2021 CSAT — Q21

Locate. This asks for the central idea — find the option that fits the whole passage, the load-bearing thesis rather than one true-but-minor detail. The passage has two movements: a long list of multiple, interlocking problems (fossil-fuel capacity, electricity access, imports, pricing/governance, environmental contestation) and a counter-movement (“But all is not bleak”) of efficiency programmes, integrated policy, and renewable initiatives that “suggest the promise of transformation.”

Test (thesis, not detail; check the fit). The message that holds both movements is that India’s energy/climate decision-making is complex and interconnected — many problems, many partial promises, all tangled together. (a) states that. Test the rivals against the whole text: (b) claims the policy is heavily tuned to SDGs — far stronger than “promise of transformation”; (c) says actions are not compatible with broader goals — directly against “the promise of transformation”; (d) calls the process straightforward supply-oriented — the opposite of the passage’s tangled, multi-front picture.

Eliminate by anatomy. (b) is too strong for what the passage says — inflating “promise” into accomplished SDG-alignment. (c) is half right, half wrong (and reversed) — it seizes the problem-list and ignores the explicit promise. (d) overstates in the other direction and contradicts — “straightforward” denies the passage’s whole point about multiplicity. The transferable rule: when a passage holds a tension (problems and promise), the central idea names the tension or its shape, not just one side. Key: (a).

“The problems are multiple : sputtering fossil fuel production capabilities; limited access to electricity… rising fuel imports… electricity pricing and governance challenges… growing environmental contestation around land, water and air. But all is not bleak: growing energy efficiency programmes… bold renewable energy initiatives… suggest the promise of transformation.” — the passage piles up many interlinked problems (fuel, electricity, imports, governance, environment) yet also promise: energy/climate decision-making is multi-stranded and interconnected → (a). (b)/(c)/(d) each overstate one pole — (b) over-claims SDG-alignment, (c) flatly contradicts “the promise of transformation,” (d) contradicts the breadth (it is anything but “straightforward supply-oriented”).

The passage describes India’s energy and climate policy-making as beset by many interlinked problems but also carrying real promise of transformation — a complex, multi-stranded, interconnected picture.

• (a) names that complexity and interconnection. Correct.
• (b) overstates the promise into achieved SDG-alignment.
• (c) ignores the explicit “promise of transformation” and keeps only the bleak half.
• (d) contradicts the breadth by calling the process “straightforward supply-oriented.”

Answer: (a).

Balanced passages — “here are the problems; but here is the promise” — punish one-sided options. (c) fails because it keeps only the gloom; (b) fails because it keeps only the optimism and inflates it. The central message must survive both halves, and the only option that does is the one describing the shape of the whole: complex and interconnected. When a passage explicitly pivots on “But all is not bleak,” any option that erases either side of that pivot is a partial-scope trap.