Answer any four of the following questions in 30 – 40 words each :

(a) What does the poet’s smile in the poem, ‘My Mother at Sixty-six’ show?

(b) ‘‘Listening to them, I see two distinct worlds....’’ In the context of Mukesh, the bangle maker’s son, which two worlds is Anees Jung referring to?

(c) Though the sharecroppers of Champaran received only one-fourth of the compensation, how can the Champaran struggle still be termed a huge success and victory?

(d) Which article in McLeery’s suitcase played perhaps the most significant role in Evans’ escape and how?

(e) Why does Derry’s mother not want him to go back to visit Mr. Lamb?

(f) What considerations influenced the Tiger King to get married?

(a) Her smile signifies her helplessness which gives reassurance to the mother who is getting aged. This smile of the poet is superficial as she is sad from inside and fakes the smile for her mother.

(b) Anees Jung refers to the two worlds in which the family of the bangle makers is trapped, the first is the poverty-stricken families of Firozabad and the second is the vicious circle of corruption of the middlemen and sahukars.

(c) Champaran struggle is considered as a huge success and victory even though they received only one-fourth of the compensation. This was because for the first time the Indians had stood against the royal British Raj, who had owned most of the arable land in Champaran. Thousands of peasants demonstrated peacefully under the leadership of Mahatma Gandhi, and then a commission of inquiry was called. It marked the beginning of the independence struggle.

(d) Two articles played a huge role in Evans escape, Mc Leery who was Evans’ friend in disguise had the two articles, first was the rubber ring which was filled with pig blood, and Evans used this to fake bleeding and the second article was the yellow envelope which contained the question paper, and the last page of this question paper had the plan of escape.

(e) Derry’s mother had heard things about Mr. lamb that he was a lame old fellow. She also had heard that he was an egocentric and old fellow whom she didn’t want derry to go back to, as she thought that he might get influenced by Mr. LAMB. Thus, she didn’t want him to go to that old fellow.

(f) The tiger king was on his mission to kill 100 tigers, and in his village, no tigers were left as he had killed all of them. Thus, he decided to marry a girl from a royal family of a state which had a large tiger population and thus after getting the proposal accepted he killed 5-6 tigers every day.