UPSC Prelims 2021— Question 56

Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar played a major role in the development of women's education in nineteenth-century Bengal and served as secretary of the Hindu Female School, later known as Bethune School. Annie Besant and Sarojini Naidu belonged to later generations, while Debendranath Tagore was a reformer but not the secretary identified in this context. The final answer-key position for Set C identifies option C as the correct option. Option A — Annie Besant — is not correct because it does not satisfy the specific condition tested in the question; it represents an alternative that is contradicted, incomplete, or less precise than the accepted answer. Option B — Debendranath Tagore — is not correct because it does not satisfy the specific condition tested in the question; it represents an alternative that is contradicted, incomplete, or less precise than the accepted answer. Option C — Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar — is correct because it is the alternative that matches the constitutional, historical, geographical, scientific or economic principle established above. Option D — Sarojini Naidu — is not correct because it does not satisfy the specific condition tested in the question; it represents an alternative that is contradicted, incomplete, or less precise than the accepted answer. For PYQ interpretation, the distinction between the correct alternative and merely related facts is important. UPSC often places plausible distractors beside the precise statement that matches the underlying rule, chronology, definition or empirical relationship. The answer should therefore be read against the exact wording of the question rather than against a broadly related fact.