Exam-useful questions from this chapter, grouped by marks, each with a full model answer. Try writing the answer yourself first, then check it against this one.
1 1-Mark Questions
Q. Define transportation.
Answer: Transportation is the process by which goods, commodities and people are moved from their place of production or availability to the place where they are used or consumed.
Q. What do you understand by ‘communication’?
Answer: Communication means exchanging our views, ideas and messages from one place to another, or from one individual to another, with the help of various means.
Q. What are National Highways?
Answer: The main roads which are constructed and maintained by the Central Government, meant for inter-state transport and movement of defence men and material, connecting state capitals, major cities, important ports and railway junctions, are called National Highways.
Q. When was the Border Roads Organisation (BRO) established?
Answer: The Border Roads Organisation (BRO) was established in May 1960.
Q. What is the distance between rails in broad gauge?
Answer: The distance between rails in broad gauge is 1.676 metre.
Q. Which two states’ cities does the Konkan Railway connect?
Answer: The Konkan Railway connects Roha in Maharashtra to Mangaluru in Karnataka.
Q. In which year, and by whom, did radio broadcasting start in India?
Answer: Radio broadcasting started in India in 1923, by the Radio Club of Bombay.
Q. When was INSAT established, and what kind of satellite system is it?
Answer: INSAT was established in 1983; it is a multi-purpose satellite system for telecommunication, meteorological observation and various other data and programmes.
2 2-Mark Questions
Q. Give any two differences between National Highways and State Highways.
Answer: National Highways are constructed and maintained by the Central Government and are meant for inter-state transport and the movement of defence material to strategic areas. State Highways are constructed and maintained by state governments and join the state capital with district headquarters and other important towns.
Q. What is the Golden Quadrilateral? State its length.
Answer: The Golden Quadrilateral is a National Highways development project comprising a 5,846-km long, 4/6-lane, high-density traffic corridor connecting the four big metro cities of Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata.
Q. Name the three gauge categories of Indian Railways with their track widths.
Answer: Broad gauge (1.676 metre), metre gauge (1 metre) and narrow gauge (0.762 metre or 0.610 metre).
Q. What are the two types of water transport?
Answer: Water transport is of two types: (a) inland waterways, and (b) oceanic waterways.
Q. Write a short note on the National Waterways Act, 2016.
Answer: The National Waterways Act, 2016 declared 111 inland waterways (including 5 national waterways declared earlier) as National Waterways, to develop inland water transport as an economical, environment-friendly supplementary mode of transport to rail and road.
Q. What is the objective of the UDAN scheme?
Answer: UDAN (Regional Connectivity Scheme) aims to jump-start regional aviation by encouraging airlines to operate flights on regional and remote routes through enabling policies and incentives, making flying affordable for the common citizen.
Q. Distinguish between Personal and Mass Communication Systems, with one example each.
Answer: A Personal Communication System enables direct contact between two individuals, for example the internet (through e-mail). A Mass Communication System conveys information to a large number of people at once, for example radio.
Q. When did Doordarshan (DD) come into being?
Answer: In 1976, television was delinked from All India Radio (AIR) and given a separate identity as Doordarshan (DD); TV services themselves had begun in Delhi in 1959.
3 4-Mark Questions
Q. Explain the classification of roads in India.
Answer: For the purposes of construction and maintenance, roads in India are classified into four categories: (1) National Highways (NH), built and maintained by the Central Government for inter-state transport; (2) State Highways (SH), built and maintained by state governments, joining state capitals with district headquarters; (3) Major District Roads, the connecting link between District Headquarters and other important nodes in the district; and (4) Rural Roads, which provide vital links in rural areas and make up about 80 per cent of India’s total road length.
Q. Write a note on the history and present status of Indian Railways.
Answer: Indian Railways was introduced in 1853 with a 34-km line between Bombay and Thane. It is the largest government undertaking in the country, with a network length of 67,956 km (Railway Yearbook 2019-20). Because of its very large size, it has been divided into 17 zones. Steam engines have been replaced by diesel and electric engines, raising speed and haulage capacity, and metro rail has revolutionised urban transport.
Q. Discuss the importance and limitations of water transport in India.
Answer: Water transport is the cheapest, most fuel-efficient and eco-friendly mode, best suited to heavy and bulky material. India has 14,500 km of navigable waterways, contributing about 1% to the country’s transportation. Its limitations are that it faces tough competition from road and rail transport, and diversion of river water for irrigation has made many stretches non-navigable. Oceanic routes carry about 95% of India’s foreign trade by volume, supported by 12 major and 200 minor ports.
Q. Describe the role of pipeline transport in India.
Answer: Pipelines are the most convenient and efficient mode of transporting liquids and gases (and even solids, as slurry) over long distances. Oil India Limited (incorporated 1959) built Asia’s first cross-country pipeline, 1,157 km from the Naharkatiya oilfield in Assam to the Barauni refinery in Bihar, extended to Kanpur in 1966. GAIL (India) Ltd. (1984) built the first 1,700-km Hazira-Vijaipur-Jagdishpur (HVJ) gas pipeline, which gave impetus to the Indian gas market; India’s gas infrastructure has since expanded to 18,500 km.
Q. Describe the development of communication networks in India.
Answer: In earlier times, messages were delivered by drums, smoke or fire signals, and fast runners; the means of communication were often also the means of transportation. The invention of the post-office, telegraph, printing press, telephone and satellite made communication much faster and easier. On the basis of scale and quality, communication is divided into Personal Communication Systems (such as the internet) and Mass Communication Systems (such as radio and television). Radio broadcasting began in 1923; television began in Delhi in 1959 and became Doordarshan in 1976; satellite communication (INSAT, IRS) has since revolutionised weather forecasting and disaster monitoring.
Q. What is the importance of satellite communication for India?
Answer: Satellites are a mode of communication in themselves and also regulate the use of other means of communication. Their ability to give a continuous and synoptic view of a large area makes satellite communication very vital for economic and strategic reasons, including weather forecasting, monitoring of natural calamities and surveillance of border areas. India’s INSAT (1983) and IRS (1988) satellite systems, together with the National Remote Sensing Centre at Hyderabad, are useful for the management of natural resources.
4 6-Mark Questions
Q. Discuss the development of road transport in India and the challenges it faces.
Answer: Development: Pathways and unmetalled roads have been used since ancient times; economic and technological development led to metalled roads. Road transport in the modern sense was very limited before World War-II; the 1943 Nagpur Plan could not be implemented owing to lack of coordination between the princely states and British India. After Independence, the twenty-year road plan (1961) improved road conditions. Today India’s road network is the second largest in the world (62.16 lakh km), comprising National Highways (NH), State Highways (SH), District Roads and Rural Roads. The NHAI (1995) runs projects such as the Golden Quadrilateral (5,846 km), and the Bharatmala Pariyojana adds about 26,000 km of Economic Corridors. Challenges: roads continue to concentrate in and around urban centres; rural and remote areas have the least connectivity; the density of rural roads varies with the nature of the terrain; and National Highways, though only 2% of road length, carry 40% of road traffic, leading to congestion.
Q. Discuss the importance of Indian Railways and the regional imbalance in its network.
Answer: Importance: Indian Railways’ network is one of the longest in the world; it facilitates the movement of both freight and passengers and contributes to economic growth. Mahatma Gandhi said the railways ‘brought people of diverse cultures together to contribute to India’s freedom struggle’. It is the largest government undertaking in the country (network length 67,956 km), divided into 17 zones. Metro rail has revolutionised urban transport. Regional imbalance: during the British colonial era, towns near raw-material and plantation areas, hill stations and cantonments were well-connected by rail, mostly for resource exploitation; after Independence, routes were extended elsewhere, most significantly the Konkan Railway (1998, Maharashtra-Goa-Karnataka). Even so, the railway network remains relatively less dense in the hill states, north-eastern states, central India and Rajasthan.
Q. Give a comparative account of water, air and pipeline transport in India.
Answer: Water transport is the cheapest and most fuel-efficient mode, best suited to heavy and bulky material, but is slower, and diversion of river water for irrigation has made many stretches non-navigable (only 14,500 km navigable, about 1% of transportation). Air transport is the fastest mode, essential for a vast country like India with diverse terrain and climate (beginning in 1911 with the Prayagraj-Naini airmail service), but is costlier and its reach has been limited, which is why schemes such as UDAN and services such as Pawan Hans were introduced to widen regional connectivity. Pipeline transport is the most convenient and efficient mode for liquids and gases (as with the OIL and GAIL pipelines), but it is limited to specific liquid or gas commodities and cannot carry general goods or passengers.
Q. Give a detailed account of the growth of radio, television, satellite and internet communication in India.
Answer: Radio: broadcasting started in 1923 by the Radio Club of Bombay; brought under government control in 1930 as the Indian Broadcasting System; renamed All India Radio in 1936 and Akashwani in 1957. Television: services began in 1959, limited to Delhi; more centres became operational after 1972; in 1976 TV was delinked from AIR and given a separate identity as Doordarshan (DD); after INSAT-1A, Common National Programmes (CNP) were started and extended to backward and remote rural areas. Satellite communication: INSAT (1983) is a multi-purpose system; the IRS system became operational with IRS-1A’s launch in March 1988 from Vaikanour in Russia. India has also developed her own launch vehicle, PSLV; the National Remote Sensing Centre at Hyderabad processes this data. Internet: the most effective and advanced Personal Communication System, widely used in urban areas for e-mail, e-commerce and money transactions, acting like a huge central warehouse of data at comparatively low cost.
5 Case Studies
(A) 1 mark In which year was NHAI operationalised?
Answer: 1995.
(B) 1 mark Which four metro cities does the Golden Quadrilateral connect?
Answer: Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata.
(C) 2 marks According to the passage, what are NHAI’s responsibilities, and under which ministry does it function?
Answer: According to the passage, NHAI is an autonomous body under the Ministry of Surface Transport, entrusted with the development, maintenance and operation of National Highways, and it is also the apex body for improving the quality of roads designated as National Highways.
(A) 1 mark Who built the Atal Tunnel?
Answer: The Border Roads Organisation (BRO).
(B) 1 mark What is the length of the Atal Tunnel?
Answer: 9.02 km.
(C) 2 marks What problem did the Lahaul-Spiti valley face before the tunnel was built, and how did the tunnel solve it?
Answer: According to the passage, before the Atal Tunnel was built, the Lahaul-Spiti valley was cut off from the rest of the world for about 6 months each year owing to heavy snowfall. After the tunnel was built, the valley stays connected to Manali throughout the year, regardless of snowfall.