UNSEEN PASSAGE SOLVING (DISCURSIVE PASSAGE)

Discursive writing: expresses opinions. It can be argumentative, i.e. may give reasons, explanations, or explore cause and effect relationship. Passages of this kind are analytical. Sometimes the author presents his views with great depth of reasoning or force of argument with the intention of convincing the reader to his point of view. Such texts have great persuasive power.

Steps To Attempt Reading Comprehension

The following steps have to be attempt while reading comprehension

• Read each and every line in the Passage carefully. Reading the Passage twice is always favourable as it helps in better understanding and makes it easier for a student to find answers.
• If the title of the Passage is given, read it first as it gives the central insight of the Passage.
• Underline all the difficult words while reading the Passage, as you might be tested on these words in the vocabulary Questions.
• Always give emphasis on the beginning and end of the Passages. These paragraphs often hold the most important information of the Passage.
• While answering be sure that you’ve clearly understood the question. The answer must be relevant to the question.
• Ensure that you answer the question according to the marks it carries. Subjective Questions should be answered in complete sentences.
• Try to use your own language and modify the answer according to the question.
• Answers should be based on the information given/inference derived from the information in the Passage.
• Make sure that you use the same tense in which the question has been asked.
• In MCQ’s analyze the Questions and options carefully before selecting the correct option because some of the four options are often closely related.
• Write the correct question number on each answer sheet to avoid mistakes.

Discursive Unseen Passage 

Today’s wars have little in common with the battles of the 19th century. The fighting has gradually moved from clearly defined battlefields to populated areas. Traditional war between armies of opposing states is an exception, while non-international conflicts have become the norm. Nowadays, civilians bear the brunt of armed conflicts.

International humanitarian law has adapted to this change. Appalled by the destruction and suffering caused by the Second World War, states agreed in the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 on comprehensive protection for those who are not or are no longer participating in hostilities — wounded and sick soldiers, prisoners of war and civilians. This cornerstone of international humanitarian law was supplemented in 1977 and 2005 by three additional protocols.

The use of certain weapons, such as biological or chemical weapons, cluster munitions and anti-personnel mines is now widely oudawed. The law has placed barriers to protect the most vulnerable from the brutality of war. Its implementation has also seen a certain amount of progress, such as in the training of soldiers or in the prosecution of the worst war crimes, thanks in particular to the founding of the International Criminal Court (ICC).

Nevertheless, regular serious breaches of international humanitarian law are a cause of suffering. Underlying it all is our collective failure. The contracting states undertook in Article 1 — common to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 — “to respect and to ensure respect” for these conventions “in all circumstances.” International humanitarian law has, since its conception, lacked mechanisms for encouraging effective compliance. This impotence has often meant death and destruction for those affected by war.

Since the adoption of the first Geneva Convention 150 years ago, international humanitarian law has become a central pillar of the international legal order. Ultimately its provisions serve to protect our key characteristic as human beings: our humanity. This is an irrevocable right. It is based on the belief, forged over centuries and in all our cultures, according to which it is essential to lay down rules if we want to prevent wars from degenerating into barbarism. It is up to our generation to consolidate these achievements and to create an institutional framework to ensure these rules are respected. If it is to be fully effective, the law needs suitable instruments. Never in the history of humankind have we been closer to a solution than we are today.

Questions
(a) On the basis of your reading of the Passage, answer the following Questions briefly.
(i) How are today’s wars different from the wars of the 19th century?
(ii) What is the state of the International humanitarian law’s implementation?
(iii) What is the reason behind the regular breaches of the International humanitarian law?
(iv) How can the law become completely effective?
(v) Which word in paragraph 1 means the same as ‘chief impact of a specified action’?
(vi) Which word in paragraph 2 means ‘dismayed’ or ‘horrified’?
Answer:
(i) Today’s wars mostly take place in populated areas as opposed to 19th century battles which took place in clearly demarcated battlefields. Traditional war between armies of opposing nations has been replaced by non-international conflicts in which civilians become casualties.

(ii) The implementation of this agreement has progressed significantly, particularly in the training of soldiers and the prosecution of war criminals, aided by the founding of International Criminal Court.

(iii) The regular breaches of the International humanitarian law signify a collective failure and are caused due to the lack of a proper mechanism and institutional framework for encouraging effective compliance.

(iv) The law can become completely effective by the creation of a defined institutional framework and adoption of the necessary instruments required to instil and ensure respect for the rules.

(v) The word is’brunt’.
(vi) The word is ‘appalled’.

(b) On the basis of your reading of the Passage, answer the following Questions by choosing the most appropriate option. (iii)
(i) How did the International humanitarian law change between 1977 and 2005?
(a) It abolished use of biological and chemical weapons
(b) It abolished use of cluster munitions
(c) It abolished use of anti-personnel mines
(d) All of the above
Answer:
(d) All of the above

(ii) When and why were the Geneva Conventions adopted?
(a) 1949; to prevent wars from taking place
(b) 1977-2005; to preserve humanity during wars
(c) 1949; to preserve humanity during wars
(d) 100 years ago; to prevent wars from taking place
Answer:
(c) 1949; to preserve humanity during wars

(iii) Which of the following have the contracting states undertaken in Article 1 in all circumstances?
(a) Ensure that the conventions ate implemented
(b) Affirm that the conventions will not be violated I
(c) To respect and to ensure respect for the conventions I
(d) None of the above
Answer:
(c) To respect and to ensure respect for the conventions

(iv) The significant change that the Geneva Conventions of 1949 brought about was that the countries agreed to protect the people who were no longer fighting the war. Which of the following categories of people did it include?
(a) Prisoners of war and civilians
(b) Wounded and sick soldiers
(c) Both (a) and (b)
(d) None of these
Answer
(c) Both (a) and (b)

(v) What does the word ‘irrevocable’ mean in paragraph 4?
(a) irascible
(b) unchangeable
(c) irreparable
(d) irresponsive
Answer
(b) unchangeable

(vi) What does the word ‘forged’ mean in paragraph 4?
(a) imitated/fake
(b) broken
(c) established
(d) barricaded
Answer
(c) established

Discursive Unseen Passage with Questions 

Discursive Passage – 1

These days, it is not unusual to see people listening to music or using their electronic gadgets while crossing busy roads or travelling on public transport, regardless of the risks involved. I have often wondered why they take such risks: is it because they want to exude a sense of independence, or is it that they want to tell the world to stop bothering them? Or is it that they just want to show how cool they are?

Whether it is a workman or an executive, earphones have become an inseparable part of our lives, sometimes even leading to tragicomic situations. The other day, an electrician had come to our house to fix something. We told him in detail what needed to be done. But after he left, I found that the man had done almost nothing. It later turned out that he could not hear our directions clearly because he had his earphones on.

Hundreds of such earphones addicts commute by the Delhi Metro every day. While one should not begrudge anyone their moments of privacy or their love for music, the fact is ‘iPod oblivion’ can sometimes be very dangerous. Recently, I was travelling with my wife on the Delhi Metro. Since the train was approaching the terminus, there weren’t too many passengers. In our compartment, other than us, there were only two women sitting on the other side of the aisle. And then suddenly, I spotted a duffel bag. The bomb scare lasted for several minutes. Then suddenly, a youth emerged from nowhere and picked up the bag. When we tried to stop him, he looked at us, surprised. Then he took off his earpieces, lifted the bag, and told us that the bag belonged to him and that he was going to get off at the next station.

We were stunned but recovered in time to ask him where he was all this while? His answer: he was in the compartment, leaning against the door, totally immersed in the music. He had no clue about what was going on around him. When he got off, earplugs in his hand, we could hear strains of the song.

Questions
(a) On the basis of your reading ofthe passage, answer the following Questions briefly.
(i) What was not an unusual sight for the author?
(ii) Why didn’t the electrician carry out the work properly?
(iii) Why were the people in the compartment doubtful about the bag?
(iv) Why didn’t anyone come to claim the bag?
(v) What is the meaning of ‘tragicomic’ given in paragraph 2 ?
(vi) What do you understand by the word ‘aisle’ mentioned in paragraph 3?

(b) On the basis of your reading of the passage, complete the statements given below by choosing the most appropriate option.
(i) The reason for people listening to music or using their electronic gadgets while crossing busy roads or travelling on public transport is that they
(a) do not want to be disturbed
(b) want to show how fashionable they are
(c) want to show their independence
(d) All of these

(ii) The electrician had
(a) done his job
(b) done almost nothing
(c) fixed the defective appliance
(d) understood what was to be done

(iii) The author says that we should not resent people
(a) indulging in their love for music
(b) wanting privacy
(c) Both (a) and
(b) (d) Neither (a) nor (b)

(iv) The passengers were stunned because
(a) the youth was careless
(b) the bag contained a bomb
(c) the youth had not been visible anywhere near the bag earlier
(d) None of the above

(v) The word in paragraph 1 which means ‘in spite’ is
(a) exude
(b) anyway
(c) irrespective
(d) regardless

(vi) The synonym of ‘absorbed’ used in paragraph 4 is
(a) recovered
(b) immersed
(c) stunned
(d) soaked

Discursive Passage – 2

Like Celine Dion’s Academy Award-winning Titanic theme song, ‘My Heart Will Go On’, the mystery around what led to the sinking of the superliner on 14th April, 1912, it seems, will continue forever. So even one hundred years after the incident happened, we have yet another theory bobbing to the surface.

To recount the old official tale, RMS Titanic was on its way from Southampton to New York when it struck an iceberg just off the coast of Newfoundland. The glancing blow hit the 100-metre long starboard section of the hull, creating a huge fissure in its hull. Seawater rushed inside its six supposedly watertight compartments. Soon all the cabins were flooded and within the next three hours, the ship went down. More than 1,500 people lost their lives in the disaster. According to some hypotheses, Titanic was doomed from the start by the design so many lauded as state of the art.

But not many bought this theory and a legion of stories about the legend began to come out. The latest has been floated by science writer Richard Corfield who says that the rivets that held the ship’s hull together were not according to their specifications in composition or quality and gave way when the ship hit the iceberg. A quick web search, however, reveals that the fascinating thing called the human mind is capable of much more; while one pinned the accident down to a fire inside the ship’s coal bunkers, another one talked about the curse of the Pharaohs because a traveller had with him a sarcophagus containing the mummy of an ancient Egyptian priestess. Other than these glamorous theories, there are the ordinary ones: the helmsman making a steering blunder and the ship moving too fast to win the Blue Riband, a prestigious prize awarded to a ship for making the fastest North Atlantic crossing.

So what makes the Titanic story tick? From the very beginning, its story was tailor-made to be fascinating copy. Investigating it made good business too: from books to research grants to underwater expeditions, not to mention a mega budget movie. In other words, the Titanic story has been done to death. May be the hundredth year is a good time to leave the ship in its watery grave once and for all.

Questions
(a) On the basis of your reading of the passage, answer the following Questions briefly.
(i) How can Celine Dion’s Academy Award-winning theme song be compared with the mystery around what led to the sinking of the Titanic?
(ii) How did the Titanic sink, according to the official story?
(iii) What blunder did the helmsman make and why?
(iv) Who were the people who profited from the Titanic disaster?
(v) Which word in paragraph 1 is the antonym of ‘sinking’?
(vi) Which word in paragraph 2 is the synonym of ‘attractive’?

(b) On the basis of your reading of the passage, complete the statements given below by choosing the most appropriate option. .
(i) The Titanic had started from
(a) Southampton
(b) New York
(c) Newfoundland
(d) Egypt

(ii) According to Richard Corfield, the cause of sinking of the Titanic was
(a) the cursed mummy being carried in the ship
(b) the helmsman moving the ship too fast
(c) the poor quality of the rivets
(d) a fire inside the ship’s coal bunkers

(iii) The prize for the fastest ship to cross the North Atlantic was the
(a) Sarcophagus Prize
(b) Blue Riband
(c) North Atlantic Prize
(d) None of these

(iv) Investigation of the Titanic story led to good business in
(a) ship construction
(b) underwater fishing
(c) tailor-made stories
(d) publishing books

(v) The word in paragraph 2 means ‘large number’.
(a) legion
(b) together
(c) numerous
(d) fastest

(vi) The word in paragraph 3 means ‘remain in the limelight’.
(a) fascinating
(b) tick
(c) prominent
(d) business

Discursive Passage – 3

Every event a person sees, and every noise he hears are in ever intance part of a life that has been created for him as a unit. Whether major or insignificant, no event in the universe happens by coincidence. No flower blooms or fades by chance. No man comes into existence or dies out of pure coincidence. No man becomes sick by mistake and neither does his sickness develop in an uncontrolled manner. In each case these occurrences are especially predestined by God, from the very moment they were created.

Destiny is something that you have been creating unconsciously. You can also create it consciously. You can rewrite it; all that we do in the form of a spiritual process is just that. If you can touch the core within you, if you can experience that the source of creation is within you and then shift your whole focus on yourself, you can rewrite your own destiny. This is true as far as I know.

All the time your focus is scattered because what you consider as ‘myself is your house, your car, your wife, your children, your education, your position and your other identities. If I strip you of all these things, including your body and mind, which are just accumulations, you will feel like a nobody.

Once you become a true individual, your destiny is yours. Individual comes from ‘indivisible’ – it cannot be divided any more. It cannot be here and there. Why people in the spiritual process, who are in a hurry for spiritual growth, are not getting into marriage, children and relationships, is because the moment you have a wife or a husband, you fall into a trap. ‘Me’ gets identified with the others. The significance of Sanyasi and Brahmacharya is just shifting your focus on you. When I say ‘you’, it is just ‘you’, not your body or mind.

If you are unable to be like that, you just choose one identity. When you say ‘you’ , make it you and your Guru. You attach yourself to the Guru without any hesitation because you can get as entangled as you want with him but he is not going to get entangled. The moment you are ‘ripe’ you can drop the attachment. With other relationships, it is never so. Even if you want to get free, the others will not let you go.

So, just create a longing to grow, to dissolve, to know. What has to happen will happen. Once you become an individual, your destiny becomes yours. Once your destiny is happening in awareness, the next step will happen by itself, because life within you has the intelligence to choose freedom.

Questions
(a) On the basis of your reading of the passage, answer the following Questions briefly.
(i) How can you rewrite your own destiny, according to the writer?
(ii) Why is your focus scattered when you have possessions and relationships?
(iii) Why are ‘spiritual’ people not getting into marriage, children and relationships?
(iv) Why should you attach yourself to the Guru without any hesitation?
(v) Which word in paragraph 3 is the synonym of ‘snare’?
(vi) Which word in paragraph 4 means the same as ‘involved in complications’?

(b) On the basis of your reading of the passage, complete the statements given below by choosing the most appropriate option.
(i) Destiny can be created
(a) consciously
(c) materialistically

(ii) It can be created by
(a) touching the core inside you
(b) writing and believing
(c) working consciously
(d) working intelligently

(iii) If everything like my house, car etc is taken from me, then I will feel that I have become
(a) everything
(b) nobody
(c) poor
(d) rich

(iv) The writer means ‘ ’ when he uses the word ‘you’ in paragraph 4.
(a) only you
(b) you and your family
(c) you and your Guru
(d) None of these

(v) The word in paragraph 1 which is the antonym of‘physical’is
(a) material
(b) creation
(c) destiny
(d) spiritual

(vi) In paragraph 2, the word is the synonym of‘dispossess’.
(a) focus
(b) strip
(c) remove
(d) consider

Discursive Passage– 4

Every single mistake is a blessing in disguise; there are actually untold blessings hidden within every mistake.

Children make many mistakes while learning how to ride a bike or write, and we don’t give it a second thought because we know that through their mistakes they will learn and eventually master what they’re trying to do. So why is it that adults are so hard on themselves? We all make mistakes, and if we didn’t make them we’d never learn anything and we wouldn’t grow any smarter or wiser. We have the freedom to make our own choices, and the freedom to make mistakes. Mistakes can hurt, but if we don’t learn from the mistakes we’ve made, the pain we’ve suffered from them has been for nothing. By the law of attraction, we will make the same mistake over and over again, until the consequences hurt so much that we finally learn from it. This is the very reason why mistakes hurt, so that we do learn from them and don’t make them repeatedly.

To learn from a mistake, we first have to own it, and this is where many people can come undone because they often blame someone else for their mistake. Let’s consider the scenario of being pulled over by the police for speeding and being given a speeding ticket. Instead of taking responsibility for speeding we blame the police because we were caught unawares. But the mistake was ours as-we-ehose to speed.

We are human, we will make mistakes and it’s on of the most beautiful things about being human. But we must learn from our mistakes, lot of unnecessary pain.

So, how do we learn from our mistakes? Gratitude! No matter how bad something may seem, there are always many things to be grateful for. When you look for as many things as you can to be grateful for in a mistake, you magically transform the mistake into a blessing, and blessings attract more blessings.

Today think of a mistake and let it be a lesson learnt. Let it be a blessing. Look for the things to be grateful for. Ask yourself what you have learnt from this mistake. Every blessing you find has a magical power. So, get ready to write out your list in a gratitude journal or type them on a computer.

Questions
(a) On the basis of your reading of the passage, answer the following questions briefly.
(i) What is hidden in a mistake, according to the author?
(ii) How are children different from adults with regard to mistakes?
(iii) How can we gain from a mistake that hurts?
(iv) What do we need to do to learn from our mistakes? .
(v) How can you transform a mistake into a blessing?
(vi) What does the writer mean by the last sentence in the passage?

(b) On the basis of your reading of the passage, answer the following questions by choosing the most appropriate option.
(i) When we are caught for our mistake what is our normal reaction?
(a) We were unprepared
(b) We own up to the mistake
(c) We blame someone else for the mistake
(d) None of these

(ii) What suggestion does the author give for mistakes to become magical?
(a) Every mistake becomes a blessing in disguise
(b) Ask yourself what you have learnt from the mistakes made by you
(c) Learning from mistakes becomes a habit
(d) All of the above

(iii) Which of the following words is the antonym of ‘consequences’ used in paragraph 2?
(a) results
(b) causes
(c) ramifications
(d) outcomes

(iv) Which of the following words is the synonym of ‘eventually’ used in paragraph 2?
(a) ultimately
(b) initially
(c) timely
(d) finally

(v) Which of the following words means the same as ‘caught unawares’ used in paragraph 3?
(a) predisposed
(b) set
(c) ready
(d) unprepared

(vi) Which of the following words is the synonym of ‘grateful’ used in paragraph 4?
(a) unappreciative
(b) happy
(c) thankful

(d) None of these