The Prime Minister considered the Bill
2012
The Prime Minister considered the Bill
Answer: B. as an instrument for improving Government-citizen interface resulting in a friendly, caring and effective Government — Concept: In a passage-based detail question, the answer is the description the speaker himself affirms about the subject, not a phrase that merely occurs…
- A.
to provide power to the civil servants
- B.
as an instrument for improving Government-citizen interface resulting in a friendly, caring and effective Government
- C.
a draconian law against the officials
- D.
to check the harassment of the people
Show answer & explanation
Correct answer: B
Concept: In a passage-based detail question, the answer is the description the speaker himself affirms about the subject, not a phrase that merely occurs nearby. When a quoted sentence is built on the frame “not as X, but as Y”, X is the reading the speaker sets aside and Y is the reading he endorses. Attribution matters equally: a phrase spoken by one voice in the passage cannot be transferred to another voice or to a different subject.
Application: The passage quotes the Prime Minister's address in the Lok Sabha on the Right to Information Bill. He asks that everyone, particularly civil servants, see the Bill “not as a draconian law for paralyzing Government, but as an instrument for improving Government-Citizen interface resulting in a friendly, caring and effective Government functioning for the good of our People.” The clause introduced by “but as” carries what he holds the Bill to be. So the Prime Minister considered the Bill as an instrument for improving the Government-citizen interface, resulting in a friendly, caring and effective Government.
Cross-check: Cross-check the wording that the other descriptions rest on:
“A draconian law” sits in the rejected half of the very same sentence, where it continues “for paralyzing Government” — the Government, not the officials, is the object named there.
“Power that knowledge gives” belongs to James Madison's opening remark about “a people who mean to be their own governors”; the passage brings in civil servants only as the group asked to read the Bill in a positive spirit.
What the public is said to have faced is denial of access to information under the Official Secrets Act, 1923 — “a convenient smokescreen” — and the remedy the passage names is openness, participation in decision-making and public accountability.
Reading the quoted sentence by its “not as … but as …” structure therefore fixes the description as: an instrument for improving Government-citizen interface resulting in a friendly, caring and effective Government.