Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below it. Certain words in the passage have been printed in bold to help you locate them when answering some of the questions.

He was a funny-looking man with a high, bald, dome-shaped head, a face very small in comparison and a long wavy beard. His unusual features were a standing joke among his friends. He was a poor man idler. He didn't work at his trade a stone cutter, more than what was necessary to keep his wife and three boys alive. He preferred to talk but since his wife was an irate complaining woman, he loved to be away from home.

The whole city he lived in was seething with argumentation. The city was Athens and the man was Socrates, the Greek philosopher. He had funny ways and notions. And to the astonishment of all, the Oracle at Delphi, the priestess when asked, "Who is the wisest man in Athens ?" mentioned Socrates, Socrates was the evangelist of clear thinking: he would present people with questions pretending he didn't know the answers and get them to make astounding admissions. Socrates would go up to a prominent statesman coming to the end of a speech on 'courage', about the glory of dying for one's country and say, "Forgive my intrusion, but just what do you mean by courage ?"

"Courage is sticking to your post in danger" would be the reply. "But supposing good strategy demands that you retire ?", Socrates would ask. "You wouldn't stay in that case" the man would be forced to admit. Socrates would persist, "Then is courage sticking to your post or retiring ?". 'I'm afraid I don't know." 'I don't either", Socrates would say "but perhaps it is not different from just doing the reasonable thing regardless of the danger."

Pick out the word which is closest in meaning to the word printed in bold as used in the passage: Notion

Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below it. Certain words in the passage have been printed in bold to help you locate them when answering some of the questions.

He was a funny-looking man with a high, bald, dome-shaped head, a face very small in comparison and a long wavy beard. His unusual features were a standing joke among his friends. He was a poor man idler. He didn't work at his trade a stone cutter, more than what was necessary to keep his wife and three boys alive. He preferred to talk but since his wife was an irate complaining woman, he loved to be away from home.

The whole city he lived in was seething with argumentation. The city was Athens and the man was Socrates, the Greek philosopher. He had funny ways and notions. And to the astonishment of all, the Oracle at Delphi, the priestess when asked, "Who is the wisest man in Athens ?" mentioned Socrates, Socrates was the evangelist of clear thinking: he would present people with questions pretending he didn't know the answers and get them to make astounding admissions. Socrates would go up to a prominent statesman coming to the end of a speech on 'courage', about the glory of dying for one's country and say, "Forgive my intrusion, but just what do you mean by courage ?"

"Courage is sticking to your post in danger" would be the reply. "But supposing good strategy demands that you retire ?", Socrates would ask. "You wouldn't stay in that case" the man would be forced to admit. Socrates would persist, "Then is courage sticking to your post or retiring ?". 'I'm afraid I don't know." 'I don't either", Socrates would say "but perhaps it is not different from just doing the reasonable thing regardless of the danger."

Pick out the word which is opposite in meaning to the word printed in bold as used in the passage: Irate

Read the following passage carefully and answer the question given below it. 

The Rs.11,500 crore fraud in the Punjab National Bank where fund transfer through an inter-bank messaging system was not reported to the core banking solution, followed by the cyber-attack on the City Union Bank, has put the spotlight once again on SWIFT or the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication. In February 2016, in the Bangladesh Bank heist, $81 million was fraudulently withdrawn from the central bank of the country, at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York through the SWIFT network. The SWIFT is a secure financial message carrier — in other words, it transports messages from one bank to its intended bank recipient. Its core role is to provide a secure transmission channel so that Bank A knows that its message to Bank B goes to Bank B and no one else. Bank B, in turn, knows that Bank A, and no one other than Bank A, sent, read or altered the message en route. Banks, of course, need to have cheques in place before actually sending messages.

The SWIFT is a global member-owned cooperative that is headquartered in Brussels, Belgium. It was founded in 1973 by a group of 239 banks from 15 countries which formed a co-operative utility to develop a secure electronic messaging service and common standards to facilitate cross-border payments. It carries an average of approximately 26 million financial messages each day. In order to use its messaging services, customers need to connect to the SWIFT environment. There are several ways of connecting to it: directly through permanent leased lines, the Internet, or SWIFT’s cloud service (Lite2); or indirectly through appointed partners. Messages sent by SWIFT’s customers are authenticated using its specialised security and identification technology. Encryption is added as the messages leave the customer environment and enter the SWIFT Environment. Messages remain in the protected SWIFT environment, subject to all its confidentiality and integrity commitments, throughout the transmission process while they are transmitted to the operating centres (OPCs) where they are processed — until they are safely delivered to the receiver. While all customers are responsible for protecting their own environments, SWIFT established the customer security programme (CSP) in early 2016 to support customers in the fight against a growing cyber threat. It is critical that customers prioritise the security network. Last April, SWIFT published a detailed description of the mandatory and advisory customer security controls. This framework describes a set of controls for its customers to implement their local infrastructure.

So, have Indian banks adopted the best practices to keep the network safe? The best practices should be applied not only to the SWIFT infrastructure within banks but the full end-to-end transaction ecosystem within their firms, including payments, securities trade and treasury. In the PNB case, one of its biggest failures was the missing link between SWIFT and the bank’s back-end software. This allowed fraudulent use of a key credit instrument — letters of understanding or a loan request to another bank through the SWIFT network — to transfer funds. After the fraud, PNB adopted strict SWIFT controls. It has created a separate unit to reauthorise most messages sent over SWIFT by branches. Many other banks are expected to fast-track the integration between SWIFT and their back-end systems. To strengthen internal controls, the RBI has set April 30 as an “outer limit” for all public sector banks to integrate SWIFT with core banking solutions. As for SWIFT, a spokesperson said: “First, there is no indication that SWIFT’s own network or core messaging services have ever been compromised. SWIFT cannot comment on particular incidents. However, it continues to share insights into modus operandi and indicators of compromise with its customers.”

Which of the following statements about SWIFT is false?

Direction: Read the following passage and answer the question that follows the passage. Your answer to this item should be based on the passage only.

Superstitions are universal phenomena having their own peculiar place in the cultural ethos and milieu of a people. They epitomize man’s fear of the unknown, fear of evil, blind faith in omens and portents. Superstitions are inter-woven with myth, legend, unnatural phenomena and disasters, customs and traditions, and are mainly the outcome of ignorance. They are unreasoned and irrational beliefs that gradually become matters of faith. When certain things and happenings are rationally inexplicable people, tend to assign mysterious and supernatural reasons for their operation. Thus, a natural disaster is explained in terms of God’s wrath and the failure of one’s project is assigned to the black cat which crossed the path just as one set out on the errand.
Primitive human beings were mainly governed by superstitions. Superstitions were widespread before the dawn of civilization when science had not advanced. Thus, ignorance of the primitive people and the resultant growth of superstitions were the direct outcomes of the lack of scientific advancement. Unenlightened people always tend to be superstitious. The belief in the sanctity of time and old traditions of the ancestors bind the people into knots of superstitious thought. Besides, the unscrupulous priests and religious officials exercise a dominating, unhealthy effect upon the people believing in religious orthodoxy. They encourage superstitions for their own ulterior motives.
Superstitions are not only universally prevalent but even have strikingly common features whether believed in India or in as far off a place like Canada. There are some common superstitions that are shared by people all over the world. Beliefs in spirits, ghosts and witches and reincarnation are quite common among all the peoples of the world. Belief in witches still prevails in India, France, Scotland, England and many other countries. In countries of the East, especially in India, belief in ghosts and spirits still exists. The cries of certain birds like owls and ravens and the howl of cats are regarded with superstition as portents of evil throughout the world. Then there is a very common belief that the sighting of comets portends the death of kings or great men or some unforeseen catastrophe. Shakespeare refers to such a superstition in his Julius Caesar, Halley’s Comet in the twentieth century evoked a similar response in many a mind.

Which of the following is INCORRECT with respect to the passage?

Read the passage carefully and select the best answer to the question out of the given four alternatives.

Antarctica is a mostly unpopulated continent. It is the coldest, driest and remotest place in the world. And it is the world's only continent that does not have a native population, no single country owns the Antarctic. However, a number of countries, including Argentina, Australia, Chile, New Zealand, France, and the United Kingdom, have already laid claim to the Antarctic and others will probably follow. In some areas of the continent, two countries claim the same land.

The Antarctic Treaty was signed in 1959 and creates the rules for the exploration of the Antarctic. The treaty forbids military activity in the Antarctic, as well as mining. Many countries, however, think that there are valuable materials and minerals locked up under the frozen Antarctic ice. In addition, the treaty bans nuclear testing as well as dumping nuclear waste. The Antarctic Treaty was made to protect the continent and avoid further disputes. By 2048, the treaty must be renewed. New rules and regulations could be imposed by then.

Currently, almost all the 70 bases in the Antarctic are used for research and scientific activity. The snow-covered continent is perfect for tracking satellites and space research because it offers clear blue cloudless skies. Climatologists are studying the development of the ozone layer with growing concern. It was here that a hole in the layer was discovered for the first time, more than 4000 scientists operate the research stations in the Antarctic summer, while only about a thousand populate the continent during the harsh and severe winters.

Environmentalists fear that exploiting Antarctica for military and economic reasons will damage the environment. At present, there is no economic activity in Antarctica, except for cruise ships that travel around the continent. This could change, if a new treaty allows mining in the Antarctic. As mineral resources are dwindling in other areas, nations could turn to Antarctica to find and exploit valuable raw materials.

Some geologists say that there are over 200 billion barrels of oil under the Antarctic Ice. At the moment getting at these reserves would be very expensive. In addition, economic experts claim that there are large amounts of coal, nickel, and copper under the Antarctic ice.

Why did environmentalists have fear of exploiting Antarctica for military and economic reasons?