Indian History Mixed Quiz: Set 29

The correct answer is B, Bidar. Mahmud Gawan, the Persian-born wazir of Muhammad Shah III who held the title Malik-ut-Tujjar, built a madrasa at Bidar in 1472. It was a three-storeyed building in the Persian manner, faced with coloured tiles and equipped with a library, lecture rooms and quarters for teachers and students, and its ruins still stand. Option A is wrong because Gulbarga was the earlier Bahmani capital, famous instead for its Jama Masjid with a fully roofed courtyard. Option C is wrong because Daulatabad was the fort city of the Yadavas and later of Muhammad bin Tughlaq, and was only a Bahmani taraf headquarters. Option D is wrong because Golconda rose as the capital of the Qutb Shahis after the Bahmani kingdom broke up, and its great buildings belong to that later dynasty. Mahmud Gawan was executed in 1481 on the strength of a forged letter.

The correct answer is D, B R Ambedkar. On 20 March 1927 Dr B R Ambedkar led thousands of Dalits to the Chavdar tank at Mahad in Maharashtra and drank its water, asserting the right of the depressed classes to use a public water source. Upper-caste groups later purified the tank with cow dung and curd, and in December that year Ambedkar returned to Mahad and publicly burnt the Manusmriti. The day is remembered as Social Empowerment Day, and Mahad is called the first collective act of Dalit assertion in modern India. Option A is wrong because Jyotirao Phule died in 1890, long before 1927, though his Satyashodhak Samaj of 1873 prepared the ground. Option B is wrong because E V Ramaswamy Naicker, called Periyar, led the Self-Respect Movement and the Vaikom Satyagraha in the south. Option C is wrong because K Kelappan, known as Kerala Gandhi, led the Guruvayur Satyagraha of 1931. Exam tip: Mahad 1927 and Kalaram temple 1930 — both led by Ambedkar.

The correct answer is B, Ustad Ahmad Lahauri. Ustad Ahmad Lahauri is the architect named in the Mughal record as the chief designer of the Taj Mahal, the tomb Shah Jahan raised at Agra for his wife Mumtaz Mahal. He is also associated with the Red Fort at Shahjahanabad. Option A is wrong because Ustad Isa appears in later tradition and popular accounts rather than in the contemporary evidence, and is not the answer papers accept. Option C is wrong because Mir Abdul Karim was an architect of Jahangir's reign who worked on other imperial projects. Option D is wrong because Makramat Khan was a superintendent of construction who managed the work rather than designed it. Keep the Taj Mahal linked to Shah Jahan, Mumtaz Mahal, Agra and Ustad Ahmad Lahauri, and remember that it is built of white marble on a red sandstone plinth.

The correct answer is C, 1991. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics broke up in 1991: a failed coup against Mikhail Gorbachev in August that year destroyed the centre's authority, the republics declared independence one after another, and on 25 December 1991 Gorbachev resigned. The next day the Soviet flag came down from the Kremlin and fifteen separate countries took the place of the USSR, with Russia as its successor state. Most of them joined the Commonwealth of Independent States formed by the Alma-Ata declaration of December 1991. Option A is wrong because 1990 saw only the reunification of Germany and the first stirrings of sovereignty in the republics. Option B is wrong because 1989 was the year the Berlin Wall fell and eastern Europe turned away from communism, while the Soviet Union itself stayed intact. Option D is wrong because by 1992 the break-up was already complete. Exam tip: Berlin Wall falls 1989 → Germany reunited 1990 → USSR dissolved 1991, ending the Cold War.

The correct answer is C, a hospice. A khanqah was the hospice or lodge where a Sufi master lived with his disciples, taught, held assemblies of devotional music and fed whoever came to the door, whatever their faith or caste. It was the working centre of a silsila, and the Chishti khanqahs at Ajmer, Delhi and Ajodhan drew visitors of every background, which is why they mattered so much to the social history of the Sultanate period. Option A and option D are wrong because the words for heaven and hell in this vocabulary are jannat and jahannum, not khanqah. Option B is wrong because the tomb of a Sufi saint is called a dargah, and the death anniversary observed there is the urs. Students should also remember jamaat khana for a larger community hall and sama for the musical assembly held inside the khanqah.

The correct answer is A, 1896 INC session. Vande Mataram was first sung on a political occasion at the Calcutta session of the Indian National Congress in 1896, and it was Rabindranath Tagore who set the tune and sang it there. The song had been written earlier by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay in Sanskritised Bengali and placed in his novel Anandamath, published in 1882. After the partition of Bengal in 1905 it became the cry of the Swadeshi movement, and the Constituent Assembly later gave it the status of the national song, to be honoured equally with the national anthem. B is wrong because the 1903 session came seven years after that first singing. C is wrong because the Calcutta session of 1911 is remembered for the first singing of Jana Gana Mana. D is wrong because the 1900 session has no such first to its name. Exam tip: Vande Mataram was written in 1882 in Anandamath and first sung in 1896; Jana Gana Mana was first sung in 1911.

The correct answer is D, the Treaty of Mandeshwar. The Third Anglo-Maratha War of 1817 to 1818 was settled by a set of separate treaties with the Maratha houses, and the one with the Holkar chief of Indore was signed at Mandsaur, or Mandeshwar, in January 1818. It placed Holkar territory under the Company and ended Holkar independence. Option A is wrong because the Treaty of Purandar of 1665 was signed by Shivaji with Mirza Raja Jai Singh, long before the Company mattered in the Deccan. Option B is wrong because the Treaty of Gwalior of 1817 was signed with Daulat Rao Scindia, not with Holkar, and students often swap the two houses. Option C is wrong because the Treaty of Surat of 1775 was made with Raghunath Rao and actually began the First Anglo-Maratha War.

The correct answer is D, Rajendra Chola I. He took the title Gangaikonda Chola, the one who won the Ganga, after his army marched north about 1022 CE, defeated the Pala ruler Mahipala and carried Ganga water back to the Tamil country. That water was poured into a great tank at his new capital, Gangaikonda Cholapuram, which he raised in place of Thanjavur and where he built a large Shiva temple in his father's style. He also sent a fleet against Srivijaya in South East Asia, a rare overseas campaign for an Indian ruler. A is wrong because Vijayalaya founded the dynasty by seizing Thanjavur in the ninth century. B is wrong because Gandaraditya is remembered for a Tamil devotional hymn, not for a northern march. C is wrong because Parantaka I fought the Rashtrakutas and was beaten at Takkolam. Exam tip: Rajendra I means Gangaikonda Chola, Gangaikonda Cholapuram and the naval raid on Srivijaya.

The correct answer is B, Nana Sahib. Nana Sahib, the adopted son of the last Peshwa Baji Rao II, led the revolt of 1857 at Kanpur. The Company had refused him the pension his father had drawn, and when the sepoys at Kanpur rose in June 1857 he joined them, was proclaimed Peshwa and drove the British garrison out of the city; Tantia Tope was his commander. The British under Havelock retook Kanpur in July, and Nana Sahib is believed to have escaped into Nepal. A is wrong because Rani Lakshmibai led the fighting at Jhansi. C is wrong because Begum Hazrat Mahal led the revolt at Lucknow in the name of her young son Birjis Qadr. D is wrong because Kunwar Singh, the old zamindar of Jagdishpur, led it in Bihar. Exam tip: Kanpur Nana Sahib, Jhansi Lakshmibai, Lucknow Begum Hazrat Mahal, Bihar Kunwar Singh, Delhi Bahadur Shah Zafar.

The correct answer is C, Subhash Chandra Bose. Both slogans belong to Netaji and to the Azad Hind Fauj, the Indian National Army he led from 1943. He gave the call of Dilli Chalo to set the march on Delhi as the army's goal, and asked for blood in return for freedom in his famous appeal to Indians in South East Asia. He also gave the greeting Jai Hind, set up the Provisional Government of Free India at Singapore in October 1943, and formed the Rani of Jhansi Regiment of women soldiers. Option A is wrong because Gandhi's slogans were Quit India and Do or Die, given in 1942. Option B is wrong because Nehru is remembered for his Tryst with Destiny speech, not these slogans. Option D is wrong because Patel, the Iron Man of India, is linked to the Bardoli movement and the merger of the princely states. Exam tip: Dilli Chalo, Jai Hind and Give me blood all point to Subhash Chandra Bose.

The correct answer is A, 1856. The Hindu Widows' Remarriage Act was passed in July 1856 and made the remarriage of a Hindu widow lawful, so that the children of such a marriage were treated as legitimate. It came after a long campaign by Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, the Sanskrit scholar of Bengal, who argued from the shastras themselves that remarriage was allowed, and who gathered thousands of signatures in its support. The reformer also had to accept a condition in the Act by which a widow who remarried gave up the property she held from her first husband. B is wrong because 1858 is the year of Queen Victoria's Proclamation, which passed the rule of India to the Crown. C is wrong because 1859 is remembered for the Bengal Rent Act and the Indigo revolt, not for this law. D is wrong because 1862 is the year the High Courts were set up at Calcutta, Bombay and Madras. Exam tip: 1829 sati banned, 1856 widow remarriage allowed, 1891 Age of Consent Act.

The correct answer is A, Charles Cornwallis. Cornwallis, Governor General from 1786 to 1793, introduced the Permanent Settlement in Bengal, Bihar and Odisha in 1793, with John Shore doing much of the groundwork. It recognised the zamindars as owners of the land and fixed for all time the revenue they had to pay the Company, so any later rise in output went to the zamindar and not to the state. The sunset clause meant that a zamindar who had not paid by sunset on the appointed day lost his estate at auction, which ruined many old families and created a new class of landlords, while the peasant got no security of tenure. B is wrong because Bentinck came in 1828 and is remembered for abolishing sati. C is wrong because Mountbatten was the last Viceroy, in 1947. D is wrong because Ripon, in the 1880s, is known for local self-government. Exam tip: Permanent Settlement 1793 Cornwallis, Ryotwari Munro and Read, Mahalwari Holt Mackenzie.

The correct answer is C, Champaran. Gandhi's first satyagraha in India was fought in 1917 at Champaran in Bihar, where indigo planters forced tenants to grow indigo on a fixed part of their holding under the tinkathia system. The peasant Rajkumar Shukla persuaded Gandhi to come and see their condition; Gandhi arrived, was ordered to leave, refused, and the government instead set up an enquiry committee with him as a member. Its report ended the tinkathia system and won the peasants part of their money back. A is wrong because the Kheda satyagraha in Gujarat came in 1918, when Gandhi asked for remission of land revenue after crops failed. B is wrong because the Ahmedabad mill workers' struggle, in which Gandhi used a hunger strike for higher wages, also belongs to 1918. D is wrong because the Bardoli satyagraha of 1928 was a no-tax movement led by Vallabhbhai Patel, who earned the title Sardar there. Exam tip: 1917 Champaran, 1918 Ahmedabad and Kheda, 1928 Bardoli.

The correct answer is A, 1928. The Bardoli Satyagraha began in February 1928 in Bardoli taluka of Surat district in Gujarat, after the Bombay government raised the land revenue by about twenty-two per cent in a year when the crop had already been poor. Vallabhbhai Patel led the peasants, who refused to pay a single rupee, held together across castes and communities, and faced the seizure of land, cattle and carts without answering back. The government at last appointed the Broomfield and Maxwell enquiry, which found the increase unjustified and cut it to roughly six per cent. It was the women of Bardoli who gave Vallabhbhai the title Sardar. B is wrong because 1934 is the year the Congress Socialist Party was founded. C is wrong because 1919 is the year of the Rowlatt Satyagraha and Jallianwala Bagh. D is wrong because 1943 is the year of the Bengal famine. Exam tip: Bardoli 1928, Sardar Patel, a no-tax satyagraha, Broomfield and Maxwell enquiry.

The correct answer is D, A, B and C. When the British left in 1947, India had, besides the provinces under direct British rule, about 565 princely states whose rulers had accepted British paramountcy. That paramountcy lapsed with independence and every ruler had to accede either to India or to Pakistan; Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel and V. P. Menon, working through the States Department, persuaded almost all of them to sign an Instrument of Accession. Statements A and B therefore both describe princely states. Statement C is also true, since several, among them Himachal Pradesh, Manipur and Tripura, were kept as separate administrative units and became full states only later. Statement D is false, because Goa, Daman and Diu were Portuguese and Pondicherry was French, European possessions and never princely states. Option A is wrong because it leaves out statement C. Options B and C are wrong because each includes the false statement D. Exam tip: about 565 princely states, Patel and V. P. Menon, the Instrument of Accession, and Goa and Pondicherry as European colonies.

The correct answer is B, encompass services of nobles from different regions as the empire expanded. A mansabdar was an officer who held a mansab, a rank that fixed his position at court, his pay and the number of horsemen he had to keep ready. As the empire spread over Rajasthan, the Deccan and the east, the Mughals needed commanders and administrators who knew those regions, so Turanis, Iranis, Afghans, Rajputs and Deccanis were all taken into service. Akbar in particular widened recruitment, and the pay was met through a jagir, an assignment of revenue from a piece of land. A is wrong because language was not the reason for the policy. C is wrong because loyalty of local people was at most a by-product, not the purpose of recruitment. D is wrong because the aim was practical administration of a growing empire, not a social ideal. Exam tip: mansab means rank, zat fixes status and pay, sawar fixes the cavalry.

The correct answer is B, Samudragupta's Prashasti. A primary source is one produced in the very period being studied, and the Allahabad Pillar Inscription, the prashasti composed by the court poet Harisena in praise of Samudragupta, was carved in the fourth century CE, inside the ancient period itself. It names the kings he defeated in the north and the south and the rulers who sent him tribute, and it is engraved on an older Ashokan pillar, so one stone carries writing from two different ages. A is wrong because a Surat hundi, a merchant's bill of exchange, belongs to the medieval and early modern trading world. C is wrong because the Kandariya Mahadeva temple at Khajuraho was built by the Chandelas in the eleventh century, well into the medieval period. D is wrong because Nagabhata was a Pratihara ruler of the eighth and ninth centuries, again early medieval. Exam tip: Harisena wrote Samudragupta's Allahabad prashasti on an Ashokan pillar.

The correct answer is D, land gifted to temples. Chola inscriptions use a separate term for every kind of land grant, and tirunamattukkani is the land whose produce was set apart for a temple. The Cholas ruled the Kaveri delta from the ninth to the thirteenth century and had their land settlements cut into temple walls in Tamil, which is why historians can still name each category. In the same lists, brahmadeya was land given to Brahmanas, vellanvagai was the land of ordinary non-Brahmana peasant owners who paid tax to the state, shalabhoga was land whose income ran a school, and pallichchhandam was land given to Jaina establishments. A is wrong because land gifted to Brahmanas was called brahmadeya. B is wrong because the holdings of non-Brahmana peasant proprietors were vellanvagai. C is wrong because a grant to Jaina institutions was pallichchhandam. Exam tip: brahmadeya to Brahmanas, vellanvagai to peasants, shalabhoga to a school, pallichchhandam to Jainas, tirunamattukkani to a temple.

The correct answer is C, Thomas Munro. The Ryotwari settlement was worked out by Thomas Munro, along with Captain Alexander Read, and introduced from 1820 in the Madras Presidency, where Munro was then Governor. Under it the revenue was settled directly with the ryot, the individual cultivator, who was treated as the owner of his field for as long as he paid; there was no zamindar in between, and the demand was revised every thirty years after a survey of the soil. The system later covered much of Madras, Bombay, Assam and Berar, close to half of British India, and its high, cash demand pushed many peasants into debt. A is wrong because Warren Hastings tried the farming of revenue by auction in Bengal. B is wrong because Lord Cornwallis brought in the Permanent Settlement of 1793 with zamindars. D is wrong because Lord Ripon is remembered for local self-government and the Ilbert Bill. Exam tip: Permanent Settlement 1793 Cornwallis, Ryotwari Munro in Madras, Mahalwari in the North-Western Provinces.

The correct answer is D, Vernacular Press Act. The Vernacular Press Act was enacted in 1878 by Lord Lytton to silence Indian-language newspapers, which had begun to criticise British rule sharply, especially over the famine and the cost of the Delhi Durbar. It allowed a magistrate to demand a bond and a deposit from the printer of any Indian-language paper and to seize the press if the paper printed anything judged seditious, while English papers were left untouched. Because of this open discrimination it was nicknamed the Gagging Act, and Lord Ripon repealed it in 1882. A is wrong because the Indian Contract Act was passed in 1872. B is wrong because the East India Stock Dividend Redemption Act belongs to 1873, when the Company's stock was wound up. C is wrong because the Transfer of Property Act came in 1882, the same year the Vernacular Press Act was withdrawn. Exam tip: Lytton brought the Vernacular Press Act in 1878 and Ripon repealed it in 1882.