Statements: 1. Police resorted to lathi-charge to disperse the unlawful…

In cause-and-effect statement reasoning, each statement describes a separate event, and the task is to decide which event's occurrence is the trigger (the cause) and which is the resulting reaction (the effect) -- independent of the order the statements are listed in. Where a statement's wording could be read either way, the deciding factor is which event is the more foundational, already-under-way development and which is the specific, immediate action responding to it; a statement about an organised body's collective action (a called strike, a formed movement) usually signals the more foundational development, even when its own phrasing also frames it as a reaction to prior conduct.

Here, Statement II reports that an established citizens' forum called a general strike -- an organised, large-scale action that reflects a protest movement already under way, not a strike improvised on the spot. It is the mobilisation created by that movement which forms the unlawful gathering that Statement I's police lathi-charge then set out to disperse. Read this way, the citizens' forum's protest movement (Statement II) is the more foundational, causing event, and the specific police action (Statement I) is the effect it produced -- even though Statement II's own wording ("in protest against the police atrocities") could, taken literally, suggest a strike organised only after this one incident. The accepted reading for this item follows the movement-first direction rather than the literal one.

Checking the other readings by value:

• Statement I is the cause and Statement II is its effect -- the phrase "in protest against the police atrocities" can be read literally as objecting to this specific lathi-charge, which is what makes this option look natural, but a general strike called by an established citizens' forum reflects a movement that was already organised and running, not a strike improvised in direct response to a single police action, so the intended reading treats the movement itself, not the lathi-charge, as the more foundational event.

• Both statements are independent causes -- this overlooks that Statement II's own wording links it to conduct described in Statement I's domain ("in protest against the police atrocities"), so the two statements are clearly related rather than separate, unconnected origins.

• Both statements are effects of independent causes -- this assumes two separate, unstated backstories, but since Statement II directly references conduct tied to Statement I's subject matter, one statement is explaining the other rather than each having an independent origin.

Hence, the accepted reading is that Statement II is the cause and Statement I is its effect.