SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 23 September 2024, Shift 1 · General Awareness · Question 1 of 97

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.

Which of the following is related to neem?

(a)Pinnately
(b)Palmately
(c)Spines
(d)Tendril

Answer

Why

Correct — A. Neem carries a pinnately compound leaf: several leaflets sit in rows along a common axis called the rachis, arranged like the vanes of a feather.

That axis is the giveaway. When a blade is cut all the way down to the midrib and the pieces line up on either side of one stalk, the leaf is pinnate — which is what option (a) is pointing at with its single adverb.

Why the others are wrong

(b)
Palmately — Palmately compound leaves attach all their leaflets at one point, the tip of the petiole, spreading like fingers from a palm. Silk cotton is the standard example, not neem.
(c)
Spines — Spines are leaves modified into sharp defensive structures, as in the cactus Opuntia. Neem's leaflets are ordinary photosynthetic blades.
(d)
Tendril — A tendril is a leaf or leaflet modified into a thin coiling thread that grips a support, as in the pea. Neem is a tree and climbs nothing.

Concept

A leaf is simple when its blade is undivided, and compound when the blade is cut right down to the midrib into separate leaflets.

Compound leaves come in two arrangements. Pinnate leaflets sit in rows along a central rachis, feather-fashion, as in neem. Palmate leaflets radiate from a single point at the tip of the petiole.

Leaves can also be modified away from photosynthesis altogether — into spines for defence, or tendrils for climbing. That is a separate list, which is why two of the choices here read as plausible botany while answering a different question.

The option list mixes an adverb, 'Pinnately', with two nouns. Read it as shorthand for 'pinnately compound': the NCERT Class 11 line on compound leaves uses neem as its pinnate example, and the question is built on that sentence.

Key facts

Neem (Azadirachta indica) has a pinnately compound leaf, with leaflets arranged along a common axis called the rachis.
Silk cotton is the textbook example of a palmately compound leaf, its leaflets meeting at the tip of the petiole.
In Opuntia (cactus) leaves are modified into spines, while in the pea leaflets become tendrils.

Study next

Simple versus compound leaves, and how to tell pinnate from palmateLeaf modifications for defence, climbing and storageReticulate versus parallel venation, and which one belongs to dicots

Common traps

Reading 'pinnately' as a venation term — venation is reticulate or parallel, while pinnate and palmate describe leaflet arrangement.
Counting a many-leafleted neem twig as many leaves. It is one compound leaf, and the leaflets are not separate leaves.

SSC keeps this in the plant-morphology corner of General Awareness and rotates between leaf arrangement and leaf modification.

Venation is asked directly on 18 Sep 2024, 16:00, GA Q.9 (which plant is NOT related to reticulate venation) and on 11 Sep 2024, 16:00, GA Q.2, on parallel venation in monocot leaves.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.