Which of the following pairs is/are NOT correctly matched ? (Pass) – (State/Union Territory) 1. Lipulekh – Ladakh 2. Nathu La – Sikkim 3. Bomdila – Arunachal Pradesh 4. Shipki La – Himachal Pradesh Select the correct answer from the code given below : Code :
- (a)Only 1 and 2
- (b)Only 1, 2 and 3
- (c)Only 2, 3 and 4
- (d)Only 1
Correct — D, Only 1. Exactly one pair in the list is wrong, and it is the first. Lipulekh is not in Ladakh; it lies in Uttarakhand, in the far north-east of Pithoragarh district, on the border with Tibet close to the point where India, Nepal and China meet. It is the pass through which pilgrims have long crossed for the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra, it is one of India's designated border trade points with China, and it sits inside the Kalapani tract whose ownership Nepal disputes — all of which places it firmly in the Kumaon Himalaya and nowhere near Ladakh. The other three pairs are all correct. Nathu La is in Sikkim, on the Sikkim–Tibet border at about 4,310 metres, and is the pass that reopened for India–China border trade in 2006 after more than four decades of closure. Bomdila is in Arunachal Pradesh, in West Kameng district. Shipki La is in Himachal Pradesh, in Kinnaur district, and is the pass by which the Sutlej — rising in Tibet as the Langqên Zangbo — enters India. Since only the first pair is mismatched, the answer is (d), Only 1. There is a tidy pattern hiding here worth carrying away: three of the four passes named — Nathu La, Shipki La and Lipulekh — are precisely India's three designated border trade points with China, one each in Sikkim, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand.
- (a)Only 1 and 2 — Correctly identifies Lipulekh as misplaced but then wrongly adds Nathu La. Nathu La genuinely is in Sikkim — it is the best-known pass in that state, sitting on the old Silk Route link to the Chumbi Valley and Lhasa, and it was the site of the ceremonial reopening of India–China border trade in July 2006. There is nothing wrong with pair 2, and a candidate marking this has almost certainly confused Nathu La with Jelep La, which is also in Sikkim, rather than with any pass outside it.
- (b)Only 1, 2 and 3 — Adds Bomdila to the previous error. Bomdila is unambiguously in Arunachal Pradesh, in West Kameng district on the road towards Tawang, and the town of the same name is the district headquarters. Rejecting three of the four pairs suggests a candidate who spotted the Lipulekh error and then lost confidence in the whole list — a costly instinct in a 'which are NOT correctly matched' question, where the examiner usually plants just one or two errors.
- (c)Only 2, 3 and 4 — The mirror image of the answer, and the option this question was designed to catch you with. It names the three pairs that ARE correctly matched and leaves out the only one that is wrong. Any candidate who works out the geography perfectly and then forgets that the question asks which pairs are NOT correctly matched will mark this with full confidence. Whenever a stem carries a negation, write the direct answer in the margin first — here 'correct pairs = 2, 3, 4' — and then take its complement before touching the options.
The Himalayan passes are the historic doorways through an otherwise impassable wall, and in the exam they matter for three reasons at once: as physical geography, as trade routes, and as points of strategic and boundary sensitivity. Read west to east, the standard roster runs Karakoram, Aghil, Khardung La, Chang La and Zoji La in the Ladakh region; Shipki La, Rohtang, Bara-lacha la and Kunzum in Himachal Pradesh; Lipulekh, Mana and Niti in Uttarakhand; Nathu La and Jelep La in Sikkim; and Bomdila, Sela and Diphu in Arunachal Pradesh. Three of them — Nathu La, Shipki La and Lipulekh — carry a further label, being the border trade points formally agreed with China. Several also mark the sensitive points of the boundary question: Lipulekh sits inside the Kalapani area claimed by Nepal, and Diphu lies at the eastern trijunction with Myanmar and China.
Pass questions are pure map recall and are best learnt state by state rather than pass by pass, because that is how they are asked. Fix one anchor for each state — Zoji La and Khardung La for Ladakh, Rohtang and Shipki La for Himachal Pradesh, Lipulekh and Mana and Niti for Uttarakhand, Nathu La and Jelep La for Sikkim, Bomdila and Sela for Arunachal Pradesh — and most 'which pair is wrong' items answer themselves. Lipulekh in particular is worth pinning to Uttarakhand permanently, because the name sounds Tibetan and the pass is remote enough that candidates drift towards Ladakh by default; the fastest correction is to remember that it is a Kailash Mansarovar Yatra route out of Pithoragarh and that it lies in the Kalapani area Nepal disputes, a controversy that has no bearing on Ladakh whatsoever. Then handle the negation with discipline: identify the correct pairs, and answer with what is left over.
- Lipulekh is in Uttarakhand, in Pithoragarh district, on the India–Tibet border near the India–Nepal–China trijunction — not in Ladakh; it is a Kailash Mansarovar Yatra route, a designated India–China border trade point, and lies within the Kalapani area disputed by Nepal
- Nathu La, at about 4,310 metres in Sikkim, reopened for India–China border trade in 2006 after 44 years and is the Sikkim route for the Kailash yatra
- Bomdila lies in West Kameng district of Arunachal Pradesh; Diphu Pass in the same state marks the eastern India–Myanmar–China trijunction
- Shipki La is in Kinnaur district of Himachal Pradesh and is the pass through which the Sutlej enters India from Tibet
- India's three designated border trade points with China are Nathu La (Sikkim), Shipki La (Himachal Pradesh) and Lipulekh (Uttarakhand) — three of the four passes in this very question
- Neighbouring passes commonly used as distractors: Mana and Niti in Chamoli district of Uttarakhand, Rohtang and Bara-lacha la in Himachal Pradesh, and Aghil in the Karakoram north of K2 in the Ladakh region
- The negation in the stem. Option (c) lists exactly the three pairs that ARE correct — establish the correct pairs first, then answer with the remainder
- Filing Lipulekh under Ladakh. The name and the remoteness pull candidates west; the pass is in Pithoragarh district of Uttarakhand and is a Kailash Mansarovar Yatra route
- Assuming that several pairs must be wrong because the question says 'pairs'. UPPSC frequently plants a single error and relies on candidates over-rejecting; check each pair on its own merits
Passes are among UPPSC's most reliably repeated geography items, asked either as 'which pair is correctly matched' or, as here, with the negation reversed — and the commission has also asked them by altitude order and by range. UPSC tends to ask the same passes through their function instead: which pass was reopened for trade, which pass a highway or a tunnel bypasses, or which river enters India through a particular gap.
Which one of the following Himalayan passes was reopened in the middle of the year 2006 to facilitate trade between India and China?
- (a) Chang La
- (b) Jara La
- (c) Nathu La
- (d) Shipki La
Answer(c) Nathu La
Puts Nathu La and Shipki La in the same option list and asks which of them reopened for border trade in 2006 — two of the four passes in the present question, tested through their function rather than their state. Anyone who knows why these particular passes matter will also place them correctly on the map.
Which one of the following (Passes - States/U.T.) is correctly matched?
- (a) Mana – Himachal Pradesh
- (b) Aghil – Arunachal Pradesh
- (c) Niti – Uttarakhand
- (d) Diphu – Ladakh
Answer(c) Niti – Uttarakhand
The identical question type from the same commission two years earlier, with the polarity flipped: there the candidate had to find the one correct pair, here the one wrong pair. It also drills the neighbouring passes — Mana and Niti in Uttarakhand, Aghil in the Karakoram, Diphu in Arunachal Pradesh — which are the very names UPPSC recycles as distractors.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Which one of the following passes is the route by which the river Sutlej enters India from Tibet?
- (a)Lipulekh
- (b)Shipki La
- (c)Nathu La
- (d)Bomdila
Answer(b) Shipki La — the pass in Kinnaur district of Himachal Pradesh through which the Sutlej crosses into India; it is also one of the three designated India–China border trade points.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Consider the following statements about Lipulekh Pass: 1. It lies in Pithoragarh district of Uttarakhand. 2. It is one of the designated border trade points between India and China. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
- (a)Only 1
- (b)Only 2
- (c)Both 1 and 2
- (d)Neither 1 nor 2
Answer(c) Both 1 and 2 — Lipulekh is in Pithoragarh district of Uttarakhand, near the India–Nepal–China trijunction, and is one of the three designated India–China border trade points along with Nathu La and Shipki La.