XAT 2016 Question Paper

Which of the following options best captures the relationship similar to INSPECT : VIVISECT?

Read the following poem and answer the question that follows:

I sought a soul in the sea
And found a coral there
Beneath the foam for me
An ocean was all laid bare.
Into my heart’s night
Along a narrow way
I groped; and lo! The light,
An infinite land of day.

Which of the following would best capture the ESSENCE of the poem above?

“Assumptions are analogous to the basic ingredients in a gourment recipe. Only the final product of the recipe dictates whether the ingredients suffice………”

Which of the following is ANALOGOUS to the statement above?

The FIRST and the LAST sentences of the paragraph are numbered 1 & 6. The others, labelled as P, Q, R and S are given below:
1.Suppose I know someone, Smith.
P. One day you come to me and say: “Smith is in Cambridge.”
Q. I inquire, and find you stood at Guildhall and saw at the other end a man and said: “That was Smith.”
R. I’d say: “Listen. This isn’t sufficient evidence.”
S. I’ve heard that he has been killed in a battle in this war.
6. If we had a fair amount of evidence he was killed I would try to make you say that you’re being credulous.

Which of the following combinations is the MOST LOGICALLY ORDERED?

The FIRST and the LAST sentences of the paragraph are numbered 1 & 6. The others, labelled as P, Q, R and S are given below:
1. The word “symmetry” is used here with a special meaning, and therefore needs to be defined.
P. For instance, if we look at a vase that is left-and-right symmetrical, then turn it 180° around the vertical axis, it looks the same.
Q. When we have a picture symmetrical, one side is somehow the same as the other side.
R. When is a thing symmetrical - how can we define it?
S. Professor Hermann Weyl has given this definition of symmetry: a thing is symmetrical if one can subject it to a certain operation and it appears exactly the same after operation.
6.We shall adopt the definition of symmetry in Weyl’s more general form, and in that form we shall discuss symmetry of physical laws.

Which of the following combinations is the MOST LOGICALLY ORDERED?

In recent past, Indian football team has lost most of the matches in international football tournaments. The most successful coaches in Indian club football tournaments are from Latin American countries. In most of the Latin American countries, football is more popular sport than cricket.

From the passage above, choose the correct option:

Choose the best pronunciation of the word, Sobriquet, from the following options:

Consider the two related statements below:

Statement I: Offices and positions for the marginalized sections should be open to those with greater savings among them.
Statement II: Offices and positions must be open to everyone based on the principle of fair opportunity

Which of the following is true?

This season will pass. The Prime Minister may not win Lok Sabha elections, or she may; she may not continue as Prime Minister, or she may. The country will survive whatever the texture of politics in this decade or the next.

Which of the following, IF TRUE, will BEST reinforce the author’s view?

The subject of this book is knavery, skullduggery, cheating, betrayal, unfairness, crime, sneakiness, malingering, cutting corner, immorality, dishonesty, betrayal, graft, wickedness, and sin.

Which of the following options best captures ALL the italicized words above?

Read the following conversation:

OINOS: I can comprehend you thus far-that certain operations of what we term Nature, or the natural laws, will, under certain conditions, give rise to that which has all the appearance of creation. Shortly before the final overthrow of the earth, there were, I well remember, many very successful experiments in what some philosophers were weak enough to denominate the creation of animaculae.

AGATHOS: The cases of which you speak were, in fact, instances of the secondary creation - and of the only species of creation which has ever been, since the first word spoke into existence the first law.

Which of the following options CANNOT be DEFINITELY inferred based on the above conversation?

… there is a degree of convergence in the definition of trust which can be summarized as follows: Trust is a particular level of the subjective probability with which an agent assesses that another agent or group of agents will perform a particular action. When we say we trust someone or that someone is trustworthy, we implicitly mean that the probability that he will perform an action that is beneficial to us….

Which of the following statement BEST COMPLETES the passage above?

The meaning CLOSEST to ‘interchangeable’ in the ‘Communication as Bowling’ paragraph is:

Which of the following options is the CLOSEST to the necessary condition of communication:

The two inherent LIMITATIONS of Ping - Pong as a metaphor for communication are:

Action, interaction and transaction is CLOSEST to:

“… whether government can improve matters”. Here ‘matters’ indicates

Which of the following options CANNOT be inferred from the above passage?

Which of the following statements BEST captures the ESSENCE of the two paragraphs in the above passage?

Which of the following is DEFINITELY CORRECT according to the passage:

Which of the following is the ESSENCE of ‘The law of Causality’?

Which of the following can be best captured as ‘Identity’ and ‘Identification,?

The author would interpret Francis Bacon’s “Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed” as:

Which of the following options is DEFINITLY NOT an approximation to the complete truth?

Consider the two statements from the passage:
Statement I: The mass of an object never seems to change.
Statement II: Mass is found to increase with velocity.

Which of the following options CANNOT be concluded from the above passage?

‘Big Bang’ is a popular theory related to the origin of the universe. It states that the universe was the outcome of a big bang that released enormous energy.

Which of the following is the MOST PROBABLE inference about the big bang theory?

A consultant observing the data made the following two inferences:
Inference I: The number of Grocers per-thousand-population is the highest in North India.
Inference II: The number of Cosmetic per-thousand-population is the highest in South India.

Which of following options is DEFINITELY correct?

The average size of Food Shops in East India was twice that of Food Shops in West India. Which of the following cannot be inferred from the above data?

Bala collected the same data five years after Kamath, using the same categorization. 

Which of the following statements can DEFINITELY be concluded?

In which year were a maximum number of students offered salaries between Rs. 20 to Rs.30 lacs(both inclusive)?

Identify the years in which the annual median salary is higher by at least 60% than the average salary of the preceding year?

Identify the number of years in which the difference between the average salaries of the top 25% and the bottom 25% is more than Rs. 20 lacs:

If the average salary is computed excluding students with no offers, in how many years will the new average salary be greater than the existing median salary? Refer the table below for number of students without offers.

In the figure below, AB = AC = CD. If ADB = 20°, what is the value of BAD?

In an amusement park, a visitor gets to ride on three different rides (A, B and C) for free. On a particular day 77 opted for ride A, 55 opted for B and 50 opted for C; 25 visitors opted for both A and C, 22 opted for both A and B, while no visitor opted for both B and C. 40 visitors did not opt for ride A and B, or both. How many visited the amusement park on that day?

$\triangle$ABC and $\triangle$XYZ are equilateral triangles of 54 cm sides. All smaller triangles like $\triangle$ANM, $\triangle$OCP, $\triangle$QPX etc. are also equilateral triangles. Find the area of the shape MNOPQRM.

Akhtar plans to cover a rectangular floor of dimensions 9.5 meters and 11.5 meters using tiles. Two types of square shaped tiles are available in the market. A tile with side 1 meter costs Rs. 100 and a tile with side 0.5 meters costs Rs. 30. The tiles can be cut if required. What will be the minimum cost of covering the entire floor with tiles?

Anita, Biplove, Cheryl, Danish, Emily and Feroze compared their marks among themselves. Anita scored the highest marks, Biplove scored more than Danish. Cheryl scored more than at least two others and Emily had not scored the lowest.
Statement I: Exactly two members scored less than Cheryl.
Statement II: Emily and Feroze scored the same marks.

Which of the following statements would be sufficient to identify the one with the lowest marks?

Rani bought more apples than oranges. She sells apples at Rs. 23 apiece and makes 15% profit. She sells oranges at Rs. 10 a piece and makes 25% profit. If she gets Rs. 653 after selling all the apples and oranges, find her profit percentage.

Consider the set of numbers {1, 3, $3^{2}$, $3^{3}$,…...,$3^{100}$}. The ratio of the last number and the sum of the remaining numbers is closest to:

f is a function for which f(1)= 1 and f(x) = 2x + f(x - 1) for each natural number x$\geq$2. Find f(31)

Two numbers in the base system B are 2061$_{B}$ and 601$_{B}$. The sum of these two numbers in decimal system is 432. Find the value of 1010$_B$ in decimal system.

A water tank has M inlet pipes and N outlet pipes. An inlet pipe can fill the tank in 8 hours while an outlet pipe can empty the full tank in 12 hours. If all pipes are left open simultaneously, it takes 6 hours to fill the empty tank. What is the relationship between M and N?

Company ABC starts an educational program in collaboration with Institute XYZ. As per the agreement, ABC and XYZ will share profit in 60 : 40 ratio. The initial investment of Rs.100,000 on infrastructure is borne entirely by ABC whereas the running cost of Rs. 400 per student is borne by XYZ. If each student pays Rs. 2000 for the program find the minimum number of students required to make the program profitable, assuming ABC wants to recover its investment in the very first year and the program has no seat limits.

Study the figure below and answer the question:

Four persons walk from Point A to Point D following different routes. The one following ABCD takes 70 minutes. Another person takes 45 minutes following ABD. The third person takes 30 minutes following route ACD. The last person takes 65 minutes following route ACBD. IF all were to walk at the same speed, how long will it take to go from point B to point C?

Each day on Planet M is 10 hours, each hour 60 minutes and each minute 40 seconds. The inhabitants of Planet M use 10 hour analog clock with an hour hand, a minute hand and a second hand. If one such clock shows 3 hours 42 minutes and 20 seconds in a mirror what will be the time in Planet M exactly after 5 minutes?

a, b, c are integers, |a| ≠ |b| ≠|c| and -10 ≤ a, b, c ≤ 10. What will be the maximum possible value of [abc - (a + b + c)]?

A square piece of paper is folded three times along its diagonal to get an isosceles triangle whose equal sides are 10 cm. What is the area of the unfolded original piece of paper?

The difference between the area of the circumscribed circle and the area of the inscribed circle of an equilateral triangle is 2156 sq. cm. What is the area of the equilateral triangle?

Assume that $\pi=\frac{22}{7}$

A person standing on the ground at point A saw an object at point B on the ground at a distance of 600 meters. The object started flying towards him at an angle of 30° with the ground. The person saw the object for the second time at point C flying at 30° angle with him. At point C, the object changed direction and continued flying upwards. The person saw the object for the third time when the object was directly above him. The object was flying at a constant speed of 10 kmph.

Find the angle at which the object was flying after the person saw it for the second time. You may use additional statement(s) if required.
Statement I: After changing direction the object took 3 more minutes than it had taken before.
Statement II: After changing direction the object travelled an additional 200√3 meters.

Which of the following is the correct option?

For two positive integers a and b, if $(a + b)^{(a + b)}$ is divisible by 500, then the least possible value of a $\times$ b is:

Pradeep could either walk or drive to office. The time taken to walk to the office is 8 times the driving time. One day, his wife took the car making him walk to office. After walking 1km, he reached a temple when his wife called to say that he can now take the car. Pradeep figure that continuing to walk to the office will take as long as walking back home and then driving to the office. Calculate the distance between the temple and the office.

If a, b and c are 3 consecutive integers between -10 to +10 (both inclusive), how many integer values are possible for the expression?
$\frac{a^3+b^3+c^3+3abc}{(a+b+c)^2}$=?

In the figure below, two circular curves y and x create 60° and 90° angles with their respective centres. If the length of the bottom curve Y is 10\pi\, find the length of the other curve.

ABCD is a quadrilateral such that AD = 9 cm, BC = 13 cm and $\angle$DAB = $\angle$BCD = 90°. P and Q are two points on AB and CD respectively, such that DQ : BP = 1 : 2 and DQ is an integer. How many values can DQ take, for which the maximum possible area of the quadrilateral PBQD is 150 sq.cm?

Elon Musk is closely associated with:

Raspberry PI is a:

Which of the following films is not associated with Christopher Nolan:

Timbuktu is:

RuPay is related to:

Which Sea lies to the west of Yemen and Saudi Arabia?

In the budget Estimates of 2015-2016:

Consider the following statements:
1. Sinai is a part of Egypt.
2. Sinai is in Asia.
3. Sinai is in Africa.
4. Russian plane was downed in Sinai in November 2015.

Which of the above statements are true?

In 2015, which country was ranked number one as “as best place to do business in”?

Perumal Murugan is a(n):

In percentages terms, which Indian state has the highest forest cover?

Meghnad Saha was a famous:

Read the following statements:
1. Russia supports President Assad of Syria.
2. Saudi Arabia opposes President Assad of Syria.
3. Iran supports President Assad.
4. The United President Assad.

Which of the above statements are true:

Angus Deaton is a famous:

Which of the following is not a conglomerate?

Plasmodium Vivax causes:

Pilatus PC-7 is a(n):

Which of the following commodity is not rightly matched with its country, if ‘right match’ is considered as one of the top five producers of that commodity?

Which of the following countries has the lowest External Debt?

Which of the following city is not related to the automobile industry?

Which of the following is the closest country to Antarctica?

The “New Horizon” was in news in 2015. It refers to:

The Island that are under dispute of ownership between Japan and China are:

The Inuit Paradox:

Takata Corporation was in the news recently because it:

The following facts were observed by an analytics team hired by the government to study the extant situation.
1. There was a four-fold increase in the number of researchers leaving the organization in 2014.
2. A researcher died while on duty.
3. The quality of articles published declined substantially.
4. The average number of people accessing an article decreased by 2%.

Which of the following options would justify the government’s intention to DISCONTINUE the scheme?

The director still wanted to persuade the government to review its stand. He had framed the following arguments:
1. Most famous researchers in the world are also the highest paid.
2. American institute of research gives extra benefits to its scientists.
3. This year’s highest paid researcher had won the Noble Prize last year.
Considering the Government to be reasonable which of the following options is UNLIKELY to convince the Government?

The director wanted to promote good decision making at Indian Institute of Research. A few trusted colleagues offered the following suggestions:
1. Auditors need not be allowed to object to extra benefits schemes.
2. Auditors need not pin-point sudden increase in expenditure.
3. Auditors need not be consulted before taking any policy level decision.

Which of the following combination of options should the director agree THE MOST with?

The following day Kamal, being the most competent hairdresser on the street, was contemplating charging higher than agreed upon price.

Which of the following would enable him to charge more with minimal violation of the agreement?

Vimal relies heavily on a bunch of loyal customers. He is concerned about retaining them.

Which of the following options should he choose if he does not want to violate the agreement?

The Mayor wants the owners and drivers to care about comfort.
Which of the following decisions, IF TAKEN, is MOST LIKELY to increase the comfort levels of passengers?

The mayor wants to involve the car owners in finding a solution to the problem of comfort and safety. He is concerned that the customers may not be willing to pay more for safety.

Which of the options below is MOST LIKELY to convince the owners?

After the elections, Ghosh requested Chatterjee to sanction the land adjoining his factory, for expansion. However, the requested government land was a green belt reducing harmful pollution from the factory.

Which of the following is the BEST option for Chatterjee in these circumstances?

Inspired by Bhowmick’s manifesto, Chatterjee is contemplating a green policy which can adversely affect Ghosh’s business interest.

Which of the following actions from Ghosh is likely to convince Chatterjee NOT to pursue this policy?

Amelia is disappointed with the performance of Nicky, Manoj and Benita. She came to know that ABC was not their first choice and they had spent the first ten months applying to other organizations. However, they have now started liking ABC and promised to do their best henceforth. Amelia has to rate their annual performance and decide about their future. She has the following choices:
1. Fire them from ABC for insincerity and save the organization’s time and money.
2. Given them average ratings with a year to prove their worth and fire them from ABC if they fail to show significant progress.
3. Impose a pay-cut of 15% since they have not delivered on the promise, but give them relatively high ratings.
4. Given them relatively poor ratings with one year time to improve and fire them from ABC if they fail to show significant progress.
5. Give them high ratings and give them a second chance to prove their worth.

Which of the following options rank the above choices in the order of MOST APPROPRIATE to LEAST APPROPRIATE?

Recruiting Nicky, Manoj and Benita was part of a larger initiative to make the organization attractive to prospective employees. Recently Amelia’s boss informally told her that the trio’s perception of the organization might influence future recruitment from top B-schools. However, the trio had already expressed their unhappiness about the organization to Amelia. She suspected that her promotion due next year might depend on the trio!

Which of the following is the BEST way for Amelia to deal with this situation?

Nicky’s performance on the job is disappointing though she is considered a very helpful person outside the workplace helping her teammates and others in the organization with their personal needs e.g. finding a place to rent, a good place to get homely food etc. On the other hand, Manoj and Benita are performing well in their respective jobs and are perceived by their teammates as important to the team. But they are not interested in helping outside the workplace. Amelia has to decide the future of the trio. She has the following options:
1. Inform the higher authorities about Nicky’s poor performance and ask them to take a call.
2. Send Nicky for a one month training earmarked for top performing employees.
3. Serve Nicky an ultimatum to improve within the next six months or get fired.
4. Even though they performed well, give Manoj and Benita average ratings because of their disinterest in helping outside workplace.
5. Give Manoj and Benita high ratings based on their performance.

Which of the following combination of above options will be the MOST APPROPRIATE?

Rajan Shekhawat, the CEO of the company, feared this incident might affect the company’s image among consumers. Rajan had the following options:
1. Apologizing publicly for this inconvenience and immediately withdrawing the products from all stores.
2. Communicate ‘the correct findings’ to the public.
3. Hire a reputed independent testing agency to verify the claims of the report.
4. Establish internal mechanisms to prevent repetition of such incidences in future.
5. Give higher incentives to distributors and retailers for selling the company brands.

Which of the following would be the MOST APPROPRIATE ORDER of options for Rajan, starting from the immediate?

Mukesh Routray, a shopkeeper in a remote village was surprised to read in the newspaper, his only source of information, about harmful chemicals in Crunchy Chips. He had stocked a large quantity of Crunchy Chips for the forthcoming festive season. He also realized that people in his village are completely unaware of this controversy. He had the following options:
1. Sell the entire stock at a discount before the news spreads.
2. Destroy the entire stock and advise customers not to buy this product from other shops as well.
3. Donate the entire stock of Crunchy Chips to a local orphanage.
4. Inform customers about the controversy but understate its seriousness.
5. Ignore the news and sell the stock at the forthcoming festive season as planned.
6. Explore the veracity of the report and then take decision

If arranged from ethical to unethical which of the following is DEFINITELY the WRONG order?

An independent and trustworthy confidante of Rajan Shekhawat, the CEO of the company, informed him that one of their main competitors had bribed the food testing agency to manipulate the report.

Which of the following actions will BEST help Crunchy Chips to bounce back?

Purushottam sends a batch of sweets to the police station across the street every day. Ratan construed it as a bribe and wanted to stop this practice.

Which of the following arguments, IF TRUE, would BEST convince Ratan NOT to given up this practice?

Purushottam’s eldest son discovered that the shop repackaged sweets that were close to expiry and sold them at a discount under different names. These sweets usually get sold very fast. But his son was concerned about the possible consequences of this practice. Purushottam was thinking of the following arguments to convince his son.

1. These sweets are consumed the same day and therefore there is no cause for worry.
2. Reduced prices give enough indication about the sweets to the customers.
3. These products are preferred by those who cannot afford full price and in a way, this is a service done to them.
4. In the past 30 years not a single person has reported ill because of consumption of these sweets.
5. Repacking and selling sweets is a common practice.

Which combination of arguments below is MOST LIKELY to convince Ratan?

Purushottam’s younger son Pramod discovered that 10% of their customers whom Purushottam called privileged customers purchased sweets at prices fixed 10 years ago (which is significantly lower than the current prices). Purushottam told him, “This 10% are my core and loyal customers with whom I have personal connect and therefore they deserve this privilege”. Pramod refuted his father’s argument citing the following Information.

1. These customers are from the top 20% of the income bracket of the city.
2. These customers frequently purchase from other sweetshops at market prices.
3. None of them recognises and greets Purushottam at the shop or at anywhere else.
4. None of them was present at Pramod’s marriage.
5. These customers actually buy sweets at Puru and sons for others not part of the core and loyal customer group.

Which of the following combination of the above will MOST LIKELY convince Purushottam to charge market price to all?

Identify the project(s) where NONE of the 6 persons will be ‘satisfied’.

Identify the project(s), where AT LEAST 3 of the persons will be ‘satisfied’.

The marketing managers of all the six projects have agreed to add a recreation club and a car parking facility to the projects. In this changed scenario identify projects where AT MOST 2 of the 6 persons will NOT be ‘satisfied’.

Which of the following would DEFINITELY be a part of the ideal schedule?

Which of the following schedules would maximize her annual profit while minimizing the costs, if Geetha decides NOT to repeat a crop in a calendar year?