AHSEC – Class 12 | English Solved Question Paper -2018

SKILLS:

– Excellent written and verbal communication skills

– Working knowledge of Tally, Excel, MS-Word.

Achievements:

– Winner of Inter –college Debate Competiton (2014-2015)

Hobby: Interacting with people, reading books, cricket etc.

Language Known: Hindi, English, Bengali, Assamese.

Declaration:

5. Change the form of narration in the following sentences: 2×2=4

a) The Speaker said, “I thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for giving me a kind hearing. When I arrived here yesterday I did not believe that I might meet so large a gathering”.

Ans: Addressing the audience as ladies and gentlemen ,the speaker thanked the people for giving him a kind hearing. He also said that when he reached there a day before, he did not believe that he might meet so large a gathering.

b) His mother exclaimed in sorrow that she had not a bit of bread to give him and that he had eaten up all the provisions she had in the house the previous day.

Ans: His mother said,” Alas! I do not have a bit of bread to give you and you have eaten up all the provisions I had in the house yesterday.”

6. Change the voice of any three of the following sentences: 3×1=3

a) A Japanese firm makes these television sets. Ans: These television sets are made by a Japanese firm.

b) An earthquake destroyed the town. Ans: The town was destroyed by an earthquake.

c) Whom did you laugh at? Ans: Who was laughed at by you?

d) He was taught this in his boyhood. Ans: Someone taught him this in his boyhood.

e) Shut the window. Ans: Let the window be shut./ You are ordered to shut the window.

7. Rewrite any five the following sentences using the verbs given in brackets in their correct tense forms: 5×1=5

a) He _____ (work) here since 2011. Ans: has been working.

b) I _____ (write) the letter last night. Ans: Wrote

c) He _____ (sit) in the library when I saw him. Ans: Was sitting

d) If I were you, I _____ (not do) it. Ans: If I were you, I would not have done it

e) The first World War _____ (last) for four years and ended in 1918. Ans: lasted

f) The rubbish van _____ (come) again in the afternoon tomorrow. Ans: will come

8. Rewrite any four of the following sentences filling in the blanks with appropriate prepositions: 4×1=4

a) He is fond _____ playing cards. Ans: of

b) She was annoyed _____ missing the bus. Ans: At

c) Who is responsible _____ breaking this mirror? Ans: for

d) We tried to dissuade her _____ marrying an old man. Ans: from

e) They are thinking _____ moving to another house. Ans: of

9. Rewrite any four of the sentences as directed: 4×1=4

a) This is one of the best colleges in the North. (Change it into comparative degree)

Ans: This college is better than many other colleges in the North.

b) You are richer than I. (Make it negative without changing the meaning)

Ans: You are not as rich as I.

c) There is no smoke without fire. (Make it affirmative without changing the meaning)

Ans: Where there is Fire, there is smoke.

d) We heard of her failure. (Make it a complex sentence)Ans” We heard that he had failed.

e) He admitted that he had done wrong. (Make it a simple sentence)Ans: He admitted his mistake

f) Unless you work hard, you will fail. (Make it a compound sentence)

Ans: Work hard or you will fail.

SECTION D

(Text books : 45 Marks)

10. Read one of the following extracts and answer the questions that follow:

a) “Perhaps the Earth can teach us

As when everything seems dead

And later proves to be alive.

Now I’ll count up to twelve

And you keep quiet and I will go”.

Questions:

i. What can the Earth teach us?

Ans: The earth teaches us that there is life under apparent stillness. It means that we can still be alive even if we appear to be still or clam. The earth is never dead when everything seems to be dead, it remains still alive.

ii. Why does the poet count up to twelve? 1

Ans: . The poet asks us to count to twelve as there are 12 hours represented on a clock or as there are twelve months in a year

iii. What will ‘keeping quiet’ help us achieve? 1

Ans: Counting up to twelve takes very short time. Keeping still for this brief interval of time gives us a monetary pause to introspect and review the course of action. It will promote peace and brotherhood among men. It will make us energetic.

Or

b) “No, in country money, the country scale of gain,

The requisite lift of spirit has never been found,

Or so the voice of the country seems to complain,

I can’t help owing the great relief it would be,

To put these people at one stroke out of their pain

And then next day as I come back into the sane,

I wonder how I should like you to come to me

And offer to put me gently out of my pain.”

Questions:

(i) Where do these lines occur? 1

Ans. These lines occur in the poem “The Roadside Stand” written by Robert Frost.

(ii) Why has the requisite spirit never been found? 1

Ans. Because the rural people are depressed because of their poverty

(iii) What does the voice of the country people seem to say? 1

Ans. The voice of the country people seems to complain of injustice against them. There is lack of money in their lives.

(iv) What will be of great relief for the poet? 1

Ans. The poet will feel a great relief if the rural people are liberated from all pains at one stroke.

11. Answer any three of the following questions in 30-40 words: 3×2=6

a) What increases continuously in ‘A Thing of Beauty’?

Ans: A thing of beauty gives us eternal and everlasting joy. It loveliness increases day by day. It stays in our imagination and becomes a source of joy forever. It never passes into nothingness. It gives us sweet dreams and happiness and remove the cover of sadness from our soul.

b) What is considered to be ‘an exotic moment’ in ‘Keeping Quiet’?

Ans: The poet refers to the moment of stillness and quietness as an exotic moment because it will initiate peace and brotherhood. In this moment a bliss of extra-ordinary calmness would prevail on the whole earth.

c) What are the ‘merry children spilling out of there homes’ symbolic of?

Ans: The poet was driving a car with her mother. When she looked outside she noticed the ‘merry children spilling out of their homes’ which symbolizes happiness and spontaneous overflow of energy in life.

d) Who are referred to as the ‘flower of cities’ in ‘A Roadside Stand’?

Ans: The flower of cities are those who have the money and whose cash flow supports the cities so that they do not sink and wither.

e) Which things irritated the passers-by who stopped at the road-side stand?

Ans: Many things irritated those passers by who stopped at the roadside stand. The badly painted buildings spoilt the landscape, the writings on the signboard were defective, the letters ‘N’ and ‘S’ weren’t properly written and most importantly, the place didn’t provide much stuff for shopping.

12. Answer any five of the following questions: 5×1=5

a) What is the name of the blacksmith in “The Last Lesson”?

Ans: The blacksmith in ‘The Last Lesson’ was Wachter.

b) What is the ‘great trouble with Alsace’?

Ans: According to M. Hamel, procrastination (postponing something, टालमटोल) among the people, who always put off (टालना )their learning till tomorrow is the great trouble with Alsace.

c) Why have Saheb and his family migrated to Seemapuri?

Ans: The storm had swept away Saheb’s home and green fields in Dhaka. Hence, he and his family had migrated to Seemapuri.

d) Who is the ‘Chota Sahib’ in the ‘Memories of a Chota Sahib”

Ans: He was the last British Senior Conservator of Forests of Assam

e) How did John Rowntree find the weather when he arrived at Gauhati?

Ans: John Rowntree fond that the weather was cold.

f) Where was Champaran?

Ans: Champaran was in the foothills of the Himalayas, near the kingdom of Nepal.

g) Which country does Danny Casey play for?

Ans: He plays for the Ireland.

13. Answer any five in 30-40 words: 5×2=10

a) ‘Will they make them sing a German, even the pigeons?’ What does this sentence suggest?

Ans: The imposition of German over French was humiliating. The imposed every possible rule on the people of Alsace and Lorraine. It filled the people with great Patriotic feelings. Suddenly, on the roof when pigeons coo in a low tone. Franz asks himself whether they will make the pigeons also sing in German. This remark is a Frenchman’s typical reaction to imposition of learning German. This also shows the extent the German’s would go in their attempts at linguistic chauvinism.

b) What are the two different world’s Firozabad?

Ans: The author noticed two different worlds- one of the family, caught in a web of proverty burdened by the stigma of caste in which they are born; the other a vicious circle of sahukars , the middlemen, the policemen, the keepers of law, the bureaucrates and the politicians.

c) What was the promise made by Anees Jung to Saheb?

Ans: The author made a promise to open a school. The writer was embarrassed because she has not opened the school yet and Saheb keeps of asking her,”Is your school ready”, she fells embarrassed. She made a promise that was not meant.

d) What unusual visitor did Rowntree have in his bungalow one night?

Ans: Although, Gauhati was said to be the port entry into Assam, most of the travelers passed through between Calcutta and Shillong or to districts further up the valley. The narrator had unusual visitors, for example, one of which was a tiger that had been washed up by a flood. The imprint of its foot was visible through the compound of the bungalow.

e) Why did Gandhi choose to go to Muzzafarpur first before going on to Champaran?

Ans: Gandhi decided to go to Muzzafarpur first before going to Champaran because he wanted to obtain more complete information about the conditions of sharecropper of Champaran. He did not want to act blindly. It did prove helpful as the lawyers in Muzzafarpur, who frequently represented the peasant groups in the court, brief Gandhiji about the cases.

f) What job is Geoff engaged in? Does he entertain wild and impractical dreams like his sister?

Ans: Geoff was engaged as an apprentice mechanic. He has to travel to his work place each day to the far side of the city. He is not a day-dreamer like his sister. Perhaps he knows his and his family’s limitations better than her.

g) What kind of a person is Geoff?

Ans: Geoff was a quiet boy and kept his views to himself. He spoke little and did not share his views with others. He was the first person with whom Sophie shared all her secrets. She was jealous of his silence and for her it seemed that when he was quiet he was in those places where she had never been.

14. Answer any one of the following question in 80-100 words? 1×5=5

a) Describe the bangle makers of Firozabad. How does the vicious circle of the Sahukars, the middlemen never allow them to come out of their poverty? 1×5=5

Ans: The bangle makers of Firozabad have spent generations working around furnaces. Every other family in Firozabad is engaged in making bangles. They sit around lamps welding glass, making bangles for all the women in the land.

These families are caught in the web of poverty. They are burdened by the stigma of caste. They believe that they are born to this caste and thus bangle making is a god given lineage, out of which they can never imagine a life. They cannot organize themselves into cooperatives for fear of the police. Individual bangle makers are always cought in the vicious circle of the middlemen and the sohukars. This vicious circle exploits them so much that they are left with so less money that they have only enough to engage in bangle making. They cannot afford to have two meals a day. Thus they live in abject poverty

Or

b) Relate Rowntree experiences of floods in Assam.

Ans: According to the author, during the cold days, the north bank of the Brahmaputra River was delightful. But in the rainy season, it was best to avoid the place as it was the hot bed of malaria disease. Travelling at this time may also cause problems. The rivers were over flooded and the bamboo bridges erected at the start of the cold weather were washed away. These bridges swayed and creaked alarmingly when a car passed through it, but were immensely strong and extremely useful. Once, the narrator crossed one of these flooded rivers on horseback. With difficulty, he persuaded his horse to plunge into the water, them slipped over his croup and hung on to his tail, which he was able to use as a rudder. When the narrator pushed the horse to the right, it veered to the left and when he pushed to the left, the horse veered to the right and in this way, eventually they made a safe landing on the other side of the river.

15. Answer any one of the following questions in 152-150 words: 1×7=7

a) Describe Tishani’s journey to the end of the earth – the Antarctic region, and his experience during that journey. ( Not in syllabus now)

Or

b) Discuss the forms of discrimination projected in the narrations of Zitkala-Sa and Bama.

Ans. Zitkala-Sa was an American Native. She was forcibly taken from her mother and an alien culture was thrust upon her against her wishes. But this was not the end of her misery. Her hair was cut. This was unacceptable to her. In her community, shingled hair was worn by cowards and short hair by those in mourning. Her experience depicts racial discrimination.

Bama belongs to a community which is considered low caste. They were untouchables and the high caste people thought that they would be polluted if low caste people touched them. She was very sad and the thought infuriated her.

Both of them refused to be victims. Zitkala put up a fight before her hair could be shingled. Bama studied like crazy and stood first in her class. Throughout their lives they continued to fight social discrimination.

16. Answer any four of the following questions in 30-40 words: 4×2=8

a) What was Zitkala-Sa’ immediate reaction to the cutting of her hair?

Ans: Zitkala-Sa was terribly shocked. She was in tears. She moaned for her mother. But no one came to comfort her. No one came to reason with her as her mother used to do. Now she felt herself as one of many little animals driven by a herder

b) What did Annan say about his community to the narrator?

Ans: Annan told the narrator that they belonged to a ‘low’ caste. The people of his community were not respected, honoured or given any importance. The members of their community can attain honour and dignity if they study and prosper. If they become learned, people will come to them of their own accord.

c) How has Antarctica remained relatively pristine?( Not in syllabus now)

d) What are Geoff Green’s reasons for including high school students in the ‘Students of Ice’ expedition? ( Not in syllabus now)

e) What is it that draws Derry towards Mr. Lamb in spite of himself?

Ans: Derry finds Mr. Lamb very different from others. Mr. Lamb shows no shock or fear on seeing Derry’s burnt face. Rather, he talks to him in a loving manner. He welcomes him to his garden. He tells Derry never to think of his burnt face. He says that Derry has two arms, two legs, eyes, ears, tongue and a brain. And if he has a firm mind, he can do better than others. Such words of encouragement bring about a total change in Derry’s mind. It is by such words of encouragement that Mr. Lamb draws Derry to himself.

f) Why aren’t there any curtains at the windows of Mr. Lamb’s house?

Ans: Mr. lamb loves outside world. He does not believe in shutting things out. He wants to feel the beauty of this world. He likes to hear the sound of wind blowing outside and the birds chirping outside. So he does not have curtains at his window. He also likes light and darkness.