SSC CGL 2025 Tier-I · 18 September 2025, Shift 2 · General Awareness · Question 1 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.

The Nabanna (new rice) during the Nuakhai festival in Sambalpur, Odisha, is first offered to which deity?

(a)Maa Samaleswari
(b)Maa Mangala
(c)Maa Bhubaneswari
(d)Maa Budhi Thakurani

Answer

Why

Correct — A. In Sambalpur, the head priest of the Samaleswari Temple offers the nua-anna, or nabanna, to the goddess Samaleswari at the auspicious moment (lagna) fixed for Nuakhai.

Samaleswari is the presiding deity of Sambalpur, so the new rice goes to her first → option (a).

Why the others are wrong

(b)
Maa Mangala — Maa Mangala is worshipped at Kakatpur in Puri district, on the Prachi river, and is tied to the Jagannath Nabakalebara. Sambalpur's first offering does not go to her.
(c)
Maa Bhubaneswari — Maa Bhubaneswari is not the goddess Sambalpur's nabanna goes to. The first offering there is made at the Samaleswari Temple, whose goddess presides over the town.
(d)
Maa Budhi Thakurani — Maa Budhi Thakurani belongs to Brahmapur (Berhampur) in Ganjam district, where her Thakurani Jatra is the city's chief festival. Sambalpur offers to Samaleswari.

Concept

Nuakhai is an agricultural festival of western Odisha. The name joins nua (new) and khai (food): the farmers now have the newly harvested rice.

It falls on the panchami tithi of Bhadrapada (August–September). The new rice goes first to the region's presiding goddess and is eaten at home after that.

Different parts of western Odisha timed the festival by their own goddess. Traditionally, the tithi and lagna were calculated in the name of Pataneswari in the Balangir-Patnagarh area, Sureswari in Subarnapur and Manikeswari in Kalahandi.

The stem names Sambalpur, so the goddess is Samaleswari.

Key facts

Nuakhai is observed on the panchami tithi of Bhadrapada (August–September).
In Sambalpur, the head priest of the Samaleswari Temple offers the nabanna to goddess Samaleswari at the fixed lagna.
The Samaleswari Temple stands on the banks of the Mahanadi at Sambalpur.
Traditionally, Kalahandi fixed the Nuakhai date and moment in the name of Manikeswari Devi.

Study next

Presiding goddesses of western Odisha: Samaleswari, Pataneswari, Sureswari, ManikeswariThakurani Jatra of BrahmapurMaa Mangala of Kakatpur and the Nabakalebara

Common traps

Picking Maa Mangala because she is a well-known Odia goddess: her temple is at Kakatpur in Puri district, not Sambalpur.
Forgetting that each area has its own goddess: Kalahandi's date was fixed in Manikeswari's name, while Sambalpur offers to Samaleswari.

Here Nuakhai is tested one step deeper than its state. The festival itself was asked at 9 Sep 2024, 16:00, GA Q.3, which asks which state Nuakhai belongs to (key: Odisha).

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

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