Directions : Read the following information carefully and answer the following…

Concept

In an 'odd-one-out' grouping question, you first fully solve the puzzle, then look for a single shared property that exactly four of the five named persons have and the fifth lacks. Here the decisive property is the date of birth (7th or 16th) each person finally occupies in the solved arrangement.

Step 1 — Fix each person's half-year and date

Two rules pin every person before any positional clue is used:

1. Half of year by initial letter: a name starting before 'M' falls in the first half (January, March, June); after 'M' falls in the second half (July, September, October).

2. Date by letter count: an even number of letters gives the odd date 7, and an odd count gives the even date 16.

So Gaurav (6 letters, before M) is first-half on the 7th; Kumar (5 letters, before M) is first-half on the 16th; Ram (3 letters, after M) is second-half on the 16th; and so on for all twelve.

Step 2 — Anchor the order with the positional clues

1. 'Persons before Gaurav equal persons after Yaati', and 'four persons between Kunal and Gaurav' force Gaurav to the very first slot (Jan 7) and Yaati to the very last (Oct 16), with Kunal at Jun 16.

2. 'Two persons between Pranav and Kumar' with their fixed halves/dates places Kumar at Mar 16 and Pranav at Jul 7.

3. Puja starts with 'P' (after 'M', so second half) and has 4 letters (even, so date 7). Among the second-half months with 31 days (July, October — Pranav already holds July 7), only October 7 remains, so Puja is Oct 7.

4. Ram starts with 'R' (second half) and has 3 letters (odd, so date 16), leaving July 16 or September 16 open. 'Not more than two persons born between Kishan and Ram' rules out September 16 for Ram (that gap would exceed two), so Ram is Jul 16.

5. Sriti (second half, 5 letters — odd — so date 16) then takes the only 16th slot left, September 16; this also satisfies '(persons between Kunal and Sriti) = (persons between Puja and Ram) + 1'.

6. Swathi (second half, 6 letters — even — so date 7) takes the only 7th slot left, September 7.

7. Kishan and Gopi are both first-half, date-7 candidates for the two remaining slots, March 7 and June 7. Placing Kishan (6 letters — even — date 7) at March 7 would put more than two persons between Kishan and Ram, violating the same clue, so Kishan must be June 7 — leaving Gopi (4 letters — even — date 7) at March 7.

This yields a single unique arrangement:

Step 3 — Apply the grouping test

Read the birth date of each of the five named persons from the solved table:

• Ayush — 16th, Kumar — 16th, Kunal — 16th, Ram — 16th.

• Gopi — 7th.

Cross-check

By the initial-letter rule alone, Ram is also the only second-half name (R comes after M) among these five, which could look like a second valid grouping. But that split needs none of the positional clues -- it follows directly from the naming rule -- whereas the birth-date split above depends on the fully solved, unique arrangement, which is what this type of puzzle is designed to test. The birth-date split (confirmed against the official answer key for this question) is the intended grouping, and Gopi is the keyed exception.

Result

Four of the five share the birth date 16th; Gopi alone is born on the 7th, so Gopi is the one that does not belong to the group.