Who among the following established himself as an independent ruler with the title of Nizam-ul-Mulk Asaf Ja with his base at Hyderabad?

The correct answer is D, Muslim League. The Lucknow Pact of December 1916 was an agreement between the Indian National Congress and the All India Muslim League, by which the Congress accepted separate electorates for Muslims and the two bodies placed a joint demand for self government before the British. The same Lucknow session brought the moderates and the extremists back into one Congress, so Bal Gangadhar Tilak returned to it; Tilak and Muhammad Ali Jinnah were the chief architects of the pact and Annie Besant helped bring the two sides together. The unity it created strengthened the Home Rule agitation, though the politics of the 1920s pulled the two apart again. A is wrong because the Swatantra Party was founded only in 1959, by C. Rajagopalachari. B is wrong because the Communist Party of India took shape in the 1920s, after the pact. C is wrong because the Hindu Mahasabha, founded in 1915, was not a party to it. Exam tip: Lucknow 1916 - Congress and Muslim League together, moderates and extremists reunited.

The correct answer is A, 1906. The All India Muslim League was founded at Dhaka in December 1906, with Nawab Salimullah of Dhaka taking the lead and Nawab Mohsin-ul-Mulk and Nawab Viqar-ul-Mulk among its founders, while Aga Khan III became its first president. The body grew out of the Simla deputation of 1906, which asked the Viceroy Lord Minto for separate electorates, and the Morley-Minto reforms of 1909 granted that demand. The League signed the Lucknow Pact with the Congress in 1916, and from 1940, under Muhammad Ali Jinnah, it pressed the Lahore Resolution demand for Pakistan. B is wrong because 1901 has no link with the founding of the League. C is wrong because 1905 is the year of the Partition of Bengal, which shaped the politics the League grew in. D is wrong because no such body was formed in 1903. Exam tip: hold the sequence - Partition of Bengal 1905, Simla deputation and Muslim League 1906, separate electorates 1909.

The correct answer is D, 1918. Gandhi led the Kheda satyagraha in 1918, asking the government to remit land revenue after the crops failed in that district of Gujarat. The rules allowed a remission when the yield fell below a quarter of the normal crop, but the officials refused, so Gandhi and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel urged the peasants to withhold revenue, and the government finally suspended collection from the poorer cultivators. The same year brought the Ahmedabad mill strike, where Gandhi used a hunger strike for the first time in India, and it followed Champaran in 1917. A is wrong because 1916 is the year of the Lucknow Pact and of Gandhi's speech at Banaras Hindu University. B is wrong because the Non-Cooperation Movement began in 1920. C is wrong because 1919 saw the Rowlatt satyagraha and the Jallianwala Bagh massacre. Exam tip: keep the early movements in order - Champaran 1917, then Ahmedabad and Kheda in 1918.

The correct answer is C, Magadha. Magadha was the first power of ancient India to use elephants in war on a large scale, taking them from the forests of its east Indian heartland. Magadha grew from a mahajanapada into an empire under rulers such as Bimbisara, Ajatashatru, Mahapadma Nanda and later the Mauryas, and its strength rested on the fertile Ganga plains, the iron mines near Rajgir and these war elephants. Its early capital Rajagriha, today Rajgir, was later shifted to Pataliputra, which guarded the river routes of the Ganga. Greek accounts of the Nanda and Mauryan armies record thousands of elephants, and the peace Chandragupta Maurya made with Seleucus included a gift of 500 elephants. A is wrong because the Kushans of the first and second centuries CE are known for cavalry and gold coins. B is wrong because the Cholas of the far south are remembered for their navy and their temples. D is wrong because the Shungas came after the Mauryas and ruled a much smaller realm. Exam tip: remember the four props of Magadha - iron, fertile land, rivers and war elephants.

The correct answer is C, Bronze/Copper. Muhammad bin Tughlaq issued token coins of bronze and copper in 1329-30 that were to pass at the value of the silver tanka. The idea itself was sound and had worked in China and Persia, but the sultan did not keep the minting of these coins in state hands. Goldsmiths across the empire forged them in their homes, the treasury was flooded with fake coins, and traders refused to accept them. The sultan had to withdraw the issue and exchange the token coins for silver, which drained the treasury. A is wrong because Rupak was a coin name of the ancient period, not of this experiment. B is wrong because the rupee was introduced much later by Sher Shah Suri as a silver coin. D is wrong because the tanka was the standard silver coin whose value the token coins were meant to carry. Exam tip: link the pair - Muhammad bin Tughlaq and the failed bronze token currency of 1329.