Gautamiputra Satakarni was the greatest ruler of the _______ Empire in the 2nd century CE.

The correct answer is C, Rajendra I (Chola). Around 1025 CE Rajendra Chola I sent a naval expedition that raided Kadaram (Kedah) and other ports of the Srivijaya kingdom.

Srivijaya, based in Sumatra, controlled the Strait of Malacca and the sea trade between India and China. Rajendra I, son of Rajaraja I, launched the expedition probably to protect Chola merchants and trade routes. His inscriptions list the places taken, including Kadaram, Palembang, Malaiyur and Ilamuridesam, and the capture of the Srivijaya king Sangrama Vijayottunggavarman. Rajendra also marched to the Ganga, took the title Gangaikonda and built a new capital, Gangaikonda Cholapuram. He is also called Kadaram Kondan, the conqueror of Kadaram.

A is wrong: Amoghavarsha was a 9th-century Rashtrakuta king known for the Kavirajamarga, not for overseas wars.

B is wrong: Prataparudra was the last Kakatiya king of Warangal, defeated by the Delhi Sultanate.

D is wrong: Vishnuvardhana was a 12th-century Hoysala king who built the Chennakeshava temple at Belur.

Exam tip: Rajendra I = Gangaikonda, Kadaram Kondan, Srivijaya expedition (c. 1025); Rajaraja I = Brihadeeswara temple and Sri Lanka.

The correct answer is C, Lala Lajpat Rai. The Punjab leader wrote these biographies, lived in the United States during the First World War and was elected to the Central Legislative Assembly in 1926.

Lajpat Rai, the 'Punjab Kesari', was one of the Lal-Bal-Pal trio of extremist leaders. He wrote short lives of the Italian nationalists Giuseppe Mazzini and Giuseppe Garibaldi and of Shivaji and Shrikrishna to inspire national pride. From 1914 to 1919 he stayed in the United States, where he founded the Indian Home Rule League of America and wrote Young India. He presided over the Calcutta special session of the Congress in 1920, founded the Servants of the People Society, and died in 1928 after the police lathi charge during the protest against the Simon Commission in Lahore.

A is wrong: Aurobindo Ghosh turned to spiritual life in Pondicherry and never sat in the Central Assembly.

B is wrong: Bipin Chandra Pal, another of the Lal-Bal-Pal trio, did not write these biographies or found a league in America.

D is wrong: Motilal Nehru led the Swarajists in the Assembly but did not write these works or live in America.

Exam tip: Lajpat Rai = Punjab Kesari, Young India (book), Home Rule League of America, died after Simon Commission protest (1928).

The correct answer is A, it was considered a source of income for the State, a sort of tax paid by the people. Vishti was unpaid labour that subjects owed to the king, so it worked like a tax paid in work instead of money or grain.

Vishti, or forced labour, is mentioned in the Arthashastra and in many inscriptions of the Gupta and post-Gupta age. Villagers could be made to carry goods for the army and officials, build or repair works and serve passing royal officers. Land grants to Brahmanas and temples often listed exemption from vishti among the privileges handed over, which shows that the right to demand it had value to the State. The practice is recorded in central India and western India, including Kathiawar, during this period.

B is wrong: inscriptions from Madhya Pradesh and Kathiawar mention vishti, so it was not absent there.

C is wrong: vishti was by nature unpaid; no weekly wage was due.

D is wrong: no rule said the eldest son had to be sent as the labourer.

Exam tip: vishti = forced, unpaid labour for the State; exemption from it was a common privilege in Gupta-period land grants.

The correct answer is B, Chandragupta II. Fa-hien was in India from about 399 to 414 CE, when Chandragupta II Vikramaditya ruled the Gupta empire.

Faxian was a Chinese Buddhist monk who set out overland to collect Buddhist texts, especially rules of monastic discipline. He visited Buddhist sites such as Kapilavastu, Bodh Gaya, Sarnath and Pataliputra, and went home by sea via Sri Lanka. His account, known in English as A Record of Buddhistic Kingdoms, describes the Madhya-desha as peaceful and prosperous, with light taxes, rare use of the death penalty, free hospitals in Pataliputra, and Chandalas who lived outside towns. Oddly, he never names the king.

A is wrong: Samudragupta, father of Chandragupta II, ruled before Fa-hien arrived.

C is wrong: Kumaragupta I came to the throne around 415 CE, after Fa-hien had left.

D is wrong: Skandagupta ruled in the mid-5th century and faced the Huna invasions.

Exam tip: Fa-hien = Chandragupta II (Guptas); Hiuen Tsang = Harshavardhana; I-tsing = visited Nalanda in the late 7th century.

The correct answer is D, 1, 2 and 3. All three are marks of Mahayana Buddhism, the 'Great Vehicle' that grew from around the beginning of the Common Era.

Mahayana treated the Buddha as a divine saviour rather than only a human teacher, so he came to be worshipped as a god. It placed the bodhisattva ideal at its centre: a bodhisattva is a being who has earned enlightenment but delays nirvana to help others reach it, and followers aim to tread that path. Images of the Buddha and bodhisattvas such as Avalokiteshvara and Maitreya, along with rituals and devotion, became central, which helped the growth of the Gandhara and Mathura schools of sculpture. The Fourth Buddhist Council under Kanishka is linked with the rise of Mahayana, and Nagarjuna was its leading thinker.

A is wrong: it leaves out statements 2 and 3.

B is wrong: it leaves out image worship.

C is wrong: it leaves out the deification of the Buddha.

Exam tip: Mahayana = Buddha as god, bodhisattva ideal, image worship, Sanskrit texts; Hinayana or Theravada = Buddha as teacher, Pali texts.