Consider the following statements about Stone Age in India : 1. Different periods are identified on the basis of the type and technology of stone tools. 2. There are no regional variations in the type and technology of tools in different periods. 3. Stone Age cultures of different periods evolved uniformly in a neat unilinear fashion all over the subcontinent. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

The correct answer is A, 1 only. Archaeologists divide the Stone Age into the Palaeolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic periods mainly by the kind of stone tools found and the way they were made. Large hand axes and cleavers mark the Lower Palaeolithic, flakes and scrapers the Middle, blades and burins the Upper Palaeolithic, tiny microliths the Mesolithic, and ground and polished tools the Neolithic. So statement 1 is correct. Statement 2 is wrong because tools varied from region to region with the local raw material and way of life; the Sohanian pebble tools of the north-west differ from the Madrasian hand axes of the south, for example. Statement 3 is wrong because these cultures did not move forward in one neat line everywhere; they overlapped, and hunter-gatherer groups lived alongside farming villages in many areas for centuries. Option B is wrong because it accepts statement 2. Option C is wrong because it accepts statement 3 and rejects statement 1. Option D is wrong because it accepts all three. Exam tip: Stone Age periods are named by tools, and Indian cultures were regional and overlapping, not unilinear.