In this reasoning question on furniture demand, two statements are given about wooden furniture and its replacement by fibre or plastic furniture. Treat both statements as true and decide which of the conclusions, if any, logically follow: Statements: (I) Demand for wooden furniture has gone down in the overall market. (II) Wooden furniture has been replaced by fibre or plastic furniture. Conclusions: (I) Wooden furniture needs more maintenance and is difficult to handle. (II) Plastic furniture is termite free and can be easily handled.

Introduction / Context:
This problem involves interpreting statements about changes in market demand for furniture. Two statements describe the decline in demand for wooden furniture and its replacement by fibre or plastic furniture. You must decide whether the given reasons about maintenance and handling properties logically follow from those statements.

Given Data / Assumptions:

• Statement I: Demand for wooden furniture has gone down in an aggregate scenario.
• Statement II: Wooden furniture has been replaced by fibre or plastic furniture.
• Conclusion I: Wooden furniture needs more maintenance and is difficult to handle.
• Conclusion II: Plastic furniture is termite free and can be easily handled.
• We treat the statements as factual market observations, not as full explanations.

Concept / Approach:
The two statements talk about observed demand and substitution in the market, but they do not explicitly state the reasons behind these changes. Conclusions I and II provide specific causal explanations: higher maintenance and difficulty of handling for wooden furniture, and termite free and easy handling properties of plastic furniture. In logical reasoning questions, we can only accept such conclusions if they are clearly and directly implied by the premises.

Step-by-Step Solution:
Step 1: From the statements, we can infer that consumers are buying less wooden furniture and more fibre or plastic furniture compared to before. Step 2: However, the statements do not specify why this shift is occurring. Possible reasons could include price, fashion, supply, weight, durability, or any combination of factors. Step 3: Conclusion I asserts a specific reason: wooden furniture needs more maintenance and is difficult to handle. While this might be true in some cases, it is not mentioned in either statement and is not logically forced. Step 4: Conclusion II claims that plastic furniture is termite free and easy to handle. These are again plausible features, but the statements do not explicitly say that these properties are the reason for replacement. Step 5: Because neither conclusion is a necessary logical consequence of the given statements, we cannot accept them as following logically.

Verification / Alternative check:
Imagine an alternative cause for the trend: suppose wooden furniture has become more expensive due to higher timber costs, while plastic furniture is cheaper and more fashionable. This alone could explain the shift in demand, even if wooden furniture were easy to maintain and plastic furniture had some handling disadvantages. In this situation, both statements are still true, but neither conclusion about maintenance and termites is required. This shows that the conclusions are speculative and not logically implied.

Why Other Options Are Wrong:
Option A chooses only conclusion II, but we have no direct evidence for it in the premises. Option B claims that both conclusions follow, which adds two separate causal stories not supported by the data. Option D selects only conclusion I, again without textual backing. Option E suggests that exactly one of the two must follow, but we have seen that both can fail while the given statements remain valid.

Common Pitfalls:
A frequent error is to inject real world knowledge and personal experience, for example thinking that plastic furniture is obviously termite proof or that wooden furniture obviously needs more care, and then treating these assumptions as logically proven. Another pitfall is to confuse correlation with causation: the fact that plastic furniture demand rose while wooden furniture demand fell does not prove specific detailed reasons unless they are clearly stated.

Final Answer:
The logically correct assessment is that neither conclusion I nor conclusion II follows from the given statements.