IAS Mains Geography Optional 2017 – Paper 1 Section A (Part - 2) (Download PDF)

Geography optional paper was very predictable based on the recent happenings around the globe –indeed many concepts were similar to those asked in our past test series. In the 2018 Geography optional Test Series, we have reserved 2 mock test for the month of March to cover the contemporary happenings. As expected, climate and environment was indeed the major focus areas for 2017 paper.

3a. “Climate Change is a Reality. ” Explain with Suitable Examples.

• Carbon pollution – warming the earth – extreme weather conditions
• Temperature is rising – glacier melting
• Proceeding at a rate unprecedented in last 1300 years
• Swallow entire islands and creep closer to populated areas of great coastal cities like New York, Melbourne, Venice, Dakar, Guayaquil, and Chittagong
• Parali Island – vanished (Lakshdweep)
• Mumbai & Mangalore – coastal flooding
• Glacial melting
• Extreme weather events like torrential rain, floods, heat waves, and drought are becoming more frequent and intense

3b. Distinguish between the Characteristics of Chernozem and Sierozem Soils.

Chernozem soils

• Black colored
• High humus
• Very fertile
• High phosphoric acid, phosphorous and ammonia
• High agricultural yields
• European Steppes

Sierozem Soils

• Grey soil (at surface & light below)
• Cool temperate semi-arid areas
• Shrub and grasses
• Carbonate layer or hardpan

Include Map

3c. Give a Classification of Plants Based on the Amount of Water Requirement.

• Hygrophytes: Water-loving plants in humid areas - water hyacinth, mangroves, rice, and banana (plentiful rain in all seasons)
• Mesophytes: moist and not wet conditions
• Tropophytes: grow in regions with alternate wet and dry seasons
• Nerophytes: drought regions for example, cacti and euphorbias
• Phreatophytes: arid conditions by growing long roots which obtain water from underground reserves.
• Xerophytes – dry loving plants

a. Discuss the concept of Periglacial cycle as propounded by Peltier.

• Peltier (1950) gave “cycle of periglacial erosion” – followed ideas of Troll gave process based classification for morphogenetic classification based on climatic controls
• Proposed how relative importance of different weathering and erosional processes would vary with annual temperature & precipitation within the normal cycle area
• Periglacial - climatic and geomorphic conditions found in the edges of Pleistocene ice sheets and glaciated areas, later explained intense frost action
• Identified in cold, humid, subarctic region with production of 3 coexisting surfaces: (each cycle to be independent with its own regime)

1. Surface of downwasting produced by congeliturbation
2. Surface of lateral planation produced where the water table and the zone of frequent nivation coincide
3. Stream graded, or aggraded surface.

• The benched-slopes result from cryoplanation processes that produce the flattening and decrease in inclination of the profile

b. “Climate, slope gradient and rock structure influence the avulsion of channels”. Explain.

• Explain drainage formation – antecedent and superimposed
• Avulsion - rapid abandonment of a river channel and the formation of a new river channel
• Slope Gradient – centripetal & centrifugal
• Rock structure – trellis drainage
• Climate change – floods and droughts and change of river course
• Changes in course of Sarasvati River

C. Discuss the Perception, Attitude, Value and Emotion (PAVE) Theory of Environmental Management.

• BKW (Burton, Kates & White) school – Behavioural geographic approach
• MOSS (Mitchell, O’Riordan, Saarinen & Sewell) school of PAVE – Natural resource management
• They emphasized perceptions and attitude in resource decision making, behavioural and institutional analysis & resource management model.

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