UGAT Bangalore 2025 · Actual Paper

Read the following passage and answer the question.

In an epoch intoxicated by its own technological omnipotence, humanity has transformed health into a quantifiable pursuit - fitness metrics, calorie counters, heart-rate monitors, and serotonin graphs. The ancient art of healing has been supplanted by the commerce of treatment; hospitals resemble corporations, and the physician, once a custodian of empathy, now negotiates uneasily between profit and protocol. Longevity has become the new paradigm. In chasing endless life, we seem to have forgotten how to live.

Dr. Ira Sen, an eminent neuroscientist renowned for her pioneering work on cognitive architecture, abandoned her illustrious career after discerning a paradox science could not address — that despair has no neural coordinates and health and wellness cannot be manufactured through chemistry or machine learning. She withdrew to a secluded Himalayan valley where medicine was whispered through silence, ritual, and communion with the natural world. There she discovered that recovery was not an act of conquest but of reconciliation — a restoration of resonance between the self and its environment.

Years later, as societies convulsed under an epidemic of psychic exhaustion — a collective weariness untouched by pharmacology — governments began legislating tranquility, prescribing mindfulness as if serenity could be decreed by law. The irony was tragic: compassion turned into a compliance form, and empathy became a performance metric on corporate dashboards.

In her final treatise, The Anatomy of Wholeness, Dr. Sen argued that civilization's deepest pathology was ideological — the delusion that health could exist apart from harmony. Her words, dismissed once as metaphysical indulgence, later ignited a quiet revolution in medical ethics.

Read the following passage and answer the question.

Vision impairment continues to disproportionately affect women and girls, revealing a persistent and deeply entrenched gender disparity in global health outcomes. Preventing avoidable blindness is therefore not merely a medical imperative but a crucial socio-developmental strategy that contributes directly to the reduction of gender inequalities and the broader attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals.

Current global estimates indicate that more than half of all blind adults are women, while a significant majority of blind children are girls. This imbalance is often rooted in traditional gender roles that expose women to greater health risks. Activities such as cleaning, caregiving and the collection of water frequently situate women in environments where they encounter vision-impairing pathogens. Additionally, these responsibilities severely restrict their time and mobility, resulting in delayed or entirely neglected eye health interventions.

Vision loss among women tends to intensify existing social inequities. It can curtail access to education, diminish employment prospects, and, in some contexts, lead to social marginalisation. Such circumstances increase women's dependence on male relatives and substantially reduce their autonomy and decision-making power within the household and the community. Conversely, improved eye health has a demonstrable ripple effect. When women are enabled to make informed choices about their own health, they positively influence the well-being of their families and contribute to enhanced community resilience.

In many regions, community health workers trained by Operation Eyesight's partner institutions are women. Their participation in these roles positions them as trusted community leaders and agents of transformative change. Employment in health services not only strengthens their economic independence but also elevates their status within their families, promoting greater socioeconomic stability.

Operation Eyesight continues to pursue gender transformative strategies by engaging directly with communities to identify barriers faced by women, expanding training opportunities and fostering a more inclusive health workforce. This approach ensures that even the most vulnerable populations receive equitable access to essential eye care services.