India has been able to successfully __________ its population through family planning programmes.
- (a)sterilise
- (b)stabilise
- (c)stratify
- (d)establish
Correct — B, 'stabilise'. To stabilise a population is to hold its growth steady, which is exactly what family planning programmes set out to do, and the adverb 'successfully' points to a target that can be met. The object of the blank is the population as a whole, so the verb has to be one that can take a whole population.
- (a)sterilise — It means to make an individual unable to reproduce, or to free an object of germs, and neither sense takes a country's population as its object.
- (c)stratify — To stratify is to arrange in layers or classes. That describes social structure, not the aim of a family planning programme.
- (d)establish — To establish is to set something up for the first time, and a country's population is already there.
The item turns on which verb takes 'population' as its object in the sense of holding growth steady.
Three options begin with the same two letters and look alike at speed, which is the whole design of the item. Slow down on what is being acted upon — a population, not an individual and not a social order.
- 'Stabilise' means to make or keep something steady.
- 'Stratify' means to arrange in layers or strata, as in a stratified society.
- Choosing on the shape of the word when three options share a beginning.
- Ignoring the object of the verb while judging the blank.
Asked as a fill-in-the-blank item — choose the word that completes the sentence.
No directly related past PYQ was found.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Choose the word that best completes the sentence. The bank stepped in to __________ prices after the sudden fall.
- (a)sterilise
- (b)stratify
- (c)stabilise
- (d)establish
Answer(c) stabilise — to stabilise is to hold something steady.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Choose the word that best completes the sentence. Surgical instruments must be __________ before every operation.
- (a)stabilised
- (b)sterilised
- (c)stratified
- (d)established
Answer(b) sterilised — to sterilise is to free something of germs.