At which of the following sites, the evidence of earliest villages have been formed?

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, 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 B, Arikamedu. Arikamedu, on the Ariyankuppam river near Puducherry on the Coromandel coast, began as a small fishing settlement and grew into a busy port that traded with the Romans and the Greco Roman world in the first centuries of the common era. Excavations there have brought out Roman amphorae that carried wine and olive oil, red glazed Arretine ware, glass and stone beads, lamps and Roman coins, along with the local rouletted pottery, which is why the site is identified with the Poduke named in the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea. A is wrong because Badami in Karnataka was the inland capital of the Chalukyas, known for its rock cut cave temples. C is wrong because Lothal in Gujarat is a Harappan site with a dockyard, far older and on the western coast. D is wrong because tulapurushadana was a ritual of weighing oneself against gold and giving it away, not a place at all. Exam tip: Arikamedu near Puducherry is the Poduke of Roman trade; Lothal is the Harappan dock in Gujarat.

The correct answer is A, Sangama Dynasty. The Vijayanagara kingdom was founded in 1336 by two brothers, Harihara and Bukka, who belonged to the Sangama family, and the line is therefore called the Sangama dynasty. Their capital, Vijayanagara, stood on the south bank of the Tungabhadra near modern Hampi in Karnataka. Four dynasties ruled the kingdom one after another, the Sangama, the Saluva, the Tuluva and the Aravidu. D is wrong because the Tuluva dynasty came third and gave the kingdom its most famous ruler, Krishnadeva Raya, who reigned in the early sixteenth century, but it did not found the state. B and C are wrong because Nagama and Soma were never ruling houses of Vijayanagara. The kingdom’s long rivalry with the Bahmani sultanate ended badly at the battle of Talikota in 1565, when the combined Deccan sultanates defeated Rama Raya. Exam tip: Vijayanagara founded in 1336 by Harihara and Bukka of the Sangama dynasty; the order of dynasties is Sangama, Saluva, Tuluva, Aravidu.

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.