Books & Authors Mixed Quiz: Set 3

The correct answer is A, Jyotirao Phule. Phule wrote Gulamgiri, meaning slavery, in Marathi in 1873, and dedicated it to the people of America who had fought to free slaves, drawing a line between their struggle and the condition of the lower castes in India. In it he argued that the upper castes had no right to their land or power, and he used the idea of a golden age before the coming of the Aryans. Phule and his wife Savitribai opened a school for girls in Pune in 1848, and he founded the Satyashodhak Samaj in 1873. B is wrong because Ambedkar's well known writings are Annihilation of Caste, Who Were the Shudras and The Buddha and His Dhamma. C is wrong because E. V. Ramaswamy, called Periyar, led the Self Respect Movement and wrote in Tamil. D is wrong because Narayana Guru of Kerala gave the call of one caste, one religion and one God for man. Exam tip: Phule, Gulamgiri and Satyashodhak Samaj, both 1873.

The correct answer is C, 1975–1977. The book takes its title from the Emergency, which ran from 1975 to 1977, and recalls those years through the author's own experience of them. The Emergency was proclaimed on 25 June 1975 under Article 352 on the ground of internal disturbance, on the advice of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, and was revoked on 21 March 1977. During it elections were postponed, the press was censored and many opposition leaders were jailed. A is wrong because 1962–1965 covers the war with China and the war with Pakistan, not the Emergency. B is wrong because 1989–1991 is the period of coalition governments and the Mandal agitation. D is wrong because 1969–1971 saw the split in the Congress, bank nationalisation and the Bangladesh war. Exam tip: Emergency declared 25 June 1975, lifted 21 March 1977; the 44th Amendment of 1978 replaced 'internal disturbance' with 'armed rebellion'.

The correct answer is B, Jawaharlal Nehru. He wrote it in 1944 while imprisoned in Ahmadnagar Fort, tracing Indian history and thought from the earliest times. Its Hindi version is Bharat Ki Khoj and the television series Bharat Ek Khoj was based on it.

Option A, Dr. Rajendra Prasad, wrote India Divided in 1946, Satyagraha in Champaran and the Hindi autobiography Atmakatha, and because he and Nehru wrote in the same years he is the distractor used most often here. Option C, Dr. S. Radhakrishnan, wrote on philosophy, including Indian Philosophy and The Hindu View of Life, not on history. Option D, Sardar Patel, left speeches and letters rather than a book of this kind. Remember that all three of Nehru's famous titles, An Autobiography, Glimpses of World History and The Discovery of India, were written in prison.

The correct answer is C, Ocean Vuong. The Emperor of Gladness, released in May 2025, is a novel by the Vietnamese-American writer and poet Ocean Vuong. Vuong was born near Saigon in 1988 and came to the United States as a child refugee. He first drew notice for the poetry collection Night Sky with Exit Wounds and then for the novel On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, and he has held a MacArthur Fellowship; migration, memory and working-class life run through all his writing. A is wrong because Colum McCann is an Irish novelist, best known for Let the Great World Spin. B is wrong because Sharon Lee is an American science-fiction writer and not the author of this novel. D is wrong because Charlotte McConaghy is an Australian novelist, known for Migrations. Exam tip: Ocean Vuong - Night Sky with Exit Wounds, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous and The Emperor of Gladness in 2025.

The correct answer is B, Mahatma Gandhi. The Story of My Experiments with Truth is the autobiography of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, written originally in Gujarati and later translated into English. It covers his childhood, his years as a student in London, his work in South Africa and the shaping of his ideas on truth and non violence, and it stops well before the final phase of the national movement.

Option A, Jawaharlal Nehru, wrote An Autobiography, published in Britain as Toward Freedom, besides The Discovery of India and Glimpses of World History. Option C, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, wrote India Wins Freedom, an account of the last years before independence and of partition. Option D, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, did not write an autobiography; his letters and speeches were published in collected volumes by others after his death.

The correct answer is C, Tennis. 'Ace Against Odds' is the autobiography of Sania Mirza, India's most successful woman tennis player, published in 2016 and written with her father Imran Mirza and Shivani Gupta. The title plays on 'ace', a serve the opponent cannot touch. Sania became the first Indian woman to win a WTA singles title, at Hyderabad in 2005, and went on to win six Grand Slam doubles titles, three in women's doubles with Martina Hingis and three in mixed doubles, and to become world number one in doubles in 2015. She received the Arjuna Award in 2004, the Khel Ratna in 2015 and the Padma Bhushan in 2016. A is wrong because the best-known shooting autobiography is Abhinav Bindra's 'A Shot at History'. B is wrong because badminton star Saina Nehwal's book is 'Playing to Win'. D is wrong because cricket autobiographies include Sachin Tendulkar's 'Playing It My Way'. Exam tip: Ace Against Odds = Sania Mirza (tennis); A Shot at History = Abhinav Bindra (shooting); Playing It My Way = Sachin Tendulkar (cricket).

The correct answer is B, Kapil Dev. Straight from the Heart is the autobiography of Kapil Dev, the fast bowler who captained India to its first World Cup win in 1983 at Lord's. The book came out in 2004 and describes his rise from Chandigarh, the 175 not out against Zimbabwe at Tunbridge Wells and his years as captain and coach. Kapil Dev was the first bowler to take 400 wickets in Test cricket and was named Indian Cricketer of the Century by Wisden in 2002. Option A is wrong because Sachin Tendulkar wrote Playing It My Way. Option C is wrong because M.S. Dhoni has not written an autobiography; his life was told in a film and in books by other authors. Option D is wrong because Sourav Ganguly wrote A Century Is Not Enough. Exam tip: Straight from the Heart is Kapil Dev, Playing It My Way is Sachin Tendulkar, A Century Is Not Enough is Sourav Ganguly.

The correct answer is B, Arundhati Roy. 'Mother Mary Comes to Me' is Arundhati Roy's memoir, published in September 2025, and it is built around her difficult, loving bond with her mother Mary Roy. Mary Roy was a teacher who founded a school in Kerala and won the 1986 Supreme Court case that gave Syrian Christian women an equal share in family property. Arundhati Roy herself won the Booker Prize in 1997 for her first novel, 'The God of Small Things', and later wrote 'The Ministry of Utmost Happiness' along with many essays. A is wrong because Jhumpa Lahiri is known for 'Interpreter of Maladies', which won the Pulitzer Prize, and 'The Namesake'. C is wrong because Vikram Seth wrote 'A Suitable Boy' and 'The Golden Gate'. D is wrong because Chetan Bhagat writes popular novels such as 'Five Point Someone' and 'Half Girlfriend'. Exam tip: Arundhati Roy — 'The God of Small Things', Booker Prize 1997.

The correct answer is A, Shashi Tharoor. Kerala: God's Own Country is an illustrated book on the land, people and culture of Kerala, written by Shashi Tharoor with photographs by M.F. Husain and brought out in 2009. Tharoor, a former Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations and later a Member of Parliament from Thiruvananthapuram, has written many other books, among them The Great Indian Novel, India: From Midnight to the Millennium, An Era of Darkness and Why I Am a Hindu. 'God's Own Country' is also the tourism tagline of Kerala. Option B is wrong because Jeet Thayil is a poet and novelist known for Narcopolis, which reached the Booker shortlist in 2012. Option C is wrong because Sudha Murthy writes fiction and essays such as Wise and Otherwise, Dollar Bahu and Three Thousand Stitches. Option D is wrong because Thakazhi Sivasankara Pillai was a Malayalam novelist who wrote Chemmeen and won the Jnanpith Award in 1984. Exam tip: Tharoor - The Great Indian Novel; Thakazhi - Chemmeen; Thayil - Narcopolis.

The correct answer is A, Jawaharlal Nehru. He wrote The Discovery of India during his imprisonment at Ahmednagar Fort, and the book traces Indian history, thought and civilisation from the earliest times to the national movement of his own day.

Option B, Subhas Chandra Bose, wrote The Indian Struggle, his own account of the freedom movement, which is the title most often placed beside Nehru's in these questions. Option C, Sarojini Naidu, is remembered for her poetry, The Golden Threshold, The Bird of Time and The Broken Wing, rather than for prose on history. Option D, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, wrote Gita Rahasya and The Arctic Home in the Vedas. Since Nehru wrote several well-known books, it helps to hold the three together: The Discovery of India, Glimpses of World History and his autobiography.

The correct answer is C, Dr. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam. Wings of Fire, written with Arun Tiwari, describes his boyhood in Rameswaram, his training as an engineer and his years in the space and missile programmes, and it is the most frequently asked title in this whole chapter.

Option A, Dr. Zakir Husain, was an educationist whose known work is The Dynamic University. Option B, K. R. Narayanan, is remembered for collections of speeches and essays such as Images and Insights rather than for an autobiography. Option D, Pranab Mukherjee, wrote a political memoir in three volumes, The Dramatic Decade, The Turbulent Years and The Coalition Years, and it is these that examiners set against Kalam's books. Kalam's other titles worth carrying are India 2020, written with Y. S. Rajan, Ignited Minds, Turning Points and My Journey.

The correct answer is A, Banabhatta, the court poet of Harshavardhana. The Harshacharita is a biography of his patron and one of the earliest historical biographies written in Sanskrit, while Kadambari is a romance in ornate prose and is often described as one of the first novels in any Indian language.

Option B, Bilhana, wrote Vikramankadevacharita in praise of the Chalukya king Vikramaditya VI, so he too was a court biographer but of a different dynasty. Option C, Dandin, wrote Dashakumaracharita, the tale of ten princes, and the work on poetics called Kavyadarsha. Option D, Bhasa, is an earlier dramatist remembered for Swapnavasavadatta. A useful extra fact for this question is that Harshavardhana was himself an author and wrote the plays Ratnavali, Nagananda and Priyadarshika, so the king and his poet are both examinable.

The correct answer is A, Arun Tiwari. Wings of Fire was written by A. P. J. Abdul Kalam with Arun Tiwari, a scientist who had worked under Kalam in the missile programme. The book describes Kalam's boyhood at Rameswaram, his training as an aeronautical engineer and his years with the space and defence establishments.

Option B, Y. S. Rajan, did collaborate with Kalam but on a different book, India 2020: A Vision for the New Millennium, so he is the most plausible distractor in the set. Option C, Sanjaya Baru, wrote The Accidental Prime Minister about his years as media adviser to Manmohan Singh and has no connection with Kalam's books. Option D, Robert Kanigel, is the American writer who wrote The Man Who Knew Infinity, the biography of Srinivasa Ramanujan.

The correct answer is C, Tim Wigmore. Test Cricket: A History, published in 2025, was written by the English cricket writer and journalist Tim Wigmore. The book follows the game's longest format from the first Test between England and Australia at Melbourne in March 1877 down to the present day, covering how Test cricket spread across countries, how it changed from era to era, and the pressure it now faces from the shorter formats. Wigmore also co-wrote Cricket 2.0, a study of Twenty20 cricket that was named Wisden Book of the Year. A is wrong because Michael Atherton, the former England captain, writes widely on cricket but not this book. B is wrong because Gideon Haigh is an Australian cricket historian with many other titles to his name. D is wrong because Ramachandra Guha wrote A Corner of a Foreign Field and other works on Indian cricket and history. Exam tip: Tim Wigmore - Test Cricket: A History in 2025 and Cricket 2.0 on Twenty20 cricket.

The correct answer is A, P. V. Narasimha Rao. The Insider is a novel that follows a politician's climb through state and national politics, and it is read as a lightly disguised account of the system its author knew from the inside. He was a scholar of several languages and also wrote on the Ayodhya question.

Option B, I. K. Gujral, wrote an autobiography, Matters of Discretion, which is a memoir and not fiction. Option C, Morarji Desai, wrote the autobiography The Story of My Life, again a work of recollection. Option D, Chandra Shekhar, left no book that examiners ask about. The fact to hold is a simple one: Narasimha Rao is the only Prime Minister of India to have published a novel, so any question mentioning fiction and the office of Prime Minister points to him.

The correct answer is A, Penguin Random House India. Arundhati Roy's memoir 'Mother Mary Comes to Me' was brought out in India in September 2025 by Penguin Random House India, under its literary imprint Hamish Hamilton. The book is a portrait of the author's mother, Mary Roy, the educationist who founded a school in Kerala and won the 1986 Supreme Court case on the inheritance rights of Syrian Christian women. Penguin Random House is the largest trade publisher in the world and its Indian arm publishes much of the country's serious literary writing. B is wrong because HarperCollins India, though a major literary publisher here, did not bring out this title. C is wrong because Hachette India publishes a wide list but not this memoir. D is wrong because Rupa Publications is an older Indian house known for popular and general interest books. Exam tip: link the book to both names — Arundhati Roy as the author and Penguin Random House India as the publisher.

The correct answer is C, The Man Who Knew Infinity. The book was written by Robert Kanigel about the mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan, so the writer and the subject are two different people, which makes it a biography. Ramanujan himself left no account of his life, and the book was built from letters, records and the recollections of those who knew him.

Option A, Long Walk to Freedom, was written by Nelson Mandela about his own life and is therefore an autobiography. Option B, Playing It My Way, is the cricketer Sachin Tendulkar's own account of his career and is likewise an autobiography. Option D, Wings of Fire, was written by A. P. J. Abdul Kalam with the help of Arun Tiwari, but the life described is Kalam's own, so the presence of a co-author does not turn it into a biography.

The correct answer is B, Dr. Rajendra Prasad. The first President of India published India Divided in 1946, examining the demand for partition and the arguments made on both sides in the years before independence. His other works are Satyagraha in Champaran and Atmakatha, the autobiography he wrote in Hindi while in prison.

Option A, Dr. S. Radhakrishnan, wrote on philosophy and religion, not on the political question of partition. Option C, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, wrote India Wins Freedom, the title candidates most often confuse with this one because both names contain the word India and both deal with the same years. Option D, V. V. Giri, came from the trade union movement and wrote Jobs for Our Millions and Industrial Relations. Keep the pair apart: India Divided is Rajendra Prasad, India Wins Freedom is Azad.

The correct answer is A, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad. India Wins Freedom is Azad's account of the last decade of the freedom struggle, of the Cabinet Mission and of the events that led to partition. Azad was president of the Indian National Congress during a crucial period and later became the first education minister of independent India.

Option B, Rajendra Prasad, wrote his own autobiography and books such as India Divided, but not this title. Option C, Jawaharlal Nehru, wrote An Autobiography, The Discovery of India and Glimpses of World History, all of them separate works. Option D, Subhas Chandra Bose, wrote An Indian Pilgrim, an unfinished autobiography, and The Indian Struggle, a political history of the movement, so neither matches the book named in the question.

The correct answer is A, Dr. S. Radhakrishnan, the second President of India and a professor of philosophy before he entered public life. Besides these two titles he wrote Indian Philosophy in two volumes and The Philosophy of the Upanishads, and Teachers' Day is observed on his birthday, 5 September.

Option B, Dr. Rajendra Prasad, wrote on politics and on the Champaran movement, not on philosophy. Option C, Swami Vivekananda, is the strongest distractor because his lectures on Hinduism are famous, but he held no constitutional office and these particular titles are not his. Option D, Dr. Zakir Husain, the third President, was an educationist known for The Dynamic University. A quick rule keeps this family of questions safe: philosophy and the Upanishads point to Radhakrishnan, education to Zakir Husain, labour to V. V. Giri.