SSC CGL 2025 Tier-I · 17 September 2025, Shift 2 · General Awareness · Question 21 of 99

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 13 September 2026.

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Why are the Western Ghats considered globally significant according to UNESCO?

(a)They categorize urban rivers based on their economic contribution to the city.
(b)They influence the Indian monsoon and are among the world's top biodiversity hotspots.
(c)They are located near the equator and host polar species.
(d)They form the only volcanic plateau in peninsular India with desert flora.

Answer

Why

Correct — B. UNESCO's description says the Western Ghats' high montane forests influence the Indian monsoon weather pattern, making the site one of the best examples of the monsoon system on the planet.

It adds that the range is one of the world's eight 'hottest hotspots' of biological diversity. Option (b) joins both halves of that description.

Why the others are wrong

(a)
They categorize urban rivers based on their economic contribution to the city. — It names no natural feature at all. Classifying urban rivers by economic value has nothing to do with UNESCO's case, which rests on monsoon influence, biodiversity and endemism.
(c)
They are located near the equator and host polar species. — The Ghats are not equatorial: UNESCO calls their forests non-equatorial tropical evergreen forests. Polar species have no place in them.
(d)
They form the only volcanic plateau in peninsular India with desert flora. — UNESCO describes a mountain chain that intercepts rain-laden monsoon winds and carries tropical evergreen forest, not a plateau with desert flora.

Concept

The Western Ghats run about 1,600 km along India's west coast, through Gujarat, Maharashtra, Goa, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu, broken by the 30 km Palghat Gap near 11°N.

UNESCO inscribed them as a natural World Heritage site in 2012 under criteria (ix) and (x), a serial property of 39 component parts.

Its case: the range intercepts the south-west monsoon, and it holds exceptional biodiversity and endemism.

UNESCO names the Ghats, together with Sri Lanka, as one of the world's eight 'hottest hotspots', and records at least 325 globally threatened species there.

Key facts

UNESCO inscribed the Western Ghats as a World Heritage site in 2012, under natural criteria (ix) and (x).
The property is serial: 39 component parts grouped into 7 sub-clusters.
UNESCO says the Ghats' montane forests influence the Indian monsoon weather pattern.
At least 325 globally threatened species occur in the Western Ghats, per UNESCO.

Study next

Biodiversity hotspots in India: Himalaya, Indo-Burma, Western Ghats and Sri Lanka, SundalandIndia's natural World Heritage sites and UNESCO criteria (vii) to (x)Orographic rainfall on the windward Ghats and the rain shadow over the Deccan

Common traps

Picking the volcanic-plateau option because parts of the Deccan are volcanic, when UNESCO's case is a forested mountain chain.
Remembering 'biodiversity hotspot' but forgetting the monsoon half, which UNESCO puts first.

Here the stem asks for UNESCO's stated reason, so the answer is the wording of the listing itself.

The hotspot status is the premise of 13 Sep 2025, 12:30, GA Q.23, which asks for the main threat to the Ghats' endemic species.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

Topic: Geography — all 179 SSC CGL questions on it, every solved shift.