Modern History · The Portuguese & The Dutch in India
The concept being tested: Portuguese introduction of New World crops (16th-17th centuries).
Consider the following fruits: I. Papaya II. Pineapple III. Guava How many of the above were introduced in India by the Portuguese in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries?
The Portuguese, based in Goa after 1510, plugged India into the Columbian Exchange, the global transfer of crops that followed Columbus's voyages to the Americas. Papaya, native to Mexico and Central America, pineapple, native to Brazil and Paraguay, and guava, native to Mexico and Central America, are all New World fruits with no presence in India before the sixteenth century. Portuguese traders and missionaries carried these, along with tobacco, cashew, chilli and potato, from their American colonies to Goa and onward along Indian trade routes through the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. By the seventeenth century all three had naturalised widely across the subcontinent and entered regional cuisines. Since none of the three fruits is indigenous to India and each traces its introduction to this Portuguese route, the correct count is all three.
What UPSC was testing
UPSC is testing the standard list of New World crops the Portuguese brought to India through Goa, which besides these three fruits also includes tobacco, potato, groundnut, cashew and chilli; the statement-count format here rewards knowing the full list rather than just a couple of examples.
How often this comes up
This concept has appeared 7 times in UPSC Prelims General Studies Paper I between 2015 and 2025 — in 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022 and 2025.
The option-by-option autopsy for this question — why each of the other three is wrong, and which neighbouring concept each one was built from — is in the app.