My acquaintance with the barefoot ragpickers leads me to Seemapuri, a place on the periphery of Delhi yet miles away from it, metaphorically. Those who live here are squatters who came from Bangladesh back in 1971. Saheb’s family is among them. Seemapuri was then a wilderness. It still is, but it is no longer empty. In structures of mud, with roofs of tin and tarpaulin, devoid of sewage, drainage or running water, live 10,000 ragpickers.

They have lived here for more than thirty years without an identity, without permits but with ration cards that get their names on voters’ lists and enable them to buy grain. Food is more important for survival than an identity. “If at the end of the day we can feed our families and go to bed without an aching stomach, we would rather live here than in the fields that gave us no grain,” say a group of women in tattered saris when I ask them why they left their beautiful land of green fields and rivers. Wherever they find food, they pitch their tents that become transit homes.

Children grow up in them, becoming partners in survival. And survival in Seemapuri means rag-picking. Through the years, it has acquired the proportions of a fine art. Garbage to them is gold. It is their daily bread, a roof over their heads, even if it is a leaking roof. But for a child, it is even more.

Questions:

Q.1. “Seemapuri is yet miles away from Delhi, metaphorically”. One of the following sentences explains this briefly. Pick it out.
A. Seemapuri is quite distant from Delhi.
B. Seemapuri is underdeveloped, uncultured in comparison to Delhi.
C. Seemapuri is a home-place for ragpickers only.
D. None of these three

Q.2. The phrase ‘without an aching stomach’ here means ………………… .
A. ‘without any physical disorder’. B. ‘without any trouble’.
C. ‘with stomach full’. D. ‘without taking sleeping pills.

Q.3. The words ‘land of green fields and rivers’ refer to the land of …………………………. .
A. Kolkata. B. Bangladesh. C. Delhi. D. Pakistan.

“I now work in a tea stall down the road,” he says, pointing in the distance. “I am paid 800 rupees and all my meals.” Does he like the job ? I ask. His face, I see, has lost the carefree look. The steel canister seems heavier than the plastic bag he would carry so lightly over his shoulder. The bag was his. The canister belongs to the man who owns the tea shop. Questions
Q.1. What did the new job done by the boy Involve ? i. Working at a tea stall. ii. Being paid 800 rupees. iii. Carrying the steel canister all day. iv. Being given all meals.
A. i. ii. Iii	B. i, il, iv	C. ii, iii, iv	D. ii, iv
Q.2. What was the effect of the job on the boy ?
A. He was bringing happiness to his family.		B. He was now a mature person.
C. He had lost his carefree look.		D. He had lost a lot of weight.
Q.3. Who has penned the story ?
A. Anees Jung	B. Kamala Das	C. A R Barton	D. Asokamitran

“Why not organise yourselves into a cooperative ?” I ask a group of young men who have fallen into the vicious circle of middlemen who trapped their fathers and forefathers. “Even if we get organised, we are the ones who will be hauled up by the police, beaten and dragged to jail for doing something illegal,” they say. There is no leader among them, no one who could help them see things differently.

Their fathers are as tired as they are. They talk endlessly in a spiral that moves from poverty to apathy to greed and to injustice. Listening to them, I see two distinct worlds – one of the family, caught in a web of poverty, burdened by the stigma of caste in which they are born; the other a vicious circle of the sahukars, the middlemen, the policemen, the keepers of law, the bureaucrats and the politicians. Together they have imposed the baggage on the child that he cannot put down. Before he is aware, he accepts it as naturally as his father.

To do anything else would mean to dare. And daring is not part of his growing up. When I sense a flash of it in Mukesh I am cheered. “I want to be a motor mechanic,’ he repeats. He will go to a garage and learn. But the garage is a long way from his home. “I will walk,” he insists. “Do you also dream of flying a plane?” He is suddenly silent. “No,” he says, staring at the ground. In his small murmur, there is an embarrassment that has not yet turned into regret. He is content to dream of cars that he sees hurtling down the streets of his town. Few aeroplanes fly over Firozabad.
Questions :
Q.1. The meaning of the phrase ‘hauled up’ is ……………………… .
A. ‘punished’. B. ‘tortured’. C. ‘arrested’. D. ‘supported’.

Q.2. The ‘baggage on the child’ is ………………………… .
A. ‘force the profession on the child’.
B. ‘the load of the bag full of rags’.
C. ‘the debts that their parents have incurred’.
D. None of these three.

Q.3. What is different with Mukesh?
A. He dreams of flying a plane.
B. He wants to be a motor mechanic.
C. He does not want to be seized to be a ragpicker.
D. Both ‘B’ and ‘C’.

“Why not organise yourselves into a cooperative ?” I ask a group of young men who have fallen into the vicious circle of middlemen who trapped their fathers and forefathers. “Even if we get organised, we are the ones who will be hauled up by the police, beaten and dragged to jail for doing something illegal,” they say. There is no leader among them, no one who could help them see things differently.

Their fathers are as tired as they are. They talk endlessly in a spiral that moves from poverty to apathy to greed and to injustice. Listening to them, I see two distinct worlds – one of the family, caught in a web of poverty, burdened by the stigma of caste in which they are born; the other a vicious circle of the sahukars, the middlemen, the policemen, the keepers of law, the bureaucrats and the politicians. Together they have imposed the baggage on the child that he cannot put down. Before he is aware, he accepts it as naturally as his father.

To do anything else would mean to dare. And daring is not part of his growing up. When I sense a flash of it in Mukesh I am cheered. “I want to be a motor mechanic,’ he repeats. He will go to a garage and learn. But the garage is a long way from his home. “I will walk,” he insists. “Do you also dream of flying a plane?” He is suddenly silent. “No,” he says, staring at the ground. In his small murmur, there is an embarrassment that has not yet turned into regret. He is content to dream of cars that he sees hurtling down the streets of his town. Few aeroplanes fly over Firozabad.
Questions :
Q.1. The meaning of the phrase ‘hauled up’ is ……………………… .
A. ‘punished’. B. ‘tortured’. C. ‘arrested’. D. ‘supported’.

Q.2. The ‘baggage on the child’ is ………………………… .
A. ‘force the profession on the child’.
B. ‘the load of the bag full of rags’.
C. ‘the debts that their parents have incurred’.
D. None of these three.

Q.3. What is different with Mukesh?
A. He dreams of flying a plane.
B. He wants to be a motor mechanic.
C. He does not want to be seized to be a ragpicker.
D. Both ‘B’ and ‘C’.

One winter morning I see Saheb standing by the fenced gate of the neighbourhood club, watching two young men dressed in white, playing tennis. “I like the game,” he hums, content to watch it standing behind the fence. “I go inside when no one is around,” he admits. “The gatekeeper lets me use the swing.”Saheb too is wearing tennis shoes that look strange over his discoloured shirt and shorts.

“Someone gave them to me,” he says in the manner of an explanation. The fact that they are discarded shoes of some rich boy, who perhaps refused to wear them because of a hole in one of them, does not bother him. For one who has walked barefoot, even shoes with a hole is a dream come true. But the game he is watching so intently is out of his reach.

This morning, Saheb is on his way to the milk booth. In his hand is a steel canister. “I now work in a tea stall down the road,” he says, pointing in the distance. “I am paid 800 rupees and all my meals.” Does he like the job? I ask. His face, I see, has lost the carefree look. The steel canister seems heavier than the plastic bag he would carry so lightly over his shoulder. The bag was his. The canister belongs to the man who owns the teashop. Saheb is no longer his own master!

Questions:

Q.1. Saheb is satisfied with ……………………. .
A. just watching tennis being played.
B. just having a ride on the swing.
C. entering the club with the permission of the watchman.
D. entering the club without the permission of the watchman.

Q.2. ………………………….. is ‘out of reach’ for Saheb.
A. Tennis shoes B. Game of Tennis
C. Nice clothes. D. The milk booth.

Q.3. What was wrong with the tennis shoes?A. They were given by some rich boy.
B. They were discarded ones.
C. In one of them there was a hole.
D. They did not suit him over his discoloured shirt and shorts.

“Why not organise yourselves into a cooperative ?” I ask a group of young men who have fallen into the vicious circle of middlemen who trapped their fathers and forefathers. “Even if we get organised, we are the ones who will be hauled up by the police, beaten and dragged to jail for doing something illegal,” they say. There is no leader among them, no one who could help them see things differently.

Their fathers are as tired as they are. They talk endlessly in a spiral that moves from poverty to apathy to greed and to injustice. Listening to them, I see two distinct worlds – one of the family, caught in a web of poverty, burdened by the stigma of caste in which they are born; the other a vicious circle of the sahukars, the middlemen, the policemen, the keepers of law, the bureaucrats and the politicians. Together they have imposed the baggage on the child that he cannot put down. Before he is aware, he accepts it as naturally as his father.

To do anything else would mean to dare. And daring is not part of his growing up. When I sense a flash of it in Mukesh I am cheered. “I want to be a motor mechanic,’ he repeats. He will go to a garage and learn. But the garage is a long way from his home. “I will walk,” he insists. “Do you also dream of flying a plane?” He is suddenly silent. “No,” he says, staring at the ground. In his small murmur, there is an embarrassment that has not yet turned into regret. He is content to dream of cars that he sees hurtling down the streets of his town. Few aeroplanes fly over Firozabad.
Questions :
Q.1. The meaning of the phrase ‘hauled up’ is ……………………… .
A. ‘punished’. B. ‘tortured’. C. ‘arrested’. D. ‘supported’.

Q.2. The ‘baggage on the child’ is ………………………… .
A. ‘force the profession on the child’.
B. ‘the load of the bag full of rags’.
C. ‘the debts that their parents have incurred’.
D. None of these three.

Q.3. What is different with Mukesh?
A. He dreams of flying a plane.
B. He wants to be a motor mechanic.
C. He does not want to be seized to be a ragpicker.
D. Both ‘B’ and ‘C’.

“It is his karma, his destiny,” says Mukesh’s grandmother, who has watched her own husband go blind with the dust from polishing the glass of bangles. “Can a God-given lineage ever be broken ?” she implies. Questions
Q.1. What was the old woman's belief ? A. That your destiny is chosen by you. B. That a man does what is written in his destiny and lineage. C. That destiny has no place in one’s life. D. That their destiny has always been bad.
Q.2. What suffering did the old woman witness? A. She has been making bangles from the time she was married. B. She has had a bad karma. C. Her husband did the horrible work of bangle making. D. Her husband went blind making bangles.
Q.3. Where was Mukesh from ?
A. Firozabad	B. Faridabad	C. Ferozabad	D. Faizabad