In each question below is given a statement followed by two conclusions…

Concept: In statement-and-conclusion questions, a conclusion "follows" when the ordinary, most direct reading of the statement's own wording already establishes it — without adding any assumption about rate of change, probability, or future events. A conclusion that needs such an assumption does not follow, however plausible it may sound.

Application: The statement says the company has moved India "from a position of shortage to self-sufficiency in the metal." On the ordinary, most direct reading, "a position of shortage" means domestic production could not meet domestic demand, and such a gap is ordinarily covered by sourcing the metal from outside, i.e., by importing it. The claim that India previously had to import aluminium is simply this natural restatement — it needs no further assumption about rate or future events, so it follows beyond reasonable doubt.

Cross-check — testing each answer option against this standard:

• The claim that the country "can soon become a foreign exchange earner" additionally assumes a specific pace of improvement ("with this speed") and a future export outcome. The statement confirms only present-day self-sufficiency — it says nothing about the rate of progress or about producing a surplus for export. An assumption about pace and an unstated future event are exactly what the "beyond reasonable doubt" standard rules out, so this claim does not follow.

• An "either/or" reading is reserved for two conclusions that are genuine complementary alternatives — i.e., they are two mutually exclusive outcomes of the same variable, so that exactly one of them must be true. The import-history claim (about the country's past trade dependence) and the future-export claim (about pace of growth) are about two different matters entirely; they are not two sides of the same question, so pairing them as "either/or" alternatives misapplies that rule regardless of which one is individually certain.

• Treating both conclusions as failing to follow would mean dismissing the import-history claim as an extra assumption — but on the ordinary reading it isn't one. It only restates what "a position of shortage" already establishes about the country's earlier dependence on an outside source, so at least one of the two conclusions does follow.

Result: Only the import-history conclusion is a certain, assumption-free implication of the statement; the future-export conclusion is an unsupported prediction. So only conclusion I follows.