick that he plunged deep in the sand.
        Over dinner, his family teased young Michael about coming away empty-handed. But afterward, Michael reeled in his trotline, and on the hooks were more fish than the others had caught all together!
       Michael Dell has always been fond of saying, "If you think you have a good idea, try it!" And today, at 29 he has discovered the power of another good idea that has helped him rise in just a few years from teen to a tycoon. He has become the fourth-largest manufacturer of personal computers in America and the youngest man ever to head a Fortune 500 corporation.
(1) What were Michael Dell’s achievements at his age of 29?
(2) What is the secret of Michael Dell’s Success?
(3) How did Michael surprise his family members?
(4) Do you think trying new ideas can make your life successful? How?
(5) Rewrite the following sentences in the ways instructed:
(i) He has discovered the power of another good idea.
(Rewrite the sentence beginning with 'The power of ...' )
(ii) Michael Dell sat on the beach.
(Rewrite it using past perfect continuous tense.)
(iii) The youngster cast the trotline.
(Frame a Wh-question to get the underlined part as
its answer.)
(6) 'Grab a pole and join in the fun'.
Pick out the contextual meaning of the underlined word from
the options are given below:
(i) smash
(ii) hold firmly
(iii) throw away


Read the passage given below :

Globalization

Globalization is the way to open businesses, improve technological growth, economy, etc, at the international level for all countries. It is the way in which manufacturers and producers of the products or goods sell their products globally without any restriction. It provides huge profits to the businessmen as they get 1ow cost labor in poor countries easily. It provides a big opportunity for companies to„ deal with the worldwide market. 

Globalization helps to consider the whole world 'as a single market. Traders are extending their areas of business by treating the world as a global village. Earlier till the 1990s, there was a restriction on importing certain products that were already manufactured in India like agricultural products, engineering goods, food items, and toiletries. However, during the 1990s there was pressure from. the rich countries on the poor and developing countries to allow them to spread their businesses by opening their markets. In India, the globalization and liberalization process was started in 1991. 

After many years, globalization brought about a major revolution in the Indian market when multinational brands came to India and started delivering a wide range of quality products at cheap prices. Prices of good quality products came down because of the cutthroat competition in the market. 

Globalization and liberalization of the businesses in India have flooded the market with quality foreign products but have affected the local Indian industries adversely to a great extent resulting in job loss to poor and uneducated workers. Globalization has been a bonanza for the consumers, however, a loss to the small-scale Indian producers. 

Globalization has had some very positive effects on the Indian consumer in all sectors of society. It has affected the Indian students and education sector to a great extent by making study books and a lot of information available over the internet. The collaboration of foreign universities with Indian universities has brought about a huge change in the field of education.

Globalization of trade in the agricultural sector has brought varieties of quality seeds that have disease resistati8e; property. However, it is not good for the poor Indian farmers because the seeds and agricultural technologies are costly.

It has brought about a huge revolution in the employment sector by the spread of businesses like cottage, handloom, carpet, artisan carving, ceramic, jewelry, and glassware, etc

(a) What is globalization?

(b) Write any two advantages of globalization.

(c) What was the pressure from the rich countries in the 1990s?

(d) What is the effect of multinational brands entering the Indian market?

(e) How are the prices of quality products affected due to globalization?

(f) How have foreign products affected the local industry adversely?

(g) What has been the impact of globalization on Indian students?

(h) Why has globalization had a negative effect on the poor Indian farmer?

(i) How has the cottage industry benefited from globalization?


Read the extract and complete the activities given below :

    Luxurious houses on the edge of a big city which one promoter sold with the tagline ‘‘Where Nature peeps through every window.’’ All the advantages of a modern lifestyle but with the added bonus of fresh air. But nature isn’t greenery alone; it also includes wild animals.
   While the view from the picture windows was easy on the eye, occasionally, it made them gulp with nervousness. At dusk, wild cats leaped out of the adjoining forest on to the top of the peripheral walls and strolled nonchalantly. Sometimes, they lounged on ledges with their long tails swinging freely, oblivious of the many worried human eyes pinned on them. Their cold yellow aggressive eyes turned black as their pupils dilated with failing light.
   Some Mumbaikars paid a lot of money to see leopards on safari in Africa. But to watch them from one’s own home was disconcerting. These predators were out of line, stepping off nature into the city. Why did the leopards not stay within the 100-square kilometre Sanjay Gandhi National Park? Perhaps, the leopards thought that if people could venture into nature to jog, walk and picnic, why couldn’t they hang around apartment blocks? If people could enjoy nature, couldn’t nature savour humanity’s offerings?
   Capturing leopards is extraordinarily simple. These curious cats seem incapable of resisting a free meal, walking into baited traps without hesitation. The reason the felines are attracted to their residential community is prey : stray dogs that live on rubbish heaps. Taking care of the food source is the best course of action, the volunteers said.

A1. Rewrite the following sentences as per their occurrence in the extract :

  1. Instead of capturing leopards we can take care of their food.
  2. Leopards leave their habitat and enter the human habitat.
  3. Modern lifestyle and nature both attract the dwellers.
  4. Leopards can enjoy human surroundings by leaving nature.

A2. Complete the following sentences :

  1. Nature is a combination of ______ and ______
  2. The best of both the worlds include ______ and ______
  3. The wild animals are out of line as ______
  4. The wild cats are attracted towards residential areas because ______

A3. Find out the words for leopards used in the extract :

  1. ____________
  2. ____________
  3. ____________
  4. ____________

A4. ‘‘If people could venture into nature to jog, walk, and picnic, why couldn’t the wild animals hang around apartment blocks?’’ Express your opinion.

A5. Rewrite the following sentences in the ways instructed :

  1. Taking care of the food source is the best course of action.
    (Use infinitive form of the underlined word and rewrite.)
  2. Nature isn’t greenery alone; it also includes wild animals.
    (Rewrite it by using ‘not only ... but also’.)

A6. Find a word for each of the following expressions from the extract :

  1. Enjoy the taste of something
  2. Embarrassing and confusing to watch
  3. Not conscious or aware of something or someone
  4. Relaxed and in an unworried manner

Read the following passage and answer the questions that follow:

1.

Too many parents these days can't say no, As a result, they find themselves raising 'children' who respond greedily to the advertisements aimed right at them. Even getting what they want doesn't satisfy some kids; they only want more. Now, a growing number of psychologists, educators, and parents think it's time to stop the madness and start teaching kids about what's really important: values like hard work, contentment, honesty, and compassion. The struggle to set limits has never been tougher and the stakes have never been higher. One recent study of adults who were overindulged as children paints a discouraging picture of their future: when given too much too soon, they grow up to be adults who have difficulty coping with life's disappointments. They also have a distorted sense of entitlement that gets in the way of success in the workplace and in relationships.

2.

Psychologists say that parents who overindulge their kids set them up to be more vulnerable to future anxiety and depression. Today's parents themselves raised on values of thrift and self-sacrifice, grew up in a culture where no was a household word. Today's kids want much more, partly because there is so much more to want. The oldest members of this generation were born in the late 1980s, just as PCs and video games were making their assaults on the family room. They think of MP3 players and flat-screen TV as essential utilities, and they have developed strategies to get them. One survey of teenagers found that when they crave something new, most expect to ask nine times before their parents give in. By every measure, parents are shelling out record amounts. In the heat of this buying blitz, even parents who desperately need to say no find themselves reaching for their credit cards.

3.

What parents need to find, is a balance between the advantages of an affluent society and the critical life lessons that come from waiting, saving, and working hard to achieve goals. That search for balance has to start early. Children need limits on their behaviour because they feel better and more secure when they live within a secure structure.

4.

 Older children learn self-control by watching how others, especially parents act. Learning how to overcome challenges is essential to becoming a successful adult. Few parents ask kids to do chores. They think their kids are already overburdened by social and academic pressures. Every individual can be of service to others, and life has meaning beyond one's own immediate happiness. That means parents eager to teach values have to take a long, hard look at their own.

Based on your understanding of the passage, answer any eight questions from the nine given below:

  1. What is challenging for today's parents?
  2. What will be the consequence of over indulging children?
  3. Why do parents get caught in the buying blitz?
  4. How do children learn critical life lessons?
  5. What is the impact of advertisements on children?
  6. Why do children need limits on their behaviour?
  7. How do older children learn self-control?
  8. Find a word in the passage which means 'research'. (Paragraph 2)
  9. Find a word in the passage which means 'wealthy'. (Paragraph 3)

Read the following passage and answer the questions that follow:

  1. Mankind's fascination with gold is as old as civilization itself. The ancient Egyptians held gold in high esteem. Gold had religious significance for them, and King Tutankhamen was buried in a solid gold coffin 3300 years ago. The wandering Israelites worshipped a golden calf, and the legendary King Midas asked that whatever he touched be turned into gold. 
  2. Not only is gold beautiful, but it is virtually indestructible. It will not rust or corrode. Gold coins and products fabricated from the metal have survived undamaged for centuries. Gold is extremely easy to work with. One ounce, which is about the size of a cube of sugar, can be beaten into a sheet nearly 100 square feet in size, and becomes so thin that light can pass through it. An ounce of gold can also be stretched into a wire 50 miles long. Gold conducts electricity better than any other substance except copper and silver, and it is particularly important in modern electronic industry.
  3. People have always longed to possess gold. Unfortunately, this longing has also brought out the worst in human character. The Spanish conquerors robbed palaces, temples and graves and killed thousands of people in their ruthless search for gold. Even today, the economy of South Africa's gold mines depend largely on the employment of black labourers who are paid about 40 pounds a month, plus boarding and lodging. They work in conditions that can only be described as cruel. About 400 miners die in South Africa each year.
  4. Much of the gold's value lies in its scarcity. Only about 80,000 tons have been mined in the history of the world. All of it can be stored in a vault 60 feet square, or a super tanker. Great Britain was the first country to adopt the gold standard, when the Master of the Mint, Sir Issac Newton, established a fixed price for gold in 1717. The discovery of gold in the last half of the nineteenth century in California (1848) and later in Australia and South Africa changed everything. Before the discovery there wasn't enough gold around for all the trading nations to link their currencies to the precious metal.
  5. An out-of-work prospector named George Harrison launched South Africa into the gold age in 1886 when he discovered the metal on a farm near what is now Johannesburg. Harrison was given a 12 pounds as a reward by the farmer. He then disappeared and was eaten by a lion.
  6. One of the biggest gold mining areas in the Soviet Union is the Kolyma River region, once infamous for its prison camp. The camp has gone, but in a way nothing has changed. Many ex-prisoners have stayed on to work in the mines and are supervised by ex-guards.
  7. Despite the current rush to buy gold, 75 percent of the metal goes into making jewellery. Italy is the biggest consumer of gold for this purpose, and many Italian jewellers even tear up their wooden floors and bum them to recover the tiny flecks of gold. Historically, the desire to hoard gold at home has been primarily an occupation of the working and peasant classes, who have had no faith in paper money. George Bernard Shaw defended their instincts eloquently, "You have to choose between trusting the natural stability of the honesty and intelligence of the members of the government," he said "and with due respect to these gentlemen, I advise to vote for gold."

Based on your understanding of the passage, answer the questions given below:

  1. When was King Tutankhamen burled?      (1)
    1. 1717
    2. 1886
    3. 3300 years ago
    4. 1848
  2. Why did Egyptians hold gold in great esteem?      (1)
    1. because it is a good conductor of electricity.
    2. because of its religious significance.
    3. for lovely gold ornaments.
    4. because it is indestructible.
  3. According to the passage, which of the following statements is NOT true?       (1)
    1. Gold is the best conductor of electricity.
    2. Apart from gold, copper and silver are good conductors of electricity.
    3. Gold can be easily beaten, hence it is easy to work with.
    4. Gold plays an important role in the modern electronics industry.
  4. Select the option that displays what the writer projects, with reference of the following:      (1)
    The wandering Israelites worshipped a golden calf ______.
    1. importance of religion
    2. importance of the metal
    3. good conductor
    4. can replace money
  5. How were the black labourers exploited?         (1)
  6. Complete the following with the phrase from paragraph 1:    (1)
    Opinion Reason
      King Tutankhamen was buried in
    a solid gold coffin 3300 years ago.
  7. Based on your reading of the text list 2 reasons why the writer says that,
    Not only is gold beautiful but it is virtually indestructible.      (1)
  8. Who launched South Africa into the gold age?      (1)
    1. Issac Newton
    2. George Harrison
    3. George Bernard Shaw
    4. A farmer
  9. Select the option that corresponds to the following:    (1)
    The ancient Egyptians and the modern electronic industry both hold gold in high esteem.
    1. The hardworking student came first because of his diligent practice.
    2. Honesty is underrated whereas strategy is appreciated.
    3. The vibrant colours made the interiors look luminous.
    4. The steaming food was both appetizing and tasty.
  10. Supply one point to justify the following:     (1)
    The desire to hoard gold at home has been primarily an occupation of the working and peasant classes.

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