Who was the founder of Atmiya Sabha?

The correct answer is B, Swami Dayanand Saraswati. He founded the Arya Samaj at Bombay in 1875, held the Vedas to be the source of all true knowledge, rejected idol worship, priestly authority and hereditary caste, and set out his views in Satyarth Prakash. The Samaj also began the shuddhi movement for the return of converts. Option A is wrong because Swami Vivekananda founded the Ramakrishna Mission in 1897, a different body with a different emphasis on service. Option C is wrong because Swami Shraddhanand was a later leader of the Arya Samaj who established the Gurukul at Kangri in 1902; he carried the movement forward but did not found it. Option D is wrong because Ramakrishna Paramahansa was a Bengali saint who taught the unity of religions and founded no organisation himself.

The correct answer is B, Jyotiba Phule. He founded the Satyashodhak Samaj, the society of truth seekers, in 1873 in Maharashtra to free the lower castes from Brahminical domination, and his book Gulamgiri of the same year compared their condition with that of slaves. With Savitribai Phule he had already opened a school for girls at Pune in 1848. Option A is wrong because B. R. Ambedkar's organisations came much later, the Bahishkrit Hitakarini Sabha in 1924 and the Mahad Satyagraha in 1927. Option C is wrong because Sri Narayana Guru worked in Kerala and founded the SNDP Yogam in 1903. Option D is wrong because E. V. Ramasamy Naicker, known as Periyar, began the Self-Respect Movement in Tamil Nadu in 1925. Phule's aim was social and not only religious: he pressed for schooling for the lower castes and for women, and in 1888 he was given the title Mahatma at a public meeting in Bombay.

The correct answer is A, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar. A Sanskrit scholar and principal of Sanskrit College, he argued from the shastras themselves that the remarriage of widows was permissible, petitioned the government and so brought about the Act of 1856; he also worked for girls' schools and against polygamy. Option B is wrong because Behramji Malabari, a Parsi reformer, pressed for the Age of Consent Act of 1891. Option C is wrong because Har Bilas Sarda moved the Child Marriage Restraint Act of 1929, which is named the Sharda Act after him. Option D is wrong because Raja Ram Mohan Roy died in 1833; his great legislative success was the Regulation of 1829 that declared sati illegal, not the widow remarriage law. The Act was passed while Lord Dalhousie was Governor-General, a second fact often asked along with Vidyasagar's name.

The correct answer is B, Swami Vivekananda. He founded the Mission in 1897 in the name of his teacher and established its headquarters at Belur Math near Calcutta in 1898, four years after his address to the Parliament of Religions at Chicago in 1893. The Mission's work is education, medical relief and disaster relief, on the principle that the service of man is the service of God. Option A is wrong because Ramakrishna Paramahansa, who died in 1886, founded no organisation; the Mission carries his name. Option C is wrong because Annie Besant led the Theosophical Society in India and founded the Central Hindu School at Banaras in 1898. Option D is wrong because Keshab Chandra Sen belonged to the Brahmo Samaj and died in 1884.

The correct answer is B, Adyar near Madras. The Theosophical Society was founded at New York in 1875 by Madame H. P. Blavatsky and Colonel H. S. Olcott, and in 1882 it moved its international headquarters to Adyar, from where it spread the study of ancient Indian philosophy and revived pride in Hindu and Buddhist thought. Option A is wrong because Belur Math is the headquarters of the Ramakrishna Mission, established in 1898. Option C is wrong because Banaras is where Annie Besant, a later president of the Society, founded the Central Hindu School in 1898, out of which the Banaras Hindu University grew; the school was an offshoot and not the headquarters. Option D is wrong because Aligarh is associated with Sir Syed Ahmad Khan's college of 1875. Colonel Olcott was the Society's first president, and Annie Besant, who led it later, linked its work in India with national awakening and with education.