BharatNotes How to use this page
Every question here is built from the Pre-historic Sites chapter, which is itself sourced from excavation reports — ASI Memoir No. 110, Indian Archaeology — A Review, and the Jaipur State monographs. No question invents a fact, and no question cites a PYQ that does not exist.
The distractors are the point. Most are real errors in circulation — the wrong district a textbook prints, the number an aggregator copied from the wrong site, the phase a summary misdates. If a wrong option here feels familiar, that is deliberate. Every answer also carries a "why not the others" line, because in a paper with negative marking the skill being tested is elimination, not recognition.
Work in this order: Sections A–D and G (58 MCQs) cold, then E and F, then the flashcards for anything you missed, then the one-liners as a final sweep the night before.
Read the tag on each question
Every question is labelled with the kind of error it probes, using the taxonomy from section 6 of the chapter. A wrong answer then tells you something more useful than a lost mark — it tells you which habit is costing you.
| Tag | What it tests | If you keep missing these |
|---|---|---|
| Type A · wrong period | A real feature pushed into the wrong phase | Learn sequences, not facts. This is the highest-yield trap in the unit |
| Type B · wrong site | A true statement attached to the wrong place | Build a site-and-signature table and revise it as pairs |
| Type C · overgeneralisation | "All / never / only" statements broken by one exception | Memorise the exceptions: Ojiyana, Gilund's microliths, the third burial type |
| Type D · two authorities | Sources that genuinely disagree | Do not panic. Learn the defensible form of the answer |
| Type E · weakly sourced | Popular claims with no primary report behind them | Know which are safe to tick and which not to argue from |
| Type F · sequence | Straight ordering | The easiest marks here, if the sequence is cold |
| District drift | Boundaries redrawn in 1994, 2023 and 2024 | Read section 9 of the chapter once, properly |
| Recall / Concept / Attribution | No trap — the fact, the idea, or who did it | Ordinary revision |
Section A — Palaeolithic and Mesolithic (Q1–12)
1. The Acheulian site of Singi Talav lies near which town? Recall
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(c) Didwana. Singi Talav lies south-west of Didwana and was excavated 1981–85 under V. N. Misra and S. N. Rajaguru.
Why not the others: (a) Bagor is Mesolithic, on the Kothari; (b) Tilwara is Mesolithic, on the Luni; (d) Balathal is Chalcolithic. None of the three is Acheulian at all.
2. Didwana today falls in which district? District drift
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(d) Didwana-Kuchaman, created in 2023 and retained through the December 2024 reorganisation. Nagaur is the pre-2023 answer and is what almost every book still prints.
Why not the others: (a) Nagaur held Didwana until 2023 and is still what most books print; (b) and (c) never did.
3. Two dates are in circulation for the Didwana Acheulian. Which pairing is correct? Type D · two authorities
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(a). The Singi Talav deposit was subsequently dated to about 800,000 years, while the Didwana sites generally are placed at c. 200,000 years BP. Different studies, different methods; neither cancels the other.
Why not the others: (b) swaps the two figures round; (c) 2 million years is a claim made nowhere in Rajasthan; (d) 50,000 years would drag an Acheulian assemblage into the Upper Palaeolithic.
4. What makes Didwana unusual among Indian open-air Acheulian sites? Concept
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(b) Primary context — the tools lie roughly where they were used, not washed into a river gravel. Note (a) is the classic confusion: primary context is about position, not age.
Why not the others: (a) is the classic confusion — primary context is about position, not age; (c) the rock art belt is Bundi–Bhilwara–Tonk, not Didwana; (d) copper arrives some six thousand years later.
5. The Singi Talav group appears to have camped beside — Recall
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(c). Fossil gastropods occur almost exclusively in the occupation layers, indicating a pond in a playa, away from any perennial river.
Why not the others: (a) the gastropod evidence argues specifically against a perennial river; (b) and (d) there was no sea shore or glacial lake in the Thar in the Middle Pleistocene.
6. Bagor stands on which river? Type B · wrong site
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(d) Kothari, itself a tributary of the Banas. "Banas" is the standard trap — right basin, wrong river.
Why not the others: (a) Banas is right basin, wrong river, and the commonest error on this site; (b) the Luni is Tilwara; (c) the Ghaggar is Kalibangan and Baror.
7. The dune on which Bagor sits is known locally as — Type B · wrong site
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(a) Mahasati. Dhulkot is Ahar; Bijak-ki-Pahari is Bairath.
Why not the others: (d) Tambavati is Ahar's other alias, which is what makes it the tempting wrong answer here.
8. Bagor was excavated 1968–70 jointly by how many institutions? Recall
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(b) Three — Poona University's Department of Archaeology, Deccan College, and the Rajasthan State Department of Archaeology and Museums. The third is dropped from most summaries; "ASI" is simply wrong.
Why not the others: (a) Deccan College was one of the three, not the whole; (c) two drops the Rajasthan State Department, which is exactly how most summaries get it wrong; (d) the ASI was not involved.
9. Bagor's domestication evidence covers — Type E · weakly sourced
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(c). Among the earliest such evidence in the subcontinent. The horse claim is the distractor and is not supported — carry this one, it recurs.
Why not the others: (b) camel and (d) elephant have no domestication evidence at Bagor either, but it is (a) that you will actually meet in a question.
10. Bagor's Phase I is dated to — Type F · sequence
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(d). Phase II is 2800–600 BC and Phase III is 600 BC – AD 200.
Why not the others: (a) is Phase II and (b) is Phase III, so both are real Bagor dates attached to the wrong phase; (c) 8000 BC predates the earliest occupation.
11. What does the Bagor sequence show about metal and microliths? Type C · overgeneralisation
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(a). The excavator reports no stratigraphic break across the sequence. Technological change here is additive, not substitutive — the chapter's central Mains argument.
Why not the others: (b) is the textbook assumption this site refutes; (c) both copper and iron reach Bagor; (d) reverses the metals.
12. Tilwara, the westernmost Mesolithic site of India, lies on which river and in which present district? District drift
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(b). The river is the Luni; Pachpadra tehsil moved to Balotra district in 2023, so Barmer is now the dated answer.
Why not the others: (a) Barmer is the pre-2023 answer and the river is right, which is what makes it the near-miss; (c) is Kalibangan country; (d) is Bagor's river and district.
Section B — Ahar–Banas Chalcolithic (Q13–26)
13. Ahar is also known by which two names? Type B · wrong site
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(c). Tambavati, "place of copper", and locally Dhulkot, "mound of dust". The culture is also called the Banas culture.
Why not the others: (a) Mahasati is Bagor's dune; (b) Karkota is not an Ahar alias; (d) Madhyamika is Nagari, near Chittorgarh.
14. Which statement about microliths is correct? Type C · overgeneralisation
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(d). True of the site, not the culture: Gilund had a stone-blade industry and its Period I yielded a few microliths. (a) is the common overgeneralisation.
Why not the others: (a) overgeneralises from the site to the whole culture; (b) reverses the position; (c) Balathal is not the only exception.
15. Gilund was excavated in 1959-60 by — Recall
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(a) B. B. Lal, for one season. Shinde and Possehl re-excavated 1999–2005.
Why not the others: (b) Sankalia excavated Ahar in 1961-62; (c) Agrawala began Ahar in 1952 and Jodhpura in 1972-73; (d) Misra is Bagor. All three are real Rajasthan excavators, at other sites.
16. Gilund lies on which bank of the Banas, and in which district today? Type D · two authorities
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(b). Right bank, 11.5 km off it. ASI's excavation page says Udaipur (correct for 1959-60); the Jaipur Circle list says Rajsamand, which is current.
Why not the others: (a) and (d) put Gilund on the left bank; it is on the right, 11.5 km off. (c) has the bank right and the district dated, since Udaipur was correct in 1959-60.
17. The 1999–2005 Gilund excavations are best known for — Type B · wrong site
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(c). A large bin of 100+ seal impressions, with design parallels at Indus sites — the best evidence for administrative practice in the Ahar–Banas world.
Why not the others: (a) the fortified enclosure and (b) the leprosy skeleton are both Balathal; (d) the white-painted bulls are Ojiyana.
18. Balathal's central fortified enclosure was first reported as Iron Age. What is it? Type A · wrong period
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(d) Chalcolithic. The excavators themselves corrected it in the 1997 report. A fortified Chalcolithic village is the point — social complexity earlier than the textbook chronology suggests.
Why not the others: (a) is the superseded reading the excavators themselves withdrew; (b) Balathal has no Harappan level; (c) Mauryan is a millennium and a half too late.
19. The Balathal skeleton is the world's earliest documented case of — Recall
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(a) Leprosy — a male of about 37, buried c. 2500–2000 BCE in a stone enclosure within burned cow dung, showing rhinomaxillary syndrome (PLoS ONE, 2009).
Why not the others: (b), (c) and (d) are not claimed for this skeleton; the diagnosis rests on rhinomaxillary syndrome, which is specific to leprosy.
20. Ojiyana is unique among Ahar-culture sites because — Type C · overgeneralisation
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(b). Every other Ahar-culture site flourished in a river valley. This single exception falsifies any statement that "all Ahar sites are riverine".
Why not the others: (a) largest is not claimed for Ojiyana; (c) it produced abundant pottery, including the white-painted bulls; (d) it is not the oldest.
21. Ojiyana's terracotta bulls are distinguished by — Type B · wrong site
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(c) White paint, which ASI calls unparalleled among contemporary Indian cultures. Gilund's bulls are the humped ones — the pair is a favourite match-the-following.
Why not the others: (a) the humps are Gilund's, and this pair is the favourite match-the-following in the unit; (b) and (d) neither copper inlay nor script occurs on them.
22. Ojiyana's settlement ended in — Type B · wrong site
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(d) Fire — a thick layer of ash, burnt mud plaster and charcoal-capped post-holes. (b) is Kalibangan's Period I.
Why not the others: (b) the earthquake is Kalibangan's Period I; (a) and (c) are both ruled out by the ash, burnt mud plaster and charcoal-capped post-holes.
23. The signature ceramic of the Ahar–Banas culture is — Type B · wrong site
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(a). Note the contrast the Review draws repeatedly: the Black-and-Red Ware at Noh and Sunari is unpainted, and explicitly unlike Ahar's.
Why not the others: (b) Reserve Slip Ware is Ganeshwar–Jodhpura; (c) NBPW is Early Historic; (d) OCP is what the Ganeshwar pottery was initially identified as. Every wrong option here is a real ware in the wrong place.
24. Ahar's excavation was begun in 1952 by — Recall
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(b) R. C. Agrawala of the Rajasthan State Department, with Review entries at 1954-55 and 1955-56. Sankalia, Deo and Ansari excavated in 1961-62 and published the 1969 report.
Why not the others: (a) Sankalia, with Deo and Ansari, came in 1961-62 and wrote the 1969 report, so he is later rather than first and is the near-miss; (c) Lal is Gilund; (d) Sahni is Bairat and Sambhar.
25. Which pair is correctly matched? Type B · wrong site
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(c). Gilund → humped bulls and 100+ seal impressions; Ojiyana → white-painted bulls and the hill slope.
Why not the others: (a) reverses the bull pair; (b) the seal impressions are Gilund's; (d) the hill slope is Ojiyana's. Three of the four options are true statements about the wrong site.
26. Ojiyana's single-culture deposit is about — Recall
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(d) 7.5 m, on the northern slope — possibly the deepest of any excavated Ahar-culture site, in three phases.
Why not the others: All four are plausible depths for an Ahar-culture mound, so nothing here is recoverable by elimination and the figure has to be known.
Section C — Ganeshwar–Jodhpura (Q27–34)
27. Ganeshwar and Jodhpura lie in which present districts? District drift
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(a). Neem Ka Thana district was abolished in December 2024, so Ganeshwar is in Sikar again; Kot Putli went into Kotputli-Behror in 2023, so Jaipur is now dated.
Why not the others: (b) Jaipur is the pre-2023 answer for Jodhpura; (c) Neem Ka Thana existed as a district only between 2023 and December 2024; (d) neither site was ever in Jhunjhunu or Alwar.
28. According to IAR 1987-88, Ganeshwar's Phase I is — Type A · wrong period
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(b) — microliths and wild animal bones, entirely devoid of copper. Copper is introduced in Phase II and reaches 99% of material in Phase III. So "copper centre from its foundation" is false.
Why not the others: (a) becomes true only from Phase III, which is the period trap; (c) Ganeshwar has no Harappan material; (d) iron is far later.
29. A distinctive technical absence in Ganeshwar's Phase I industry is — Recall
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(c). IAR calls the crested guiding ridge technique "ubiquitously characteristic of India", and notes its complete absence here.
Why not the others: (a), (b) and (d) are all real techniques, but the Review names the crested guiding ridge specifically, and calls its absence remarkable because the technique is ubiquitous elsewhere in India.
30. Ganeshwar's chronology is derived from — Concept
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(d). IAR 1987-88 says so outright: "this study is based on the basis of C14 study of Jodhpura". Ganeshwar has no absolute dates of its own — a claim of radiocarbon dates from Ganeshwar is false.
Why not the others: (a) is the trap, because it asserts dates the site does not have; (b) and (c) inscriptions and coins are Early Historic dating tools, of no use on a Chalcolithic mound.
31. The diagnostic ware of the Ganeshwar–Jodhpura culture is — Recall
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(a). Characteristic shape: the carinated basin. The culture's pottery was initially identified as Ochre Coloured Pottery.
Why not the others: (b) Black-and-Red Ware is Ahar–Banas; (c) PGW is Iron Age; (d) bio-chrome is Baror's Period II.
32. Roughly how many sites of this culture have been recorded? Recall
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(b) About 500. Every other option is a real figure from a neighbouring context — 111 is the count of identified Ahar-culture sites, 165 is Sothi-Siswal. Getting this right means knowing which number belongs to which culture.
Why not the others: (d) 800 is the only option not attached to a real reported figure, and is the one to discard first.
33. Which is the correct geographic contrast? Concept
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(c). South-eastern farmland produced villages, pottery and bulls; north-eastern ore near the Khetri belt produced a metal industry. Same period, different substrate.
Why not the others: (a) reverses the two; (b) only Ganeshwar sits on ore, near the Khetri belt; (d) neither culture is on the Ghaggar.
34. Jodhpura's excavation began in 1972-73 under — Recall
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(d). Ganeshwar's copper was documented in 1977 via the Neem Ka Thana Treasury Hoard; Singh and Petrie re-examined the site in 2013.
Why not the others: (a) Lal is Gilund; (b) Puri excavated Rairh; (c) Petrie re-examined Ganeshwar in 2013, four decades later.
Section D — Kalibangan and the Bronze Age (Q35–50)
35. "Kalibangan" means — Type B · wrong site
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(a). (b) is Tambavati/Ahar, (c) is Dhulkot/Ahar, (d) is Bijak-ki-Pahari/Bairath.
Why not the others: Every wrong option is a real meaning, of a different site's name. That is the whole design of this question.
36. Kalibangan stands on which bank of the Ghaggar? Type B · wrong site
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(b) Left. Baror is the one on the right bank.
Why not the others: (a) the right bank is Baror's, and this is the pair that gets swapped; (c) it stands on one bank; (d) the Luni is Tilwara.
37. Who identified Kalibangan as a Harappan site, and in which year? Attribution
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(c). Tessitori noticed the mound around 1917–19 without knowing what it was; Ghosh identified it as Harappan in 1952. Read whether the question asks about the survey or the identification.
Why not the others: (a) Tessitori noticed the mound around 1917–19 without knowing what it was, so he is the near-miss; (b) Lal directed the excavation from 1961, after identification; (d) Stein's Ghaggar survey is a separate episode.
38. The Kalibangan excavation ran for — Type D · two authorities
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(d). ASI's own memoirs disagree on the span — Part I says 1961-1969, Part II is titled (1960-69) — but both agree on nine seasons ending 1969, which is the safe answer.
Why not the others: (a), (b) and (c) are simply wrong counts. The difficulty in this question is not the distractors but the two ASI memoirs, which is why the safe answer is phrased by season count rather than start year.
39. Which mound is the Harappan cemetery? Recall
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(a) KLB-8. Most notes give Kalibangan three mounds; the burials come from a fourth. KLB-1 is the citadel, KLB-2 the lower city, KLB-3 the ritual mound.
Why not the others: (b) KLB-1 is the citadel, (c) KLB-2 the lower city and (d) KLB-3 the ritual mound, so all three are correct labels for the wrong mound. Notes that mention only three mounds mislead here.
40. How many fire altars are reconstructed on the citadel platform? Type D · two authorities
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(b) Seven, in the citadel (KLB-1), per ASI's memoir. Four to five is correct too — but for the separate structure east of the lower town. Both numbers are right about different places; swapping them is the trap.
Why not the others: (c) and (d) are simply wrong. (a) is the dangerous one, because it is correct about the eastern structure — the trap is the location, not the number.
41. The ploughed field at Kalibangan belongs to which level? Type A · wrong period
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(c). From KLB-1, south-east of the settlement, with a cross pattern of furrows linked to double cropping. B. B. Lal reported it in Puratattva 4 as perhaps the earliest ploughed field excavated anywhere.
Why not the others: (a) is the single most common error in this unit; (b) and (d) there is no post-Harappan or Iron Age level at Kalibangan carrying the field.
42. What ended Kalibangan's Period I around 2600 BC? Recall
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(d). Displaced (faulted) strata and subsided walls — perhaps the earliest archaeologically recorded earthquake anywhere. Period I ran to five structural phases and about 1.6 m of deposit.
Why not the others: (b) fire ended Ojiyana, not Kalibangan; (a) and (c) neither flood deposits nor destruction layers appear, the evidence being faulted strata and subsided walls.
43. Kalibangan carries several "earliest" claims. Which one rests on Skeleton 3 from KLB-8? Type B · wrong site
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(a). Skeleton 3 is a hydrocephalic child with trephination marks who did not survive the operation; the memoir calls it the earliest surgical operation in the world, mid-third millennium BC. (b) is the cross-furrow field from Period I and (c) the faulted strata that ended Period I — both real Kalibangan claims, which is what makes them proper distractors. Attribute (a) to A. K. Sharma / the ASI memoir, which carries a disclaimer giving the author's identifications primacy.
Why not the others: (d) the fire altars are real and famous, but belong to Period II structures rather than to a burial. Every option here is a genuine Kalibangan claim, which is what makes the question test attribution rather than recall.
44. Kalibangan's three burial types include two that contained — Type C · overgeneralisation
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(b). Extended inhumation; pot burial in a circular pit; and a grave-pit with only pottery and funerary objects. Two of the three had no body.
Why not the others: (a), (c) and (d) are not reported from Kalibangan's burials at all, and iron would in any case be anachronistic.
45. The six pre-Harappan fabrics (A–F) of Kalibangan Period I were first identified at — Type B · wrong site
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(c) Sothi — about 10 km south-west of Nohar, in Hanumangarh today (Bikaner in older sources). Fabrics A, B and D stand apart from the Harappan assemblage.
Why not the others: (a) the fabrics are found at Kalibangan but named for Sothi, which is the near-miss; (b) Siswal is the Haryana half of the Sothi-Siswal pair; (d) Baror was excavated four decades later.
46. Baror was excavated 2003-04 to 2006-07 under — Recall
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(d). Prabhakar directed Karanpura; Hanna Rydh led the Swedish expedition at Rangmahal.
Why not the others: (a) Lal and Thapar are Kalibangan; (b) Prabhakar directed Karanpura; (c) Rydh led the Swedish expedition at Rangmahal. Four real excavators, three of them at other sites.
47. Baror's Period I is characterised by pottery that is — Type F · sequence
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(a). Period II brings bio-chrome with an evanescent white pigment; Period III is a planned town. One mound carries the whole pre-urban to urban transition.
Why not the others: (b) bio-chrome is Period II; (c) painted and wheel-made directly contradicts "entirely unpainted"; (d) NBPW is Early Historic.
48. Tarkhanewala-Dera and Chak 86 yielded, respectively — Recall
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(b). IAR 2003-04: the contiguous sites "yielded Harappan and PGW cultural material respectively". Note the spelling Tarkhanewala, not Tarkhanwala.
Why not the others: (a) reverses the pair, and is the only wrong option worth worrying about; (c) and (d) miss the point of the IAR sentence, which is that the two contiguous sites are culturally different.
49. Karanpura sits on the dried channel of which river? Type B · wrong site
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(c). The other lost river of the region — Kalibangan and Baror are on the Ghaggar-Sarasvati. Karanpura is in Hanumangarh, about 7 km from Bhadra.
Why not the others: (a) the Ghaggar-Sarasvati is Kalibangan and Baror; (b) the Luni is Tilwara; (d) the Banas is the Ahar heartland.
50. Binjor (4MSR) is best described as — Recall
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(d). Anupgarh tehsil, Sri Ganganagar, about 4 km from the border; excavated 2014-15, 2015-16 and 2017-18. The most recently excavated Harappan site in the state.
Why not the others: (a) Binjor is village-scale, not a fortified city; (b) Mesolithic is Bagor and Tilwara; (c) Kushana material is Rangmahal and Noh.
Section E — Assertion and Reason (Q51-60)
RPSC uses this format and it punishes a habit that single-correct questions reward: reading only the first statement. Work out whether each statement is true on its own before asking whether the second explains the first.
51. A: Microliths at Bagor continue in use alongside copper, and later iron. R: The Bagor sequence shows no stratigraphic break from Phase I to Phase III. Type C · overgeneralisation
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(a) Continuity of the deposit is precisely why the tool tradition can be shown to persist rather than to be replaced. This is the chapter's central Mains argument, put as an assertion-reason.
52. A: Ganeshwar is dated to about 2500-2000 BCE on radiocarbon samples taken from the site. R: Ganeshwar's Phase I is a Mesolithic settlement entirely devoid of copper. Type E · weakly sourced
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(d) The date range is right but its basis is not: IAR 1987-88 says the chronology rests on C14 from Jodhpura. Ganeshwar has no absolute dates of its own. R is separately true.
53. A: All Ahar-culture settlements occupy river valleys. R: Ojiyana lies on a hill slope. Type C · overgeneralisation
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(d) R is the single exception that makes A false. Watch the direction: the true statement is the reason, not the assertion.
54. A: Kalibangan stands on the left bank of the Ghaggar. R: Baror stands on the right bank of the Ghaggar. Type B · wrong site
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(b) Both are true and both are worth knowing, but Baror's position explains nothing about Kalibangan's. A reason that is merely a related fact is not an explanation.
55. A: The fortified enclosure at Balathal is Chalcolithic. R: The excavators revised their own initial Iron Age attribution in the 1997 report. Type A · wrong period
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(a) The revision is the reason we can state the attribution. Note that the superseded reading is still in circulation, which is what makes the pairing worth drilling.
56. A: Bagor yields the earliest evidence of horse domestication in India. R: Bagor yields among the earliest evidence of domesticated sheep, goat and cattle in the subcontinent. Type E · weakly sourced
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(d) The horse claim is unsupported and is the highest-frequency distractor in the unit. R is true, and is the statement the horse claim displaces.
57. A: Microliths are practically absent at the site of Ahar. R: The Ahar culture as a whole made no use of microliths. Type C · overgeneralisation
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(c) A is a statement about the site; R inflates it into a statement about the culture, and Gilund's stone-blade industry falsifies it. Site-to-culture inflation is the commonest way this unit is misread.
58. A: Two of Kalibangan's three burial types contained no skeletal remains. R: The Harappans at Kalibangan practised only symbolic burial. Type C · overgeneralisation
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(c) A is correct. R is false because the third type is extended inhumation, an actual body. "Two of three" never licenses "all".
59. A: Sothi lies in Hanumangarh district. R: Sothi is about 10 km south-west of Nohar. Type B · wrong site
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(a) Nohar is in Hanumangarh, so the location genuinely explains the district. Older sources place Sothi in Bikaner, which was correct before the district was reorganised.
60. A: The ploughed field at Kalibangan is not a Mature Harappan feature. R: The field was found in the KLB-1 Early Harappan level, south-east of the settlement. Type A · wrong period
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(a) A is phrased negatively on purpose. Assertion-reason items often invert the familiar statement, and reading past the negation is how marks are lost here.
Section F — Match the following (Q61-68)
Do these by locking the one pair you are certain of, then eliminating. Every wrong code below is a real swap, not a random shuffle, so guessing from a single correct pair will not always be enough.
61. Site with find Type B · wrong site
List I — A. Gilund · B. Ojiyana · C. Balathal · D. Kalibangan (KLB-8)
List II — 1. World's oldest leprosy skeleton · 2. Over 100 seal impressions · 3. Trephined skull · 4. White-painted terracotta bulls
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(a) Option (b) swaps the bull pair, which is the swap RPSC would actually make.
62. Site with river Type B · wrong site
List I — A. Bagor · B. Tilwara · C. Kalibangan · D. Karanpura
List II — 1. Luni · 2. Chautang (Drishadvati) · 3. Kothari · 4. Ghaggar
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(a) Option (c) swaps the region's two lost rivers, and option (b) swaps Bagor's river with Tilwara's.
63. Site with present district District drift
List I — A. Didwana · B. Tilwara · C. Ganeshwar · D. Jodhpura
List II — 1. Balotra · 2. Kotputli-Behror · 3. Didwana-Kuchaman · 4. Sikar
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(a) All four districts are post-2023 answers. On the pre-2023 map this would read Nagaur, Barmer, Sikar, Jaipur, and only Sikar survives unchanged (Neem Ka Thana having been abolished in December 2024).
64. Site with excavator Attribution
List I — A. Ahar (1952) · B. Gilund (1959-60) · C. Bagor (1968-70) · D. Baror (2003-07)
List II — 1. V. N. Misra · 2. Urmila Sant and T. J. Baidya · 3. R. C. Agrawala · 4. B. B. Lal
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(a) Note the dates in List I. Sankalia is absent on purpose: he excavated Ahar in 1961-62, nine years after Agrawala began it.
65. Name with site Type B · wrong site
List I — A. Tambavati · B. Mahasati · C. Bijak-ki-Pahari · D. 4MSR
List II — 1. Bairath · 2. Binjor · 3. Ahar · 4. Bagor
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(a) Ahar carries two names, Tambavati and Dhulkot; only one is used here so the list stays one-to-one.
66. Context with pottery Type B · wrong site
List I — A. Ahar-Banas culture · B. Ganeshwar-Jodhpura culture · C. Baror Period II · D. Noh and Sunari
List II — 1. Reserve Slip Ware, carinated basin · 2. Bio-chrome with evanescent white pigment · 3. Unpainted Black-and-Red Ware · 4. White-painted Black-and-Red Ware
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(a) The A/D contrast is the one the Review keeps drawing: both are Black-and-Red Ware, and the painting is what separates them. Option (b) is built on exactly that confusion.
67. Kalibangan mound with function Recall
List I — A. KLB-1 · B. KLB-2 · C. KLB-3 · D. KLB-8
List II — 1. Lower city · 2. Cemetery · 3. Citadel · 4. Ritual mound
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(a) Summaries that give Kalibangan "three mounds" leave KLB-8 out, and with it the trephined skull and the axe-murder skeleton.
68. Chronological order Type F · sequence
List I — Arrange these from earliest to latest:
A. Kalibangan Period II (Mature Harappan) · B. Bagor Phase I · C. Kalibangan Period I (Early Harappan) · D. Bagor Phase III
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(a) Bagor Phase I begins c. 5000 BC, Kalibangan Period I runs c. 3000-2700 BCE, Period II c. 2600-1900 BCE, and Bagor Phase III comes down to AD 200. The long Bagor sequence straddles the whole Kalibangan story, which is the point of the question.
69. Budha Pushkar, the site that preserves a Stone Age climatic sequence, lies in which district? District drift
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(a) Ajmer. Pushkar is a tehsil of Ajmer and remained one through the 2023 reorganisation, even though Kekri and Beawar were carved out of that district.
Why not the others: (b) Nagaur holds Didwana, the other dune-stratigraphy site, which is exactly the confusion this question probes; (c) Bhilwara holds Ojiyana and Bagor's neighbourhood; (d) Jaisalmer was surveyed for Palaeolithic material but is not this site.
70. At Budha Pushkar, what is the significance of the mature soil lying between the last two arid phases? Concept
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(b) It records a period considerably wetter than the present. A mature soil forms only under sustained moisture, so it is the wet interval separating two dry ones. Middle and Upper Palaeolithic working floors sit on it.
Why not the others: (a) is a Didwana claim, not a Budha Pushkar one; (c) agriculture is Neolithic and Chalcolithic, far later than these floors; (d) the Lower Palaeolithic tools are in the earliest sand sheet, not in the soil.
71. Which statement about the Lower Palaeolithic tools at Budha Pushkar is correct? Type C · overgeneralisation
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(c) They are rolled, and so not in primary context. They occur in lenses of detritus within the earliest sand sheet, having been moved by water.
Why not the others: (a) inverts the contrast that makes both sites worth learning: Didwana is the primary-context site, Budha Pushkar is not; (b) no such claim is made for them; (d) the surface of the last sand sheet carries the Mesolithic floors.
72. The prehistory and palaeogeography of the Pushkar basin and the wider Thar was worked out chiefly by: Recall
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(d) Bridget Allchin and Andrew Goudie, whose Pushkar paper appeared in World Archaeology in 1974. With Karunakara Hegde they also wrote the 1978 volume on the prehistory and palaeogeography of the Great Indian Desert.
Why not the others: (a) Misra and Rajaguru are the Didwana and Singi Talav pair; (b) Lal and Thapar directed Kalibangan; (c) Sankalia and Deo excavated Ahar.
73. Chatrikhera, Jawasiya-Arni and Pachamta, excavated under the Mewar Plain Archaeological Assessment, all lie in which district? Recall
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(a) Rajsamand. The project is a collaboration of Deccan College (Pune), Rajasthan Vidyapeeth (Udaipur) and Kennesaw State University.
Why not the others: (b) Udaipur holds Ahar and Balathal, and is where one partner institution sits, which is the trap; (c) Bhilwara holds Ojiyana; (d) Chittorgarh holds Purani Marmi and Nagari.
74. Pachamta's large parallel wall structure with bins is important because it closely resembles a building already known from: Concept
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(b) Gilund. That is the whole point of the find. One such building at Gilund is an oddity that can be explained away; the same building at a second site makes it an architectural type of the Ahar culture, and so makes storage beyond the single household look normal rather than exceptional.
Why not the others: (a) Kalibangan is Harappan and has platforms and fire altars, not this; (c) Ganeshwar is a copper-working site with stone dams; (d) Balathal's signature structure is its fortified enclosure.
75. Which statement about the scale of the Ahar culture is correct? Type C · overgeneralisation
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(c) It has over 100 known sites, of which only about seven are excavated, running from about 3000 to 1700 BCE. That ratio is worth a sentence in Mains: what is said about the culture rests on a handful of digs standing in for a hundred sites.
Why not the others: (a) four is the number of sites usually taught, not the number known; (b) the culture extends into north-eastern Madhya Pradesh as well; (d) false because of Ojiyana, which sits on a hill slope.
76. Terracotta bull figurines are reported from which group of Ahar-culture sites? Type B · right fact, wrong site
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(d) Gilund, Ojiyana and Purani Marmi. Humped bulls at Gilund, white-painted bulls at Ojiyana, and bulls again at Marmi in Chittorgarh. Three sites is enough to call the bull a pattern of this culture rather than a coincidence.
Why not the others: (a) and (b) both attach bulls to Balathal, which is the single most common conflation in this unit; Balathal's signatures are the fortified enclosure and the leprosy skeleton. (c) Ganeshwar is copper, Tilwara is Mesolithic.
Flashcards — the facts most often missed
Tap to reveal. These are the ones that decide close questions.
Bagor — river and dune
Kothari (a Banas tributary); dune called Mahasati; ~25 km west of Bhilwara.
Bagor — domestication
Sheep, goat, cattle. Not the horse.
Kalibangan — the two "world firsts"
The ploughed field with cross furrows, and the earliest recorded earthquake (c. 2600 BC). Both from Period I, pre-Harappan.
Kalibangan — mounds
KLB-1 citadel (west) · KLB-2 lower city (east) · KLB-3 ritual mound · KLB-8 cemetery.
Kalibangan — fire altars
Seven on the citadel platform (reconstructed); four to five in the eastern structure; plus domestic altars inside houses.
Ganeshwar — the copper sequence
Phase I Mesolithic, no copper → Phase II copper introduced → Phase III copper is 99% of material.
Ganeshwar — the dating weakness
No absolute dates of its own. Dated from Jodhpura's C14.
The bull pair
Gilund → humped bulls. Ojiyana → white-painted bulls.
Balathal — the headline
World's oldest leprosy skeleton, c. 2500–2000 BCE. And the fortification is Chalcolithic, not Iron Age.
Ojiyana — the exception
The only Ahar-culture site on a hill slope. Ended by fire.
Districts that changed
Didwana → Didwana-Kuchaman · Tilwara/Pachpadra → Balotra · Jodhpura/Kotputli → Kotputli-Behror · Rangmahal → Hanumangarh.
Sothi-Siswal
Type-sites Sothi (Nohar, Hanumangarh) and Siswal (Hisar, Haryana), ~70 km apart on the Drishadvati; ~165 sites.
Rapid one-liners
Westernmost Mesolithic site of India?
Tilwara, on the Luni — Pachpadra tehsil, now Balotra district.
Who found Rajasthan's rock-art belt?
Om Prakash Sharma "Kukki" of Bundi — 100+ sites in the Bundi–Bhilwara–Tonk belt; ASI honorary archaeologist.
Deepest excavation in Rajasthan's history?
Bahaj, Deeg district — about 23 m, from January 2024 under Vinay Kumar Gupta.
Which site gave 100+ seal impressions?
Gilund, in the 1999–2005 Shinde–Possehl excavations.
Kalibangan museum — key dates?
Established 1985, reopened 18 May 2017, World Museum Day.
Which Ahar-culture site has the deepest deposit?
Ojiyana — about 7.5 m, single culture, three phases.
Ganeshwar's characteristic pottery shape?
The carinated basin, in Ganeshwar Reserve Slip Ware.
Which two sites are contiguous and reported together?
Tarkhanewala-Dera (Harappan) and Chak 86 (PGW).
Baror's coordinates and bank?
29°10′ N, 73°19′ E; right bank of the Ghaggar, Anupgarh tehsil, Sri Ganganagar.
What is Kalibangan's Period I pottery called, and where was it first identified?
The Sothi fabrics, A–F; first identified at Sothi. A, B and D stand apart from the Harappan assemblage.
What to do with your mistakes
- Missed a district? Read section 9 of the chapter. Districts changed in 1994, 2023 and 2024, and the books did not follow.
- Missed a number? Check whether the number is even settled. Several — Rairh's slag, Nagar's coins, the Noh Yaksha's height — are contested, and the Caution for Readers page says which.
- Missed a phase or period? Those are the highest-yield errors in the unit, because "right fact, wrong period" is the single most productive trap RPSC uses.
More in This Series
- Pre-historic Sites of Rajasthan: Palaeolithic to Bronze Age — the chapter these questions come from
- Unit Revision Test: Ancient Rajasthan — 60 mixed questions across all three chapters, with nothing in the question saying which chapter it came from
- Caution for Readers — the claims that are genuinely unsettled
Sources & Verification
Every question is derived from the parent chapter, which is sourced to ASI Memoir No. 110 (Excavations at Kalibangan, Part II), Daya Ram Sahni's Bairat and Sambhar monographs, K. N. Puri's Excavations at Rairh, Indian Archaeology — A Review for 1963-64, 1964-65, 1965-66, 1966-67, 1980-81, 1987-88, 2003-04 and 2013-14, Misra's 1973 Bagor report, the Ahar 1969 report, Prasad and Singh (2021), and Robbins et al. (PLoS ONE, 2009). Districts are resolved by point-in-polygon against the Rajasthan state GIS tehsil layer.
No PYQ is cited anywhere on this page. Question numbers here are our own, not RPSC's. Where a fact is contested, the question is written so that the defensible answer is correct — see Q38 on the excavation span and Q40 on the fire altars, both of which are two-authority cases stated as such rather than forced into a single key.
