With reference to the scientific progress of ancient India, which of the statements given below are correct? 1) Different kind of specialized surgical instrument were in common use by 1st century AD. 2) Transplant of internal organs in the human body had begun by the beginning of 3rd century AD. 3) The concept of sine of an angle was known in 5th century AD. 4) The concept of cyclic quadrilaterals was known in 7th century AD. Select the correct answer using the codes given below:

The correct answer is C. Statements 1, 3 and 4 are right, and statement 2 is not.

• Statement 1 (correct): The Sushruta Samhita describes over 120 surgical instruments, including scalpels, forceps, probes and bone-cutting tools. Surgery was well developed in India by the early centuries AD.
• Statement 2 (wrong): Ancient Indian surgeons were skilled at rhinoplasty and skin flap grafting, but transplanting internal organs was not achieved in this period. Organ transplantation became possible only in the twentieth century.
• Statement 3 (correct): Aryabhata (499 AD) introduced ardha-jya, the half-chord, which is the sine function, and gave a table of sine values.
• Statement 4 (correct): Brahmagupta (628 AD) in the Brahmasphutasiddhanta gave the formula for the area of a cyclic quadrilateral and discussed its properties.

The core concept is the range of Indian achievements in medicine and mathematics, which falls under Art and Culture and Science and Technology. For Mains, it helps in answering questions on India's contribution to world knowledge and on the difference between traditional knowledge and modern scientific method.

Trap: Candidates often read the word transplant loosely, counting plastic surgery as organ transplant. This leads them to mark statement 2 correct and choose D.