Which one of the following was a significant feature of the Quit India Movement ?
- (a)Women did not play an important role in the movement
- (b)Nasik in Maharashtra was an important regional base during the movement
- (c)It was marked by anti-zamindar violence
- (d)It was marked by the emergence of parallel governments in different parts of India
Correct — D, the emergence of parallel governments. With almost the whole Congress leadership arrested on 9 August 1942, the movement passed to local hands, and in several places people simply took over the administration. In the Tamluk and Contai subdivisions of Midnapore the Tamluk National Government ran its own relief, courts and volunteer force until Gandhi asked its leaders to disband it in 1944; at Ballia in eastern Uttar Pradesh the crowd overthrew the district administration, broke open the jail and released the arrested Congress leaders; Satara in Maharashtra ran the longest-lived of these governments. That is the feature which sets 1942 apart from every earlier movement.
- (a)Women did not play an important role in the movement — The opposite is true. Aruna Asaf Ali hoisted the flag at the Bombay session after the leaders were arrested, Usha Mehta ran the underground Congress Radio, and Sucheta Kripalani was part of the underground leadership — 1942 is the movement in which women's participation is most visible.
- (b)Nasik in Maharashtra was an important regional base during the movement — The Maharashtra base of 1942 was Satara, not Nasik. Satara's prati sarkar, or counter-government, is the standard example of the movement's local strength in the State, alongside Midnapore in Bengal, Ballia in the United Provinces and Talcher in Odisha.
- (c)It was marked by anti-zamindar violence — The violence of 1942 was aimed at the machinery of the colonial state — police stations, post and telegraph offices, railway lines and government buildings. Attacks on landlords belong to the peasant and kisan sabha agitations, not to the Quit India upsurge.
Quit India began with the All India Congress Committee resolution at Gowalia Tank in Bombay on 8 August 1942 and Gandhi's call to do or die. The government arrested the entire top leadership before dawn on 9 August, which is precisely what gave the movement its character: leaderless, spontaneous and locally improvised, with underground networks and, in a few districts, complete parallel administrations.
This item is really a NOT-question in disguise: three of the four options are statements you can knock out from ordinary reading, and the survivor is the answer. Watch the place names — examiners routinely swap a famous city for the district that actually mattered. Nasik has its own place in the freedom struggle through the Nasik conspiracy case of 1910, which is what makes the swap tempting here, but the 1942 Maharashtra base was Satara.
- The Quit India resolution was passed by the AICC at Gowalia Tank, Bombay, on 8 August 1942.
- The Tamluk National Government functioned in the Tamluk and Contai subdivisions of Midnapore until 1944.
- At Ballia the district administration was overthrown and the jail opened to free arrested Congress leaders.
- Satara in Maharashtra, Talcher in Odisha and Midnapore in Bengal were the strongest local centres.
- Aruna Asaf Ali, Usha Mehta and Sucheta Kripalani were prominent in the movement and its underground.
- Swapping Satara for Nasik, or Midnapore for Murshidabad, when the question names a district.
- Carrying anti-landlord violence over from the peasant movements into 1942.
- Treating the arrest of the leaders as the end of the movement rather than the reason for its local form.
Quit India is asked as 'which statement is not true', as a chronology item, or through one of the parallel governments; the district names carry most of the marks.
Consider the following statements: On the eve of the launch of Quit India Movement, Mahatma Gandhi 1. Asked the Government servants to resign. 2. Asked the soldiers to leave their posts. 3. Asked the Princes of the Princely States to accept the sovereignty of their own people. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
- (a) 1 and 2
- (b) 2 and 3
- (c) 3 only
- (d) 1, 2 and 3
Answer(c) 3 only
The same movement tested through what Gandhi actually asked of officials, soldiers and princes on the eve of 8 August 1942.
Consider the following historical events: 1. Gandhi-Irwin Pact 2. Second Round Table Conference 3. Peasant Movement in Bardoli 4. Peasant Movement in Kheda Which one of the following is the correct chronological order (starting from the earliest) of the above events?
- (a) 4–1–3–2
- (b) 4–3–1–2
- (c) 3–1–2–4
- (d) 1–2–4–3
Answer(b) 4–3–1–2
The same Gandhian-phase syllabus, tested as a sequence of mass movements rather than as a feature of one of them.
- practice — not a real PYQ
The parallel government known as the Tamluk National Government functioned during the Quit India Movement in
- (a)Midnapore in Bengal
- (b)Ballia in the United Provinces
- (c)Satara in Maharashtra
- (d)Talcher in Odisha
Answer(a) Midnapore in Bengal — in its Tamluk and Contai subdivisions, until 1944.
- practice — not a real PYQ
The Quit India resolution was adopted by the All India Congress Committee at
- (a)Lahore
- (b)Bombay
- (c)Karachi
- (d)Nagpur
Answer(b) Bombay — at Gowalia Tank Maidan on 8 August 1942.