SSC CGL 2025 Tier-I · 12 September 2025, Shift 3 · General Awareness · Question 8 of 100

We transcribed this text from the pictures on a candidate's response sheet for this shift; the answer is the key SSC colour-marked on that sheet. Solution last reviewed 11 September 2026.

Where this paper and its answers come from

SSC does not publish CGL question papers or a public answer key. From 2025 the candidate response sheet prints every question and option as a picture, so the text here is transcribed from those pictures for this shift and checked against them independently; where the layout carries meaning, the picture is shown as well. Each answer is the key SSC colour-marked on that sheet. SSC released a tentative key for challenge and later its final one, both only to candidates behind a login, and the sheet does not say which of the two it carries. The solutions are written by UnlockIAS.

We doubt SSC's key on this question.

The one book traced under this title, Anita Nair's Hot Stage (Inspector Gowda #3, Bitter Lemon Press, June 2024), is a crime novel rather than a collection of plays, so the keyed description could not be confirmed; this card follows SSC's key.

The answer below is still the option SSC's key marks, and we solve to that option.

Which of the following best describes the theme of the book 'Hot Stage'?

(a)A collection of modern Indian plays on social issues
(b)A historical account of India’s independence movement
(c)A novel about ancient Indian mythology
(d)A travelogue about the Himalayas

Answer

Why

Correct — A. SSC's key describes 'Hot Stage' as a collection of modern Indian plays on social issues, and that is option (a), the answer to mark.

Treat it as the key's description rather than a checked fact. The book published under this title, Anita Nair's Hot Stage, is a crime novel, and the other three descriptions do not fit it either.

Why the others are wrong

(b)
A historical account of India’s independence movement — The book of this name is not about the freedom struggle. Anita Nair's Hot Stage follows a murder investigation in contemporary Bangalore.
(c)
A novel about ancient Indian mythology — Anita Nair's Hot Stage is a novel, but a crime novel, a police procedural, not a retelling of myth.
(d)
A travelogue about the Himalayas — The book is set in Bangalore, not the Himalayas, and it is a police procedural, not travel writing.

Concept

Anita Nair is an Indian novelist from Kerala who writes in English and has also written for the stage: her play Nine Faces of Being adapts her novel Mistress.

Her Inspector Gowda series began with Cut Like Wound (2012) and continued with Chain of Custody. Hot Stage is the third book: ACP Borei Gowda investigates the death of Professor Mudgood, a rationalist, in Bangalore.

The keyed description could not be matched to a published book. The one book traced under this title, Anita Nair's Hot Stage, is a crime novel, released in Britain by Bitter Lemon Press in June 2024.

Give SSC's answer in the exam, but do not carry 'collection of plays' away as a fact about this book.

Key facts

Hot Stage by Anita Nair is the third novel in her Inspector Gowda crime series.
Its British edition was published by Bitter Lemon Press in June 2024.
The Inspector Gowda series began with Cut Like Wound in 2012.
Anita Nair's play Nine Faces of Being is adapted from her novel Mistress.

Study next

Recent Indian books in English and their authorsAnita Nair's novels, from Mistress to the Inspector Gowda seriesBook-and-theme questions: matching a title to its genre

Common traps

Guessing a book's subject from one word in its title.
Carrying a keyed description away as a fact about a book without checking the book.

The same 'theme of the book' frame appears at 15 Sep 2025, 12:30, GA Q.9 (Why Bharat Matters) and at 14 Sep 2025, 12:30, GA Q.7 (Because Words Matter).

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

Topic: Culture — all 163 SSC CGL questions on it, every solved shift.