Which of the following UNESCO World Heritage Sites is/are located in Uttarakhand? Choose the correct option: A. Valley of Flowers B. Kaziranga National Park C. Mountain Railways of India D. Nanda Devi National Park
- (a)A only
- (b)A and B only
- (c)A, B and C only
- (d)A and D only
Correct — D, A and D only.
Items A and D are two parks inside one natural World Heritage property in Chamoli district, Uttarakhand: Nanda Devi and Valley of Flowers National Parks. Nanda Devi National Park was inscribed in 1988, and Valley of Flowers National Park was added to it as an extension in 2005.
That joint listing is the thing to carry away: Valley of Flowers and Nanda Devi share a single inscription, so accepting one of them commits you to the other.
Kaziranga belongs to Assam, and the inscribed Mountain Railways run in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Himachal Pradesh. A and D are the pair left standing.
- (a)A only — Valley of Flowers is indeed in Uttarakhand, so this option is half-right and stops one step early. It treats Valley of Flowers as carrying the World Heritage tag on its own.
The 2005 decision extended an inscription that already existed rather than creating a fresh one, and Nanda Devi National Park is the park that was already on the list from 1988.
'A only' is the right answer to a narrower question — which of these four is the high alpine meadow known for its dense bloom of Himalayan flowering plants.
- (b)A and B only — A is right, but B moves the answer out of the state. Kaziranga National Park lies in Assam, on the Brahmaputra floodplain, and was inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1985.
Its World Heritage status is genuine, which is exactly what makes it a workable decoy here. Being a celebrated Indian natural site settles nothing about which state the site sits in.
Kaziranga is the right answer to a question about the World Heritage park that protects the greater one-horned rhinoceros.
- (c)A, B and C only — This option carries B, so it already fails on Kaziranga's Assam location before C is weighed at all.
C fails on its own terms too. Mountain Railways of India is a serial property whose inscribed components are the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway in West Bengal, the Nilgiri Mountain Railway in Tamil Nadu and the Kalka–Shimla Railway in Himachal Pradesh.
C is the right answer to a question about the serial listing of three Indian hill railways, which grew from the Darjeeling line in 1999 to take in the Nilgiri line in 2005 and Kalka–Shimla in 2008.
A World Heritage property is one inscription on UNESCO's list, and an inscription need not be one park or one monument. Some properties are serial — separated components listed under a single name — and some are extended later, when an adjoining area is folded into an existing entry.
Uttarakhand's case is an extension. Nanda Devi National Park was inscribed in 1988 for its glacier basin and high-altitude ecosystem, and in 2005 the neighbouring Valley of Flowers National Park was added, giving the property its present two-park name.
Placement questions on World Heritage Sites test two things at once: whether you know a site is on the list, and whether you know which state holds it. A site can be recognised correctly and still be put in the wrong state.
For a Uttarakhand paper, the natural-heritage anchor is the Chamoli property, which sits alongside the state's other protected areas — the Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve, Corbett and Rajaji among them.
- Nanda Devi National Park, in Chamoli district of Uttarakhand, was inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1988.
- Valley of Flowers National Park was added to that property as an extension in 2005, producing the name Nanda Devi and Valley of Flowers National Parks.
- Kaziranga National Park lies in Assam and was inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1985.
- Mountain Railways of India is a serial property: the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway (1999), the Nilgiri Mountain Railway (2005) and the Kalka–Shimla Railway (2008).
- Great Himalayan National Park, inscribed in 2014, is in Himachal Pradesh rather than Uttarakhand.
- Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve is a designation under UNESCO's Man and the Biosphere Programme, which is a separate track from the World Heritage List.
Two of the four listed items lie in Uttarakhand, and those two are inscribed as one combined property.
- Splitting one property into two: Valley of Flowers and Nanda Devi are separate national parks but a single World Heritage inscription, so admitting one and refusing the other is not a coherent position.
- Stopping at the first true item. A is true and an option reading 'A only' is on offer, so D can go untested.
- Letting a park's fame substitute for its address. Kaziranga's World Heritage status is real; the item asks about Uttarakhand, and Kaziranga is in Assam.
- Reading 'Mountain Railways of India' as a country-wide label that must sweep in any Himalayan line. The inscription names particular railways — Darjeeling Himalayan, Nilgiri and Kalka–Shimla.
The idea turns up as a 'which of the following is/are located in' set, mixing one or two sites from the state with well-known sites that belong elsewhere.
It also comes as a single-site placement item — 'Great Himalayan National Park is located in:' — and as a matching item pairing a World Heritage Site with its state, or with the species or feature it protects.
UKPSC_2012_PRE_PaperI_Q1132012Same skill — placing a Himalayan national park that carries World Heritage status in its correct state. What differs is the destination: that item's answer is Himachal Pradesh for Great Himalayan National Park, and it asks about a single site rather than sorting a list of four.
UKPSC_2012_PRE_PaperI_Q152012Same site, different designation. That item asks which Uttarakhand area is a biosphere reserve and answers Nanda Devi; ours asks about the World Heritage List. Biosphere reserve status comes through UNESCO's Man and the Biosphere Programme, a separate track from World Heritage inscription.
UPSC_2005_GS1_Q392005Same construction — a mixed list to be filtered for World Heritage membership. What differs is the filter: that item tests only whether each entry is on the list at all, across cultural sites nationwide, with no state-location element to check.
CDS_GK_2023_I_Q562023Same shape — World Heritage Sites within one named place, with famous non-inscribed landmarks used as decoys. What differs is the place and the heritage type: Delhi's cultural monuments there, Uttarakhand's natural parks here.
RPSC_2023_PRE_Prelims2023_Q1472023Same site, located under a different frame. One of its statements places Valley of Flowers in the Himachal and Uttarakhand Himalayas, which is a physiographic division of the mountain belt; our item asks for the administrative state and pairs the valley with Nanda Devi.
- practice — not a real PYQ
The World Heritage property 'Nanda Devi and Valley of Flowers National Parks' is made up of two national parks lying in which district of Uttarakhand?
- (a)Pithoragarh
- (b)Chamoli
- (c)Uttarkashi
- (d)Rudraprayag
Answerb — Chamoli. Both Nanda Devi National Park and Valley of Flowers National Park lie in Chamoli district, in the upper Alaknanda basin.Pithoragarh is the eastern border district along the Kali river frontier with Nepal. Uttarkashi holds Gangotri National Park and the Bhagirathi's source region. Rudraprayag is known for the Alaknanda–Mandakini confluence, not for this inscription.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Which of the following is NOT one of the inscribed components of the 'Mountain Railways of India' World Heritage property?
- (a)Darjeeling Himalayan Railway
- (b)Nilgiri Mountain Railway
- (c)Kalka–Shimla Railway
- (d)Matheran Hill Railway
Answerd — Matheran Hill Railway. The property's inscribed components are three: the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway, added first in 1999; the Nilgiri Mountain Railway, added in 2005; and the Kalka–Shimla Railway, added in 2008.Options a, b and c are therefore each part of the inscription, and Matheran's hill line is not among those three components.
- practice — not a real PYQ
In which year was Valley of Flowers National Park added to the World Heritage List as an extension of an existing property?
- (a)1988
- (b)1999
- (c)2005
- (d)2014
Answerc — 2005, when Valley of Flowers National Park was joined to the Nanda Devi inscription.1988 is the year Nanda Devi National Park itself was inscribed, which is the property that was later extended. 1999 is the year the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway was inscribed. 2014 is the year Great Himalayan National Park, in Himachal Pradesh, was inscribed.