SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 13 September 2024, Shift 3 · General Awareness · Question 17 of 98

Text as printed on a candidate's response sheet for this shift; answer per SSC's tentative key as marked on that sheet. Solution last reviewed 6 September 2026.

Where this paper and its answers come from

SSC does not publish CGL question papers or a public answer key. The questions and options here are reproduced as printed on a candidate's own response sheet for this shift — the Commission's text, unchanged. Each answer is SSC's tentative key as marked on that sheet; SSC allowed challenges to it and never publishes a final key. The solutions are written by UnlockIAS.

Dr. B. R. Ambedkar described Directive Principles of State Policy as __________of the Indian constitution.

(a)identity card of the constitution
(b)The mostprecious part of the constitution
(c)soul of the state
(d)a novel feature of the constitution

Answer

Why

Correct — D. Dr B. R. Ambedkar described the Directive Principles as novel features of the Indian Constitution — the paper prints the phrase in the singular.

What was novel was the combination. Article 37 makes Part IV unenforceable in any court, and in the same breath calls it fundamental in the governance of the country and a duty of the State to apply.

A government that ignores them answers to the electorate rather than to a judge, and that is the description in option (d).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
identity card of the constitution — Identity card of the Constitution is a description of the Preamble, credited to the jurist N. A. Palkhivala. It is not Ambedkar on Part IV.
(b)
The mostprecious part of the constitution — The paper prints the mostprecious part of the constitution, typo and all. No standard attribution links that phrase to Ambedkar speaking about the Directive Principles.
(c)
soul of the state — Soul of the state is not a recognised description of Part IV. The phrase students half-remember is about the Preamble being the soul of the Constitution, a different part of the document altogether.

Concept

The Directive Principles occupy Part IV, Articles 36 to 51, and tell the State what kind of society to build — a welfare state.

Article 37 fixes their legal status: not enforceable by any court, yet fundamental in the governance of the country, with a duty on the State to apply them in making laws.

The idea was borrowed from the Constitution of Ireland. Being binding in principle while unenforceable in court is what made the device new to India.

SSC tests Part IV mostly through two doors — an attributed phrase, and what the principles are not, namely justiciable. Both doors reward knowing Article 37 word for word.

Key facts

The Directive Principles of State Policy are contained in Part IV, Articles 36 to 51.
Article 37 declares them non-justiciable but fundamental in the governance of the country.
The idea of Directive Principles was borrowed from the Constitution of Ireland.
Dr B. R. Ambedkar described them as novel features of the Indian Constitution.

Study next

Article 37 and the non-justiciable character of Part IVDirective Principles added by the 42nd AmendmentFundamental Rights compared with Directive Principles

Common traps

Attaching phrases coined for the Preamble, such as identity card or soul, to Part IV.
Reading non-justiciable as optional, when Article 37 still calls applying the principles a duty of the State.

Part IV is quarried from several sides across this corpus: what is NOT correct about the principles on 9 Sep 2024, 12:30, GA Q.25, the article on village panchayats on 17 Sep 2024, 12:30, GA Q.1, and how many principles the 42nd Amendment added on 23 Sep 2024, 16:00, GA Q.23.

Carry the article numbers, not just the idea.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.