English Test-3...

Low wages, large numbers of casual and contract workers, authoritarianism in the workplace, unjust victimisation of workers who are at the forefront of resistance, the coming together of company and state to put down worker resistance with a heavy hand and the lack of a fighting spirit on the part of the central trade unions affiliated to the mainstream political parties - these are what the workers are up against, even in the public sector.
One is reminded of the 44-day strike that began in April this year of thousands of contract workers, of the public sector Neyveli Lignite Corporation (NLC), who have been struggling for many years to win wage parity with the company 's permanent workers and the regularisation of their jobs. Sadly, the All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) and the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) allied with it did not even give a call for the permanent workers to ally with these contract workers. Instead, all the AITUC did was to appeal to Jayalalithaa, the chief minister of Tamil Nadu, in which the NLC is located, to intervene on behalf of the workers and prevail upon the central government to help settle the strike in their favour. This, when the Tamil Nadu police had been ordered to arrest the striking workers after their strike had been declared "illegal "through a court order.
The political parties, to which the AITUC and the CITU are affiliated, had entered into a thoroughly opportunistic alliance with Jayalalithaa 's AIADMK in the state assembly elections last year and wanted to keep the alliance going. Indeed, it was the AIADMK government along with the central government, which controls the NLC that was instrumental in the defeat of the strike when the AITUC decided to call it off after some vague promises of regularisation were made, without, of course, any agreement on pay parity. If this then is the plight of workers in leading enterprises in the private and public sector, Maruti Suzuki and NLC, one can only imagine what their predicament is in labour-intensive manufacturing like apparel and footwear, and in the sweatshops of diamond cutting and polishing, all industries where the growth of exports is faltering.

Which of the following options has not been mentioned as some of the challenges that workers face?

Low wages, large numbers of casual and contract workers, authoritarianism in the workplace, unjust victimisation of workers who are at the forefront of resistance, the coming together of company and state to put down worker resistance with a heavy hand and the lack of a fighting spirit on the part of the central trade unions affiliated to the mainstream political parties - these are what the workers are up against, even in the public sector.
One is reminded of the 44-day strike that began in April this year of thousands of contract workers, of the public sector Neyveli Lignite Corporation (NLC), who have been struggling for many years to win wage parity with the company 's permanent workers and the regularisation of their jobs. Sadly, the All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) and the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) allied with it did not even give a call for the permanent workers to ally with these contract workers. Instead, all the AITUC did was to appeal to Jayalalithaa, the chief minister of Tamil Nadu, in which the NLC is located, to intervene on behalf of the workers and prevail upon the central government to help settle the strike in their favour. This, when the Tamil Nadu police had been ordered to arrest the striking workers after their strike had been declared "illegal "through a court order.
The political parties, to which the AITUC and the CITU are affiliated, had entered into a thoroughly opportunistic alliance with Jayalalithaa 's AIADMK in the state assembly elections last year and wanted to keep the alliance going. Indeed, it was the AIADMK government along with the central government, which controls the NLC that was instrumental in the defeat of the strike when the AITUC decided to call it off after some vague promises of regularisation were made, without, of course, any agreement on pay parity. If this then is the plight of workers in leading enterprises in the private and public sector, Maruti Suzuki and NLC, one can only imagine what their predicament is in labour-intensive manufacturing like apparel and footwear, and in the sweatshops of diamond cutting and polishing, all industries where the growth of exports is faltering.

From the passage, it can be inferred that the AITUC called off the strike because

Low wages, large numbers of casual and contract workers, authoritarianism in the workplace, unjust victimisation of workers who are at the forefront of resistance, the coming together of company and state to put down worker resistance with a heavy hand and the lack of a fighting spirit on the part of the central trade unions affiliated to the mainstream political parties - these are what the workers are up against, even in the public sector.
One is reminded of the 44-day strike that began in April this year of thousands of contract workers, of the public sector Neyveli Lignite Corporation (NLC), who have been struggling for many years to win wage parity with the company 's permanent workers and the regularisation of their jobs. Sadly, the All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) and the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) allied with it did not even give a call for the permanent workers to ally with these contract workers. Instead, all the AITUC did was to appeal to Jayalalithaa, the chief minister of Tamil Nadu, in which the NLC is located, to intervene on behalf of the workers and prevail upon the central government to help settle the strike in their favour. This, when the Tamil Nadu police had been ordered to arrest the striking workers after their strike had been declared "illegal "through a court order.
The political parties, to which the AITUC and the CITU are affiliated, had entered into a thoroughly opportunistic alliance with Jayalalithaa 's AIADMK in the state assembly elections last year and wanted to keep the alliance going. Indeed, it was the AIADMK government along with the central government, which controls the NLC that was instrumental in the defeat of the strike when the AITUC decided to call it off after some vague promises of regularisation were made, without, of course, any agreement on pay parity. If this then is the plight of workers in leading enterprises in the private and public sector, Maruti Suzuki and NLC, one can only imagine what their predicament is in labour-intensive manufacturing like apparel and footwear, and in the sweatshops of diamond cutting and polishing, all industries where the growth of exports is faltering.

The passage mentions Maruti Suzuki and NLC in order to

Low wages, large numbers of casual and contract workers, authoritarianism in the workplace, unjust victimisation of workers who are at the forefront of resistance, the coming together of company and state to put down worker resistance with a heavy hand and the lack of a fighting spirit on the part of the central trade unions affiliated to the mainstream political parties - these are what the workers are up against, even in the public sector.
One is reminded of the 44-day strike that began in April this year of thousands of contract workers, of the public sector Neyveli Lignite Corporation (NLC), who have been struggling for many years to win wage parity with the company 's permanent workers and the regularisation of their jobs. Sadly, the All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) and the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) allied with it did not even give a call for the permanent workers to ally with these contract workers. Instead, all the AITUC did was to appeal to Jayalalithaa, the chief minister of Tamil Nadu, in which the NLC is located, to intervene on behalf of the workers and prevail upon the central government to help settle the strike in their favour. This, when the Tamil Nadu police had been ordered to arrest the striking workers after their strike had been declared "illegal "through a court order.
The political parties, to which the AITUC and the CITU are affiliated, had entered into a thoroughly opportunistic alliance with Jayalalithaa 's AIADMK in the state assembly elections last year and wanted to keep the alliance going. Indeed, it was the AIADMK government along with the central government, which controls the NLC that was instrumental in the defeat of the strike when the AITUC decided to call it off after some vague promises of regularisation were made, without, of course, any agreement on pay parity. If this then is the plight of workers in leading enterprises in the private and public sector, Maruti Suzuki and NLC, one can only imagine what their predicament is in labour-intensive manufacturing like apparel and footwear, and in the sweatshops of diamond cutting and polishing, all industries where the growth of exports is faltering.

Consider the following statements:
(i) Footwear is not a labour intensive industry.
(ii) The strike at NLC continued for over two months.
According to the above passage, which of the statements is/are valid?

All astronauts look forward to living in the lonely and unpredictable environment of space. In low earth orbit, for instance, you get to see 16 sunrises and 16 sunsets! For the day fades into night every 45 minutes as the spacecraft rotates slowly to keep its solar panels facing the sun. Viewers in Delhi shared a bit of this excitement with Sunita Williams aboard the international Space Station, when she tele chatted with them earlier this month.
Astronauts spend long periods in weightlessness of 'zero gravity '. It may be fun for us sitting in our gravity cocooned rooms and watching them on TV, as they float around. But inside their bodies things are happening that aren 't any fun at all. Scientists study the effects of outer space on the human body to see how it behaves in zero gravity and then re-adapts to earth 's gravity at the end of the spaceflight. In space the number of red blood cells, bone and muscle tissues are all altered and the metabolic process upset.
On Earth, gravity pulls blood to lower body, away from the head. Nerves called the baroreceptors detect this and redirect blood flow, ensuring that the brain gets enough oxygen and sugar. In space baroreceptors don 't sense any pressure difference and the astronaut flies with an atypical redistribution of blood. On earth we build bones by running or jumping. But without gravity, the bones begin to lose calcium, which is absorbed in the body. (Bedridden and paraplegics suffer the same problem, losing 30% of their lower body bone mass within months). The minerals lost from the leg and hipbones aren 't excreted and they migrate to the head, making the skull dense. This is the body 's way of making better use of its resources: legs are useless in space, so the body moves to protect the brain!.
Unlike on earth there is no muscle tension in space. Muscles are relaxed, stretched and actually grow by five to seven inches in a space flight. Surprisingly one gets taller while one sleeps, too, because of relaxed muscles - sometimes enough to readjust one 's car 's rear-view mirror in the morning. To offset this, the astronauts aboard the ISS exercise on a treadmill every day. So every space payload has a large component of medical experiments to help scientists figure out what we gain-or lose-up there.

It can be inferred from the passage that living in space

All astronauts look forward to living in the lonely and unpredictable environment of space. In low earth orbit, for instance, you get to see 16 sunrises and 16 sunsets! For the day fades into night every 45 minutes as the spacecraft rotates slowly to keep its solar panels facing the sun. Viewers in Delhi shared a bit of this excitement with Sunita Williams aboard the international Space Station, when she tele chatted with them earlier this month.
Astronauts spend long periods in weightlessness of 'zero gravity '. It may be fun for us sitting in our gravity cocooned rooms and watching them on TV, as they float around. But inside their bodies things are happening that aren 't any fun at all. Scientists study the effects of outer space on the human body to see how it behaves in zero gravity and then re-adapts to earth 's gravity at the end of the spaceflight. In space the number of red blood cells, bone and muscle tissues are all altered and the metabolic process upset.
On Earth, gravity pulls blood to lower body, away from the head. Nerves called the baroreceptors detect this and redirect blood flow, ensuring that the brain gets enough oxygen and sugar. In space baroreceptors don 't sense any pressure difference and the astronaut flies with an atypical redistribution of blood. On earth we build bones by running or jumping. But without gravity, the bones begin to lose calcium, which is absorbed in the body. (Bedridden and paraplegics suffer the same problem, losing 30% of their lower body bone mass within months). The minerals lost from the leg and hipbones aren 't excreted and they migrate to the head, making the skull dense. This is the body 's way of making better use of its resources: legs are useless in space, so the body moves to protect the brain!.
Unlike on earth there is no muscle tension in space. Muscles are relaxed, stretched and actually grow by five to seven inches in a space flight. Surprisingly one gets taller while one sleeps, too, because of relaxed muscles - sometimes enough to readjust one 's car 's rear-view mirror in the morning. To offset this, the astronauts aboard the ISS exercise on a treadmill every day. So every space payload has a large component of medical experiments to help scientists figure out what we gain-or lose-up there.

The author would most likely agree with which of the following statements?

All astronauts look forward to living in the lonely and unpredictable environment of space. In low earth orbit, for instance, you get to see 16 sunrises and 16 sunsets! For the day fades into night every 45 minutes as the spacecraft rotates slowly to keep its solar panels facing the sun. Viewers in Delhi shared a bit of this excitement with Sunita Williams aboard the international Space Station, when she tele chatted with them earlier this month.
Astronauts spend long periods in weightlessness of 'zero gravity '. It may be fun for us sitting in our gravity cocooned rooms and watching them on TV, as they float around. But inside their bodies things are happening that aren 't any fun at all. Scientists study the effects of outer space on the human body to see how it behaves in zero gravity and then re-adapts to earth 's gravity at the end of the spaceflight. In space the number of red blood cells, bone and muscle tissues are all altered and the metabolic process upset.
On Earth, gravity pulls blood to lower body, away from the head. Nerves called the baroreceptors detect this and redirect blood flow, ensuring that the brain gets enough oxygen and sugar. In space baroreceptors don 't sense any pressure difference and the astronaut flies with an atypical redistribution of blood. On earth we build bones by running or jumping. But without gravity, the bones begin to lose calcium, which is absorbed in the body. (Bedridden and paraplegics suffer the same problem, losing 30% of their lower body bone mass within months). The minerals lost from the leg and hipbones aren 't excreted and they migrate to the head, making the skull dense. This is the body 's way of making better use of its resources: legs are useless in space, so the body moves to protect the brain!.
Unlike on earth there is no muscle tension in space. Muscles are relaxed, stretched and actually grow by five to seven inches in a space flight. Surprisingly one gets taller while one sleeps, too, because of relaxed muscles - sometimes enough to readjust one 's car 's rear-view mirror in the morning. To offset this, the astronauts aboard the ISS exercise on a treadmill every day. So every space payload has a large component of medical experiments to help scientists figure out what we gain-or lose-up there.

The main purpose of the author in the passage is to

All astronauts look forward to living in the lonely and unpredictable environment of space. In low earth orbit, for instance, you get to see 16 sunrises and 16 sunsets! For the day fades into night every 45 minutes as the spacecraft rotates slowly to keep its solar panels facing the sun. Viewers in Delhi shared a bit of this excitement with Sunita Williams aboard the international Space Station, when she tele chatted with them earlier this month.
Astronauts spend long periods in weightlessness of 'zero gravity '. It may be fun for us sitting in our gravity cocooned rooms and watching them on TV, as they float around. But inside their bodies things are happening that aren 't any fun at all. Scientists study the effects of outer space on the human body to see how it behaves in zero gravity and then re-adapts to earth 's gravity at the end of the spaceflight. In space the number of red blood cells, bone and muscle tissues are all altered and the metabolic process upset.
On Earth, gravity pulls blood to lower body, away from the head. Nerves called the baroreceptors detect this and redirect blood flow, ensuring that the brain gets enough oxygen and sugar. In space baroreceptors don 't sense any pressure difference and the astronaut flies with an atypical redistribution of blood. On earth we build bones by running or jumping. But without gravity, the bones begin to lose calcium, which is absorbed in the body. (Bedridden and paraplegics suffer the same problem, losing 30% of their lower body bone mass within months). The minerals lost from the leg and hipbones aren 't excreted and they migrate to the head, making the skull dense. This is the body 's way of making better use of its resources: legs are useless in space, so the body moves to protect the brain!.
Unlike on earth there is no muscle tension in space. Muscles are relaxed, stretched and actually grow by five to seven inches in a space flight. Surprisingly one gets taller while one sleeps, too, because of relaxed muscles - sometimes enough to readjust one 's car 's rear-view mirror in the morning. To offset this, the astronauts aboard the ISS exercise on a treadmill every day. So every space payload has a large component of medical experiments to help scientists figure out what we gain-or lose-up there.

According to the passage in the low earth orbit there are

All astronauts look forward to living in the lonely and unpredictable environment of space. In low earth orbit, for instance, you get to see 16 sunrises and 16 sunsets! For the day fades into night every 45 minutes as the spacecraft rotates slowly to keep its solar panels facing the sun. Viewers in Delhi shared a bit of this excitement with Sunita Williams aboard the international Space Station, when she tele chatted with them earlier this month.
Astronauts spend long periods in weightlessness of 'zero gravity '. It may be fun for us sitting in our gravity cocooned rooms and watching them on TV, as they float around. But inside their bodies things are happening that aren 't any fun at all. Scientists study the effects of outer space on the human body to see how it behaves in zero gravity and then re-adapts to earth 's gravity at the end of the spaceflight. In space the number of red blood cells, bone and muscle tissues are all altered and the metabolic process upset.
On Earth, gravity pulls blood to lower body, away from the head. Nerves called the baroreceptors detect this and redirect blood flow, ensuring that the brain gets enough oxygen and sugar. In space baroreceptors don 't sense any pressure difference and the astronaut flies with an atypical redistribution of blood. On earth we build bones by running or jumping. But without gravity, the bones begin to lose calcium, which is absorbed in the body. (Bedridden and paraplegics suffer the same problem, losing 30% of their lower body bone mass within months). The minerals lost from the leg and hipbones aren 't excreted and they migrate to the head, making the skull dense. This is the body 's way of making better use of its resources: legs are useless in space, so the body moves to protect the brain!.
Unlike on earth there is no muscle tension in space. Muscles are relaxed, stretched and actually grow by five to seven inches in a space flight. Surprisingly one gets taller while one sleeps, too, because of relaxed muscles - sometimes enough to readjust one 's car 's rear-view mirror in the morning. To offset this, the astronauts aboard the ISS exercise on a treadmill every day. So every space payload has a large component of medical experiments to help scientists figure out what we gain-or lose-up there.

The tone of the author is