BPSC 70th CCE Re-exam Prelims General Studies · Question 116 of 142

Correct — C, Kozhikode in Kerala. On World Cities Day in 2023 UNESCO admitted 55 new cities to its Creative Cities Network, and Kozhikode entered as a City of Literature — the first Indian city ever designated in that field. Gwalior joined in the same round as a City of Music. The Creative Cities Network is a UNESCO programme launched in 2004 for cities that treat culture and creativity as drivers of sustainable urban development, and a city applies in exactly one of its creative fields: crafts and folk arts, design, film, gastronomy, literature, media arts or music. A City of Literature is assessed on things a city can actually show — the writers it has produced, its libraries, publishing houses and bookshops, its literary festivals and its translation activity — which is why Kozhikode's case rested on Malayalam letters, its publishing trade and its long-running literary culture. India's other members of the network make the picture clearer: Jaipur for crafts and folk arts in 2015, Varanasi for music in 2015, Chennai for music in 2017, Mumbai for film in 2019, Hyderabad for gastronomy in 2019, Srinagar for crafts and folk arts in 2021, then Gwalior and Kozhikode in 2023. Note the shape of the question: it asks for the first Indian City of Literature, not the first city in the world, which is Edinburgh, designated when the programme began.

• (a)Kolkata in W.B. — The most tempting option, because Kolkata is the city Indians most associate with books — the College Street book market, the Kolkata Book Fair and a two-century publishing tradition. But the designation is a formal UNESCO admission to a network, not a reputation, and Kolkata is not a member of the Creative Cities Network in any field.
• (b)Nasik in Maharastra — Nashik has no UNESCO Creative City designation. It appears in general-knowledge lists for other reasons — the Kumbh Mela, its wine industry, its ancient rock-cut caves — and the option works only on a candidate who recognises the city name without knowing what the network is.
• (d)Jabalpur in M.P. — Jabalpur holds no such designation either. The Madhya Pradesh entry in the 2023 round was Gwalior, and it came in as a City of Music, not of literature — so a candidate who half-remembers 'a Madhya Pradesh city joined UNESCO's network in 2023' lands on the wrong city and the wrong field at once.

UNESCO runs several distinct designation programmes and questions constantly mix them up. The World Heritage List, under the 1972 Convention, inscribes properties of outstanding universal value — sites, not cities as such. The Man and the Biosphere programme designates biosphere reserves. The Memory of the World Register lists documentary heritage, which is how the Rig Veda manuscripts entered a UNESCO list in 2007. The Global Geoparks programme recognises areas of geological significance. The Creative Cities Network, launched in 2004, is different from all of these: it is a network of member cities, each admitted in one of seven creative fields, committed to cooperating with each other and to reporting on their activity every four years. Membership is applied for by the city, evaluated against criteria specific to the chosen field, and announced in batches — the 2023 batch of 55 cities, announced on World Cities Day, is the one that brought in Kozhikode and Gwalior. Nearly 300 cities from about 90 countries belong to the network.

For any 'first Indian X' question, separate three things: the first in the world, the first in India, and the most famous candidate. Here the first in the world is Edinburgh, the first in India is Kozhikode, and the most famous candidate is Kolkata — and only the middle one is asked. The reasoning route when the fact is not remembered is to work from the year: the question implies a recent designation, and the recent Indian additions to the network are Srinagar in 2021 and Gwalior and Kozhikode in 2023, which is a short enough list to reason over. A second habit worth building is to store a UNESCO designation with its programme attached, because 'UNESCO recognised city X' is meaningless until you know whether the recognition is a World Heritage inscription, a biosphere reserve, a geopark or a creative-city membership. Kozhikode's designation is a creative-city membership in the field of literature, and nothing more or less than that.

• Kozhikode was designated a UNESCO City of Literature in 2023, in the batch of 55 cities announced on World Cities Day — India's first city in that field
• Gwalior joined the same 2023 round as a City of Music, the only other Indian addition that year
• The UNESCO Creative Cities Network was launched in 2004 and covers seven creative fields — crafts and folk arts, design, film, gastronomy, literature, media arts and music; as of 2022 it had almost 300 cities from about 90 countries
• India's other members: Jaipur (crafts and folk arts, 2015), Varanasi (music, 2015), Chennai (music, 2017), Mumbai (film, 2019), Hyderabad (gastronomy, 2019), Srinagar (crafts and folk arts, 2021)
• Edinburgh was the world's first City of Literature, designated when the programme began in 2004
• The Creative Cities Network is separate from the World Heritage List, the Man and the Biosphere programme and the Memory of the World Register, each of which has its own criteria and its own Indian entries

• Answering from a city's literary reputation rather than from the formal list; Kolkata is not in the Creative Cities Network at all
• Confusing the first city in the world (Edinburgh) with the first in India (Kozhikode)
• Mixing UNESCO programmes — a World Heritage inscription, a biosphere reserve and a creative-city membership are three different things with three different processes

BPSC asks the 'first Indian city / state / person to receive X' in one line, with three well-known names as decoys, so the preparation is a maintained list of recent designations with their years. UPSC asks the same material as a checking exercise — which of these four properties were inscribed in a given year, what a particular register implies — so the list has to be held with dates and with the meaning of each programme attached.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Which Indian city was admitted to the UNESCO Creative Cities Network as a City of Music in 2023 ?

  • (a)Varanasi
  • (b)Chennai
  • (c)Gwalior
  • (d)Bhopal

  Answer(c) Gwalior — admitted in the same 2023 round as Kozhikode; Varanasi joined as a City of Music in 2015 and Chennai in 2017.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Hyderabad is a member of the UNESCO Creative Cities Network in which creative field ?

  • (a)Film
  • (b)Gastronomy
  • (c)Design
  • (d)Media arts

  Answer(b) Gastronomy — designated in 2019 for Hyderabadi cuisine; Mumbai is the Indian City of Film, designated in the same year.