Q12 of 29 Page 1

Examine the importance and limitations of memories and oral testimonies in reconstructing the history of the partition of India.

OR


Examine the outcomes of the provincial elections of 1937 and also examine the role of Congress ministries and the Muslim League in it.


The importance and limitations of memories and oral

testimonies in reconstructing the history of the partition of India are explained below:


1. Memoires, diaries, family history and first handwritten accounts have helped us to understand the life of ordinary people during the partition of the country.


2. Many people viewed partition in terms of suffering and challenges requiring a lot of psychological and emotional adjustment.


3. It was not only a political event but a lot of meaning has been attached to the people who had suffered through it.


4. There is a lot of testimony about the stress and trauma that people had to go through during the partition.


5. The historians have been able to gather a lot of information about the experiences of the poor and the powerless by many oral testimonies.


6. There are many limitations to such testimonies.


7. For example, it is not easy for the government to extract this kind of information because it deals mainly with policy and party related matters of various States.


8. Many historians are very skeptical about the oral testimony because it does not have any chronological support of evidence.


9. Different types of sources have to be tapped to answer different types of questions.


10. The government has provided information about the number of recovered women exchange by Indian and Pakistani States but it is the women who will tell them about the actual suffering they had to go through.


OR


The outcomes of the provincial elections of 1937 and the role of Congress ministries and Muslim League in it is explained below:


1. In the 1937 elections, Congress won by a majority of 511 provinces.


2. It formed government in seven of these.


3. The Muslim League did not perform very well in the constituencies reserved for the Muslims.


4. The Muslims had polled only 4.4 % of the total Muslim vote cast in the elections.


5. It was not able to secure even one seat in NWFP.


6. It was able to capture only 2 out of the 84 reserved constituencies in Punjab and 3 out of 33 reserved constituencies in Sind.


7. Jinnah was also not able to convince the people that it would be considered as the sole spokesman for the Muslims.


8. The league assumed that only a Muslim party would be able to successfully represent the interest of the Muslim and that Congress was a party of the Hindus.


9. It received good support from Bombay, Madras, and the united province.


10. But it was not able to gather support from Punjab, Sind, and Bengal.


11. The Congress wanted to abolish the system of landlordism which was supported by the Muslim League. But it did not take any steps for the same.


12. Congress launched the Muslim mass contact program but failed. The secular concept of the Congress alarms the Muslims conservative and the Muslim Elite.


13. The Muslim League passed a resolution demanding a measure of autonomy for the Muslim majority areas of the country on 23rd of March 1940.


More from this chapter

All 29 →
10

Describe the teachings of Buddha and the development of Buddhist ideas and practices by the first century CE.

OR


Describe the magnificent features of the sculpture of Sanchi Stupa.


 11

‘‘The idea of Sulh-i Kul (absolute peace) was the cornerstone of enlightened rule.’’ Explain the statement of Abul Fazl concerning Akbar’s Empire.

OR


‘‘Mughals transmitted their grand vision through the writing of dynastic histories.’’ Explain the statement with reference to the Akbar Nama and Badshah Nama.


 13

Read the following extract carefully and answer the questions that follow :

A mother’s advice


The Mahabharata describes how, when war between the Kauravas and the Pandavas became inevitable, Gandhari made one last appeal to her eldest son Duryodhana :


By making peace you honor your father and me, as well as your well-wishers ... it is the wise man in control of his senses who guard his kingdom. Greed and anger drag a man away from his profits; by defeating these two enemies a king conquers the earth ... You will happily enjoy the earth, my son, along with the wise and heroic Pandavas ... There is no good in a war, no law (dharma) and profit (artha), let alone happiness; nor is a there (necessarily) victory in the end — don’t set you mind on war ...


Duryodhana did not listen to this advice and fought and lost the war.


(13.1) Analyze Gandhari’s concern for her eldest son, Duryodhana.


(13.2) How do you think that greed and anger are the vices that


overcome the senses of man?


(13.3) Explain the wise suggestion Gandhari gave to her son.


 14

Read the following extract carefully and answer the questions that follow :

‘‘Moistening the rose garden of fortune’’


In this extract, Abu’l Fazl gives a vivid account of how and from whom he collected his information :


... to Abu’l Fazl, son of Mubarak ... this sublime mandate was given. ‘‘Write with the pen of sincerity the account of the glorious events and of our dominion-conquering victories ...


Assuredly, I spent much labour and research on collecting the records and narratives of His Majesty’s actions and I was a long time interrogating the servants of the State and the old members of the illustrious family. I examined both prudent, truth-speaking old men and active-minded, right-actioned young ones and reduced their statements to writing. The Royal commands were issued to the provinces, that those who from old service remembered, with certainty or with adminicle of doubt, the events of the past, should copy out the notes and memoranda and transit them to the court. (Then) a second command shone forth from the holy Presence-chamber; to wit – that the materials which had been collected should be ... recited in the royal hearing, and whatever might have to be written down afterward, should be introduced into the noble volume as a supplement, and that such details as on account to the minuteness of the inquiries and the minutae of affairs, (which) could not then be brought to an end, should be inserted afterwards at my leisure.


Being relieved by this royal order – the interpreter of the Divine ordinance – from the secret anxiety of my heart, I proceeded to reduce into writing the rough draughts (drafts) which were void of the grace of arrangement and style. I obtained the chronicle of events beginning at the Nineteenth Year of the Divine Era, when the Record Office was established by the enlightened intellect of His Majesty, and from its rich pages, I gathered the accounts of many events. Great pains too, were taken to procure the originals or copies of most of the orders which had been issued to the provinces from the Accession up to the present-day ... I also took much trouble to incorporate many of the reports which ministers and high officials had submitted, about the affairs of the empire and the events of foreign countries. And my labour-loving soul was satiated by the apparatus of inquiry and research. I also exerted myself energetically to collect the rough notes and memoranda of sagacious and well-informed men. By these means, I constructed a reservoir for irrigating and moistening the rose garden of fortune (the Akbar Nama).


(14.1) How were imperial ideologies disseminated?


(14.2) Why were Royal orders considered as Divine ordinance?


(14.3) Which sources were used to describe the vivid account of the Mughal Empire?