Pantheon '13 General Quiz Prelims

1. General Quiz
Pantheon 2013

2. Question 1

3. Answer

4. Question 2
• He was born in 1963 in Bhopal to a Tamil IFS officer. He
is an alumnus of DPS RK Puram, IIT- D and IIM A. He
was the chief economic adviser to India's Ministry of
Finance during last year and chief economist at
the International Monetary Fund from 2003 to 2007.
He is also a member of the elite Group of Thirty, an
international body of leading financiers and academics
which aims to deepen understanding of economic and
financial issues and their consequences.
• To attend to his current duties as the new ____
________ of India, he is on leave of absence as a
professor of finance at the Booth School of Business,
Univ of Chicago.
• Who is he ?

5. Answer
• Raghuram Rajan, RBI Governer

6. Question 3
• X Minus X is a webcomic created by Dan Walsh, a
technology manager from Dublin. Each strip consists of a
reprint of a past episode from the comic strip X, from which
all the characters except Y have been removed
through photo manipulation. The resulting strips thus
consist mostly of Y interacting with himself, rather than
with X. The strip's website characterizes this result as "a
journey deep into the mind of an isolated young
everyman as he fights a losing battle against loneliness
and depression in a quiet American suburb.“
• X creator Jim Davis has commented on the webcomic,
stating that he is an occasional reader and finds it
"fascinating“ and an "inspired thing to do“.
• Who is X ?

7. Answer
• X = Garfield
• Y = Jon

8. *Question 4
•
•
•
The citation for the Param Vir Chakra awarded to him reads:
Lance Naik X was in the left forward company of a battalion of the Brigade of
Guards during their attack on the enemy defences at Gangasagar on the Eastern
front. This was a well-fortified position held in strength by the enemy. The
assaulting troops were subjected to intense shelling and heavy small-arms fire, but
they charged onto the objective and were locked in bitter hand-to-hand combat.
Lance Naik X noticed an enemy light machine-gun (LMG) inflicting heavy casualties
on his company. With complete disregard for his personal safety, he charged the
enemy bunker, bayoneted two enemy soldiers and silenced the LMG. Though
seriously wounded in this encounter, he continued to fight alongside his comrades
through the mile deep objective, clearing bunker after bunker with undaunted
courage. Towards the northern end of the objective one enemy medium machinegun (MMG) opened up from the second storey of a well-fortified building inflicting
heavy casualties and holding up the attack. Once again this gallant soldier, without
a thought for his personal safety, despite his serious injury and the heavy volume of
enemy fire, crawled forward till he reached the building and lobbed a grenade into
the bunker killing one enemy soldier and injuring the other. The MMG however
continued to fire. With outstanding courage and determination Lance Naik X
scaled a side wall and entering the bunker, bayoneted the enemy soldier who was
still firing and thus silenced the machine-gun, saving further casualties to his
company and ensuring the success of the attack. In this process however, he
received serious injuries and succumbed to them after the capture of the objective.
In this action, Lance Naik X displayed the most conspicuous valour and
determination and made the supreme sacrifice in the best traditions of the Army.

9. Answer
• Albert Ekka

10. Question 5
• ____ is a type of steamed/fried bun with or without
fillings, and is usually served with a dipping sauce
normally consisting of tomatoes as the base
ingredient, from which numerous variations can be
made. It has become a traditional delicacy
in Tibet, Nepal, Bhutan, Sikkim,Darjeeling
district and Ladakh and has recently become one of
the most popular fast foods in many regions of India,
specially those that have a significant population of
people of Tibetan, Nepali or other Himalayan origins.
• FITB

11. Answer

12. Question 6
• ‘Vorsprung durch Technik’ is a German phrase
which roughly translates to "Advancement
through technology" .
• Since 1971, it has been the main advertising
slogan and company ethos for a
prominent German car manufacturer.
• Which company ?

13. Answer

14. Question 7
____ was a Roman Emperor who was known for
his tyranny. According to legend, when the Great
Fire of Rome started in 64 AD, he spent his time
playing lyre and singing while the entire city was
burning.
A widely used computer software has an obvious
pun on this incident. In its initial version, while
the software ran, it did not allow the user to
execute any other operation on the computer.
Name the emperor and you will also know the
name of the software.

15. Answer
Nero Burning ROM!
(Nero is a German company and the pun is
even more obvious as Rom is the German
word for Rome).

16. *Question 8
Black
then
white are
all I see
in my infancy.
Red and yellow then came to be,
reaching out to me,
lets me see.
There is,
so ,
much,
more and
beckons me
to look though to these,
infinite possibilities.
As below so above and beyond I imagine,
drawn outside the lines of reason.
Push the envelope.
Watch it bend.
Song : Lateralus
Artist : Tool
Album : Lateralus
Year : 2002
What is the big deal about
these lyrics ?

17. Answer
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
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•
•
The syllables during the verses form the first few Fibonacci numbers, ascending and
descending:
(1) Black,
(1) then,
(2) white are,
(3) all I see,
(5) in my in·fan·cy,
(8) red and yel·low then came to be,
(5) rea·ching out to me,
(3) lets me see.
(2) There is,
(1) so,
(1) much,
(2) more and
(3) beck·ons me,
(5) to look through to these,
(8) in·fi·nite pos·si·bil·i·ties.
(13) As be·low so a·bove and be·yond I im·ag·ine,
(8) drawn be-yond the lines of rea·son.
(5) Push the en·ve·lope.
(3) Watch it bend

18. Question 9
• From 1901 to 2012, Nobel Prizes have been
awarded to over 800 individuals, of whom at
least 20% were ____, although ____ comprise
less than 0.2% of the world's population.
• FITB.

19. Answer
• Jews

20. Question 10
• Satyajit Ray, the genius filmmaker, was also a
prolific writer and is well known for his
contributions to Bengali literature. One of his
short stories ‘Patol Babu, Film-Star’; which
was about a failed actor struggling to make a
living after his father’s death, was recently
adapted for the silver screen as a part of a
movie.
• Name the movie.

21. Answer
• Bombay Talkies
• The Dibakar Banerjee directed short ‘Star’
• Nawazuddin Siddiqui played the protagonist.

22. Question 11
• Rubāʿī is a style of Persian poetry, where each Rubai is a
quatrain (4 lines) and a rubāʿiyāt is used to describe a
collection of such quatrains. The rhyme scheme is such that
all the rubaai end in the same word, which is usually the
title of the rubāʿiyāt.
• Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam is one of the most famous
examples of this type of poetry. A famous Indian poet was
very much inspired by Omar Khayyam’s work and
translated it into Hindi. Later, he wrote his own trilogy of
poems based on the Rubāʿī style. The first part of the
trilogy became so famous that it completely overshadowed
the other two parts, and common people very rarely know
that this work also has 2 other parts.
• Which literary work are we talking about ?

23. Answer
• Madhushala (1935)
• Madhubala (1936)
• Madhukalash (1937)

24. *Question 12
• Saint Syrus of Pavia was the first bishop of
Pavia during the 1st century. His legend, according
to the 14th century De laudibus Papiæ (In the
Praise of Pavia), states that Syrus was the boy
with the five loaves who appears in the Gospels.
Syrus is said to have followed Saint Peter to Rome
and from there he was sent to the Po valley to
preach and convert the people to the Christian
faith. He preached in all of the major cities
of northern Italy.
• How is he remembered in the world of football ?

25. Answer
• San Siro, the home ground of both AC Milan
and Inter Milan, is named after him.

26. Question 13
• Proposed map of what ?

27. Answer
• Khalistan, an independent country for the
Sikhs.

28. Question 14
• She is a Pakistani school pupil and education activist from
Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. She is known for
her education and women's rights activism in the Swat Valley,
where the Taliban had at times banned girls from attending school.
In early 2009, she wrote a blog under a pseudonym for
the BBC detailing her life under Taliban rule, their attempts to take
control of the valley, and her views on promoting education for
girls.
• On 9 October 2012, she was shot in the head and neck in an
assassination attempt by Taliban gunmen while returning home on
a school bus.
• She received treatment in the UK and eventually recovered.
• Her story garnered lots of international interest and she became
"the most famous teenager in the world“. She was nominated for
the 2013 Nobel Peace Prize and on 12 July 2013, she spoke at the
UN to call for worldwide access to education
• Who is she ?

29. Answer
• Malala Yousafzai

30. Question 15
• ________ came to India with the British Army; end of
World War I saw Indian soldiers of British Indian Army
bringing it back with them as a diet supplement. A lot
of well-to-do Indian families took to drinking ________
in early 1940s and 1950s and it became a sort of status
symbol in upper middle class and the rich classes.
• It is currently the most widely consumed packaged
beverage in India, after bottled water.
• William ________, the patent holder of the drink, has a
mountain range in Antarctica named after him because
not only did he support the expeditions financially, but
his product also provided a non-perishable source of
nutrition to the explorers.
• FITB

31. Answer

32. *Question 16
• The name “AB" was coined by the Finns during the Winter War. The
name is an insulting reference to Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav
A, who was responsible for the partitioning of Finland with Nazi
Germany under the A - Ribbentrop Pact in August 1939, which
secretly stated the Soviet intention to invade Finland in November
1939, and included his declaration on Soviet state radio that
bombing missions over Finland were actually airborne
humanitarian food deliveries for their starving neighbours. The
Finns, far from starving and engaged in a bitter war for national
survival with the Soviet forces, sarcastically dubbed the
Soviet cluster bombs “A bread baskets" in reference to A’s
propaganda broadcasts. The AB was developed to attack Soviet
tanks, and the Finns called it the “AB" as "a drink to go with the
food". A himself despised the name, and the term became
ubiquitous.
• AB = ?

33. Answer
• AB = Molotov Cocktail

34. Question 17
• X is a fictional character, an antihero appearing in comic
books published by DC Comics. X is a workingclass magician, occult detective, and con man stationed in
London. He is known for his endless cynicism, deadpan snarking,
ruthless cunning, and constant chain smoking. X is also a
passionate humanist driven by a heartfelt desire to do some good
in his life.
• Pop artist Sting served as visual inspiration for the
character. Empire Magazine ranked X third in their 50 Greatest
Comic Characters of All Time, while IGN ranked him #29 in their
Top 100 Comic Book Heroes, and the character ranked #10
in Wizard Magazine's Top 200 Comic Book Characters of All Time.
• Who is X ?

35. Answer
• John Constantine

36. Question 18
• Arunabh Kumar, an IIT-Kharagpur graduate, quit his job
in the US Air-force and worked with Red Chillies
Entertainment as an assistant director for Om Shanti
Om. He then made a couple of short films, music
videos and freelanced with various ad agencies. After
pitching ideas to big media conglomerates, he realised
that they had a ‘pigeon-hold’ idea about ‘what would
work’ and they weren’t willing to let go of the formula.
• Frustated, he decided to work on his own and started
his own website that featured short films, sketches,
parodies and web series. The website became an
instant rage across colleges in India. Which website are
we talking about ?

37. Answer
• The Viral Fever

38. Question 19
• ‘‘Lewis took five years to chronicle Narnia
Tolkien had twelve years, and Rowling took ten
Lucas spent nearly three decades on Star Wars
And we all know how that one turned out in the end
• You’re not our bi*ch and you’re not a machine
And we don’t mean to dictate how you spend your days
But please, bear in mind, in the time that you’ve had
Shakespeare churned out thirty-five friggin’ plays’’
Lyrics of a song titled ‘Write like the wind’ by Paul and Storm.
Who is the subject of this song ?

39. Answer
• George R. R. Martin

40. *Question 20
• “___ ____ ___” is a phrase spoken by the character
Leonard McCoy in the original Star Trek series, to
declare someone or something deceased and is
considered his catchphrase.
• The line has entered popular culture as a general
metaphor, with uses as diverse as describing an
unresponsive electronic circuit to describing an
opponent’s destruction in an action game. Most
famously, Google Chrome uses the phrase as an error
message if a tab gets terminated unexpectedly.
• What is the phrase ?

41. Answer

42. Question 21
• Yen Sid Retlaw is the name of
a powerful wizard in the
sequence ‘Sorceror’s
Apprentice’ from ‘Fantasia’
• Mickey Mouse is a student of
Yen sid in the show.
• Who was the inspiration
behind the name and facial
characteristics of Yen Sid
Retlaw ?

43. Answer
• Walter Disney spelled backwards is Yensid
Retlaw.

44. Question 22
• Approximately 1.6
million people
formed a 480kilometre human
chain on 11
September 2013.
The event was
widely covered by
the international
media and
received support
from all over. What
was the cause ?

45. Answer
• Demand for Catalonian independence from
Spain.