Art & Culture MCQs for UPSC Prelims — September 2026
Q1. The seat from which the rulers of the former Bastar princely state administered their territory, and which lies just south of the Indravati river, is which present-day city?
- A. Dantewada, the shrine town of the ruling house's tutelary goddess
- B. Kanker, the headquarters of a separate princely state to the north
- C. Jagdalpur, an upland town encircled by dense forest
- D. Kondagaon, a craft centre on the plateau's northern approach
Q2. In accounts of the founding of the Bastar ruling house, the term 'Danteshwari Mai' denotes which one of the following?
- A. The hereditary office of diwan through which the ruling house administered its forest tracts
- B. The mother goddess installed by the Kakatiya rulers who moved to Bastar from Warangal
- C. The tract of upland forest reserved for the exclusive hunting use of the ruling house
- D. The assembly of village headmen that confirmed each new ruler of the Bastar house
Q3. The over-a-century-old red heritage hall in Lalbagh, built in the Indo-Classical colonial style and later pulled down by the horticulture department, had how many granite-cored Ionic columns at its front?
- A. Two
- B. Four
- C. Six
- D. Eight
Q4. Which one of the following, a Kew Gardens-trained botanist of German birth who died in Bengaluru in 1956, served as Superintendent of Lalbagh from 1908 to the early 1930s?
- A. John Cameron
- B. William New
- C. M. H. Marigowda
- D. Gustav Hermann Krumbiegel