English Language Questions | NIACL Assistant 2017 | 08.04.2017

Directions (1-10): In the following passage there are blanks, each of which has been numbered. These numbers are printed below the passage and against each five words are suggested, one of which fits the blank appropriately. Find out the appropriate words. 

The capital’s “airpocalypse”, the choking smog that descended on Beijing in the winter of 2012-13, galvanised public opinion and ….(1).. the government. The strange thing is, though, that information about air pollution—how extensive it is, how much damage it does—has long been sketchy, …(2)…. mostly on satellite data or computer models. Until now. …..(3)…. to the outcry, the government set up a national air-reporting system which now has almost 1,000 monitoring stations, pumping out hourly reports on six pollutants, including sulphur dioxide, ozone and (the main ….(4)… particulate matter less than 2.5 microns in diameter, or PM2.5. These are tiny particles which lodge in the lungs and ….(5)…. respiratory disease. The six are the main cause of local pollution but have little to do with climate change, since they do not include carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas. Scientists from Berkeley Earth, a not-for-profit foundation in America, have …(6)… through this recent cloud of data for the four months to early August 2014, sieved out the bits that are manifestly wrong (readings where the dial seems to be stuck, forinstance) and emerged with the most detailed and upto-date picture of Chinese air pollution so far. Pollution is sky-high …(7)…. in China. Some 83% of Chinese are …(8).. to air that, in America, would be deemed by the Environmental Protection Agency either to be unhealthy or unhealthy for sensitive groups. Almost half the population of China experiences levels of PM2.5 that are …(9).. America’s highest threshold. That is even ….(10)… than the satellite data had suggested.

Q1. (a) Frightened (b) Spooked (c) Startled (d) Pleased (e) Agitated 

Q2. (a) Situated (b) Stationed (c) Based (d) Enacted (e) Disambiguated 

Q3. (a) Countering (b) Retorting (c) Answering (d) Greeting (e) Responding 

Q4. (a) Fugitive (b) Felon (c) Miscreant (d) Culprit (e) Suspect 

Q5. (a) Hamper (b) Cause (c) Lead (d) Result (e) Originate 

Q6. (a) Seined (b) Drained (c) Carried (d) Trawled (e) Propelled 

Q7. (a) All over (b) Nowhere (c) Around (d) Ubiquitous (e) Everywhere 

Q8. (a) Exposed (b) Obscured (c) Exhibited (d) Blocked (e) Concealed 

Q9. (a) Above (b) Over (c) Aloft (d) Beyond (e) After 

Q10. (a) Better (b) Worse (c) Poo (d) Horrible (e) Repugnant

Answer

S1. Ans.(b) 

S2. Ans.(c) 

S3. Ans.(e) 

S4. Ans.(d) 

S5. Ans.(b) 

S6. Ans.(d) 

S7. Ans.(e) 

S8. Ans.(a) 

S9. Ans.(a) 

S10. Ans.(b)