UGC NET Questions (Paper – 1)

Sesavat anumana moves from a known effect to an unknown cause, as when one sees a flooded field and infers that it must have rained earlier. The conclusion concerns a prior event that explains the present state. Nyaya highlights such reasoning as a distinct type because the temporal order runs from later to earlier. Thus the inference described in the stem is sesavat anumana.

Option A:
Option A, purvavat, runs in the opposite direction from cause to future effect and does not fit cases where the cause is inferred after the effect.

Option B:
Option B is correct because sesavat literally means “like the remainder” and is used for inference where an unseen cause is posited to explain a presently experienced effect.

Option C:
Option C, samanyatodrsta, deals with general regularities not necessarily grounded in specific causal chains and so does not capture the effect-to-cause structure.

Option D:
Option D, kevalavyatireki, classifies inference by the pattern of vyapti, relying only on negative concomitance, which is a different basis of division.