Correct Answer: (c) Yamuna
Explanation: Yamuna is highly polluted, especially between Delhi and Etawah, due to the massive discharge of untreated industrial effluents and domestic sewage.

Correct Answer: (b) Diarrhoea
Explanation: Waterborne diseases like diarrhoea, cholera, and hepatitis are caused by consuming contaminated water. Respiratory diseases are linked to air pollution.

Correct Answer: (d) Air pollution
Explanation: Gases like Sulphur Dioxide (SO2) and Nitrogen Oxides (NOx) released from factories mix with atmospheric moisture to form acid rain.

Correct Answer: (a) Migration
Explanation: Push factors (unemployment, poverty in villages) and Pull factors (better jobs, education in cities) drive people to migrate.

Answer: Pollution is the negative alteration of the environment caused by human activities, whereas pollutants are the actual harmful substances or agents (like toxic gases, plastic, chemicals) that cause this pollution.

Answer: The major sources of air pollution include the combustion of fossil fuels (coal, petrol, diesel) in industries, thermal power plants, and automobiles. Solid waste disposal and mining activities also release harmful particulate matter into the air.

Answer: Urban waste disposal faces problems like the lack of proper dumping sites, unsegregated garbage, overflowing landfills, and untreated toxic industrial waste mixing with general municipal waste, leading to severe health and environmental hazards.

Answer: Large-scale rural-urban migration leads to overcrowding in cities, the growth of slums, severe strain on urban infrastructure (water, electricity), and an increase in environmental pollution.

Answer: Water pollution in India is a severe crisis affecting both surface water (rivers, lakes) and groundwater.

• Domestic Waste: Rapid urbanization means untreated domestic sewage is dumped directly into rivers.
• Industrial Waste: Industries like leather tanning, chemical plants, and paper mills discharge highly toxic effluents containing heavy metals into water bodies. Rivers like Ganga and Yamuna are the worst affected.
• Agricultural Run-off: The heavy use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides in farming washes into rivers during rains, causing eutrophication.
• Cultural Activities: Immersion of painted idols and religious offerings further chokes the rivers. The consequence is a massive rise in waterborne diseases like cholera, jaundice, and diarrhoea, which account for almost one-fourth of communicable diseases in India.

Answer: Slums are environmentally degraded, overcrowded, and unregulated residential areas that crop up due to rapid rural-to-urban migration. People forced by poverty move to cities but cannot afford proper housing.

• Poor Living Conditions: Slums lack basic amenities like clean drinking water, proper sanitation, drainage, and electricity.
• Health Hazards: Because of open drains and garbage heaps, these areas become breeding grounds for diseases.
• Socio-Economic Issues: Residents mostly work in the unorganized sector with low, unstable wages. This poverty often leads to social problems like crime, drug abuse, and vandalism.

A prime example is Dharavi in Mumbai, one of Asia's largest slums, which highlights the stark inequality in Indian metropolitan cities.

Answer: Land degradation means the decline in the productive capacity of the soil. To reduce it, we need an integrated approach:

• Afforestation: Planting more trees binds the soil and prevents both wind and water erosion.
• Sustainable Agriculture: Discouraging excessive irrigation (which causes waterlogging and salinity) and minimizing the use of chemical fertilizers by promoting organic farming.
• Regulated Grazing: Overgrazing strips the land of its protective vegetation cover. Pasture lands must be managed properly.
• Treatment of Industrial Waste: Toxic effluents must be chemically treated before being discharged onto open land to prevent soil toxicity.
• Watershed Management: Implementing schemes that focus on soil and water conservation to restore degraded ecological balances.

Correct Answer: (c) Solar panels
Explanation: Solar energy generation is silent and environmentally friendly.

Correct Answer: (c) Mumbai

Correct Answer: (c) Water pollution

Correct Answer: (b) Urban heat island

Answer: Yamuna in Delhi is highly polluted because the city discharges millions of liters of untreated domestic sewage into it daily. Add to this the toxic industrial effluents from nearby factories and the dumping of solid municipal waste directly on its banks.

Answer:
1. Health issues: It causes severe respiratory diseases like asthma, bronchitis, and lung cancer.
2. Environmental damage: It leads to acid rain, which destroys crops, forests, and historical monuments.
3. Smog: It creates dense smog in cities (like Delhi during winters), heavily reducing visibility and causing accidents.

Answer: Urban sprawl refers to the rapid and often unplanned expansion of a city's geographic footprint into its surrounding areas. Yeh agricultural land ko destroy karta hai kyunki fertile farming land ko housing complexes, industries, and roads banane ke liye use kar liya jata hai.

Answer:

• Push Factors: Reasons that force people to leave their homes (e.g., poverty, lack of jobs, natural disasters in villages).
• Pull Factors: Reasons that attract people to a new place (e.g., better job opportunities, good education, medical facilities in cities).

Answer: Solid waste management is a nightmare in big cities due to overpopulation and changing consumption patterns.

• Huge Volume: Mega cities generate thousands of tonnes of garbage daily.
• Lack of Segregation: Biodegradable waste is mixed with toxic e-waste and plastics, making recycling impossible.
• Overflowing Landfills: Cities are running out of space to dump waste. Open dumping leads to toxic leachate seeping into groundwater.
• Health Hazards: Rotting garbage breeds flies and rats, spreading diseases like typhoid, malaria, and dengue.
• Solution: Strict segregation at the source, adopting the 3Rs (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle), and setting up waste-to-energy plants are urgently needed.

Answer:

• Positive Impacts: It provides a cheap labor force for urban industries. The migrants send remittances back home, which boosts the rural economy and helps in poverty alleviation. It also leads to the breaking down of rigid caste barriers present in villages.
• Negative Impacts: It puts massive pressure on urban infrastructure (housing, water, transport), leading to the mushrooming of slums. It causes environmental degradation in cities. Meanwhile, villages face a "brain drain" and a shortage of able-bodied youth for agriculture.

Answer: Green Revolution techniques increased crop yields but heavily degraded the land:

1. Over-irrigation: In states like Punjab and Haryana, excessive irrigation has caused waterlogging. Water brings underground salts to the surface, causing soil salinity and alkalinity.
2. Chemical Fertilizers: Excessive use of chemical fertilizers kills beneficial soil microorganisms, reducing the natural fertility of the soil.
3. Pesticides: Toxic chemicals used to kill pests accumulate in the soil, making it poisonous over time.
4. Monoculture: Growing the same crop repeatedly drains specific nutrients from the soil, leaving it barren.

Answer: The major components are dust, fumes, gases, fog, odour, smoke, and vapour.

Answer: The combustion of various fuels releases a high volume of toxic gases (like CO, SO2) into the atmosphere, which significantly increases air pollution and harms both living organisms and property.

Answer: (a) Both A and R are true, and R is the correct explanation of A.

Answer: (d) A is false, but R is true. (Assertion is false because noise pollution does have severe health impacts like anxiety and hearing loss).