SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 17 September 2024, Shift 3 · General Awareness · Question 24 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.

Kajari Mahotsav is primarily celebrated in which of the following districts of Uttar Pradesh?

(a)Kushi Nagar
(b)Gorakhpur
(c)Jhansi
(d)Mirzapur

Answer

Why

Correct — D. Kajari Mahotsav is held in Mirzapur, in eastern Uttar Pradesh.

Kajri is monsoon music. It is sung through Sawan, when the rains break, and its verses turn on separation — a woman waiting out the rains for a husband who is away.

The form is classed by regional style, Mirzapuri and Banarasi among them, and Mirzapur is the district where the festival named for it is celebrated. Option (d).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
Kushi Nagar — Kushinagar is a Buddhist pilgrimage centre, the place of the Buddha's mahaparinirvana. Its calendar is built around that, not around a monsoon song festival.
(b)
Gorakhpur — Gorakhpur is known for the Gorakhnath temple and its Khichdi fair at Makar Sankranti — a winter occasion and a different tradition.
(c)
Jhansi — Jhansi lies in Bundelkhand, a separate cultural region from the eastern Uttar Pradesh belt where kajri is sung. The festival the stem names belongs to Mirzapur.

Concept

Kajri is one of the seasonal folk-song forms of eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, sung through Sawan and Bhadon, the monsoon months.

It belongs to the same seasonal repertoire as chaiti for spring and hori for Holi, and Banaras singers perform all of them in a semi-classical manner beside thumri and dadra. The subject is almost always viraha, the ache of separation, set against clouds and rain.

Mirzapur district, which also holds the Vindhyavasini temple at Vindhyachal, is where the festival carrying the name is staged.

Kajri is sung across a wide belt, and more than one town holds a fair in the same season. So where kajri is sung and where the Kajari Mahotsav is held are two different questions, and the stem asks the second.

Key facts

Kajari Mahotsav is held in Mirzapur district, Uttar Pradesh.
Kajri is a monsoon folk-song form sung in the months of Sawan and Bhadon.
Its recurring theme is viraha, the separation of a woman from her absent husband.
Chaiti and hori are the spring and Holi counterparts in the same seasonal repertoire.

Study next

Seasonal folk-song forms of the Hindi belt: kajri, chaiti, hori and jhoolaFolk fairs and festivals of Uttar Pradesh, district by districtSemi-classical forms of the Banaras tradition, including thumri and dadra

Common traps

Answering with a district you associate with some other famous fair, such as Gorakhpur's Khichdi mela.
Reading the stem as 'where is kajri sung', which has a far wider answer than the festival's location.

SSC asks folk culture as a straight place pairing: the state of the Matki dance is asked at 17 Sep 2024, 4:00 pm, GA Q.13, Tera Tali at 13 Sep 2024, 4:00 pm, GA Q.16, and the Kuki dance at 26 Sep 2024, 9:00 am, GA Q.13.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.