Which of the following is a primary source to understand the Ancient Indian period?

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.

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 C, Banda Bahadur. Guru Gobind Singh died at Nanded in 1708, and before his death he had sent Banda Singh Bahadur to Punjab to lead the Khalsa against Mughal authority. Banda Bahadur took Sirhind in 1710 after defeating its governor Wazir Khan, struck coins in the name of the Gurus, issued orders under his own seal from Lohgarh and gave peasants rights over the land they tilled. Emperor Bahadur Shah and then Farrukhsiyar turned the weight of the empire against him; he was besieged and captured at Gurdas Nangal in 1715 and put to death at Delhi in 1716. A is wrong because Guru Angad was the second Sikh Guru, of the sixteenth century. B is wrong because Guru Amar Das, the third Guru, belongs to the same early period. D is wrong because Guru Nanak Dev, the founder of Sikhism, died in 1539. Exam tip: Banda Singh Bahadur — Sirhind 1710, captured 1715, executed 1716.