BPSC 70th CCE Re-exam Prelims General Studies · Question 4 of 142

Correct — C, Rajiv Ranjan Sinha. The Government of India Act 1935 gave Bihar a two-chamber legislature for the first time: a Legislative Assembly as the lower House and a Legislative Council as the upper House. The first Bihar Legislative Council was constituted on 22 July 1936 with 30 members, and the two Houses held their first joint session on 22 July 1937. The Bihar Vidhan Parishad's own roll of former Chairmen — पूर्व सभापतियों की सूची, published by the Council itself — opens with exactly one name for that founding term: Rajiv Ranjan Prasad, Chairman from 23 July 1937 to 6 September 1948, followed by Shyama Prasad Singh from 7 September 1948. Eleven years in the chair, and the only man who can be called the Council's first Chairman under the 1935 Act. Option (c) is that man, and it is the only option that carries his given name. One honest caveat, because it is visible on the page: the booklet prints the surname 'Sinha' where the Council's own list prints 'Prasad'. The Commission published no key for this paper, so nothing external settles the spelling; what can be established is that no other option names anyone who ever presided over this House, and that the given name 'Rajiv Ranjan' belongs to precisely one presiding officer in the Council's entire record. Take the name in the option as pointing to the Chairman of 1937–48, and (c) is the answer.

• (a)Rajendra Prasad — The biggest name a Bihar paper can put in front of a candidate, planted here precisely because it is Bihari and constitutional. Rajendra Prasad presided over the Constituent Assembly, which elected him its President on 11 December 1946, and became India's first President in 1950 — but he never chaired the Bihar Legislative Council. He does have a real 1939 claim, and it is a different one: he took over as President of the Indian National Congress after Subhas Chandra Bose resigned that April, which is question 41 on this very paper.
• (b)Rai Bahadur Satish Chandra — A plausible-sounding colonial honorific attached to a name that appears nowhere in the presiding record of either House. The pre-1937 presidents of the old Bihar and Orissa Legislative Council were Sir Walton Maude (1921), Sachchidanand Sinha (July 1921 to November 1922), Khawaja M. Noorie (1922–29), Nirsu Narayan Singh (1930–32) and Rajandhari Singh (1933–36); the post-1937 Chairmen begin with the 1937–48 term. 'Rai Bahadur Satish Chandra' is on neither list.
• (d)More than one of the above — This escape option can only win if you can name at least two of the other three who simultaneously satisfy the stem. The Council has one first Chairman and one founding term, 23 July 1937 to 6 September 1948, held by one man. Two people cannot both be first.

The Government of India Act 1935 was the longest statute the British Parliament had ever passed, and its provincial half is the part that actually took effect. It abolished dyarchy in the provinces and gave them autonomy, with ministers responsible to elected legislatures, and it created second chambers where none had existed: six of the eleven British Indian provinces — Bengal, Bombay, Madras, Bihar, Assam and the United Provinces — received a Legislative Council alongside the Legislative Assembly. A Legislative Council is a permanent House. Unlike an Assembly it cannot be dissolved; a share of its members retires periodically and is replaced, so the House itself never ceases to exist. Its presiding officer, called Sabhapati in Hindi and Chairman in English, is elected by the members from among themselves — which is what the stem's word 'elected' is signalling, in contrast with the nominated European presidents who had chaired the old Bihar and Orissa Council in the 1920s.

The reasoning route here is elimination by office, not recall of an obscure name. Ask what each named man is actually famous for. Rajendra Prasad's offices are all recorded and none of them is this one — Congress President in 1934, 1939 and 1947, President of the Constituent Assembly from December 1946, first President of India from 1950. That leaves a name that is genuinely obscure and a name that is genuinely invented, and BPSC's habit is that the obscure-but-real name is the answer. It is also worth separating the two 1937 offices that this period produces, because BPSC asks about both: the head of government in Bihar under the 1935 Act was called the Premier, not the Chief Minister — Mohammad Yunus first, then Sri Krishna Sinha, who formed his cabinet at Patna on 20 July 1937 and served to 31 October 1939 — while the Chairman of the Legislative Council is a presiding officer of the upper House, not a minister at all. Confusing the two is the standard error on this decade of Bihar polity.

• The Government of India Act 1935 made Bihar's legislature bicameral; the first Bihar Legislative Council was constituted on 22 July 1936 with 30 members, and both Houses held their first joint session on 22 July 1937.
• The Bihar Vidhan Parishad's own list of former Chairmen opens with Rajiv Ranjan Prasad, 23 July 1937 to 6 September 1948, followed by Shyama Prasad Singh from 7 September 1948.
• Presiding officers of the earlier Bihar and Orissa Legislative Council: Sir Walton Maude (1921), Sachchidanand Sinha (July 1921 – November 1922), Khawaja M. Noorie (1922–29), Nirsu Narayan Singh (1930–32), Rajandhari Singh (1933–36).
• Bihar's head of government under the 1935 Act was styled Premier: Mohammad Yunus first, then Sri Krishna Sinha, who formed his cabinet at Patna on 20 July 1937 and held office to 31 October 1939 before becoming Bihar's first Chief Minister in 1947.
• Bihar remains one of only six States with a Legislative Council — Andhra Pradesh, Bihar (75 members), Karnataka, Maharashtra, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh. Jammu and Kashmir's 36-member Council was abolished by the Jammu and Kashmir Reorganisation Act, 2019.

• Choosing Rajendra Prasad because he is the famous Bihari constitutional figure. His offices are Congress President, President of the Constituent Assembly and President of India — never Chairman of the Bihar Legislative Council.
• Confusing the Chairman of the Legislative Council with the Premier of the province. In 1937 those were two different offices held by two different men.
• Reading 'Legislative Council' as the pre-1937 Bihar and Orissa Legislative Council. That was a single-chamber body whose presiding officers were a separate line ending in 1936.

BPSC asks Bihar's institutional history by name and office — who was the first Chairman, the first Premier, the first Speaker, the first Governor — because these are facts a Bihar candidate is expected to hold and a general aspirant will not. UPSC never asks who held a State office; it asks what the Act did, which is why UPSC's version of this material arrives as 'which of the following was not a feature of the Government of India Act, 1935'.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Government of India Act 1935 introduced bicameral legislatures in how many of the eleven British Indian provinces ?

  • (a)Four
  • (b)Five
  • (c)Six
  • (d)All eleven

  Answer(c) Six — Bengal, Bombay, Madras, Bihar, Assam and the United Provinces received a Legislative Council alongside the Legislative Assembly; the remaining five provinces stayed single-chambered.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Under the Government of India Act 1935, the head of government in a province such as Bihar was designated

  • (a)Chief Minister
  • (b)Premier
  • (c)Chief Commissioner
  • (d)Diwan

  Answer(b) Premier — Bihar's Premiers under the Act were Mohammad Yunus and then Sri Krishna Sinha, who formed his cabinet at Patna on 20 July 1937. The designation 'Chief Minister' came only with the Constitution.