Who chaired the first conference of ‘Kumaon Parishad’ organised at Almora in 1917?
- (a)Hargovind Pant
- (b)Jadutt Joshi
- (c)Badridutt Pande
- (d)Govind Ballabh Pant
Correct — B, Jadutt Joshi.
The first conference of the Kumaon Parishad met at Almora in 1917, and the chair went to Jadutt Joshi — the name is written elsewhere as Jai Dutt Joshi — a retired deputy commissioner rather than one of the younger nationalists who had built the body.
That choice fits what the Parishad was at the time: a regional platform putting Kumaon's grievances to the administration. A senior retired official in the chair lent those demands respectability with the very government being petitioned.
The idea to carry away is that the founder of an organisation and the president of its opening session are two different questions. Hargovind Pant, Badri Datt Pandey and Govind Ballabh Pant were all active in the Parishad, but the Almora chair in 1917 was Joshi's.
- (a)Hargovind Pant — Hargovind Pant is one of the men who built the Kumaon Parishad, which makes him the natural pick if the stem is read as asking who was behind the organisation. It asks instead who sat in the chair at Almora in 1917, and that was Joshi.
Pant is the right answer to the Kumaon Parishad founder who represented the hill districts of the United Provinces in the Constituent Assembly. He was also elected deputy speaker of the Uttar Pradesh legislature (the former United Provinces) on 4 January 1951.
- (c)Badridutt Pande — Badri Datt Pandey's standing in Kumaon rests on what came after 1917. He edited Almora Akhbar in 1913, and when it was shut down he launched the weekly Shakti on 15 October 1918; his mass following dates from the agitation of 1921.
He is the right answer to the leader titled 'Kumaon Kesari' for the Coolie-Begar movement of 1921, and to questions on the Kumaon press. Placing him in the 1917 chair runs a later reputation backwards into an earlier date.
- (d)Govind Ballabh Pant — Recognition is not evidence. Govind Ballabh Pant is the best-known name in this list, but in the Parishad's early years he was a young lawyer working as an organiser, not the presiding officer of the 1917 session.
He is the right answer to the Kumaon figure who became Premier of the United Provinces, then Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh and Union Home Minister. He was awarded the Bharat Ratna in 1957.
The Kumaon Parishad was a regional political organisation of the Kumaon hills in the early twentieth century. It worked through conferences held in towns of the region, each with its own year, venue and presiding officer.
Its agenda was Kumaon's own burdens — above all the forced-labour customs of coolie-begar, utar and bardayash, together with the hardship the forest rules imposed on hill villages.
The Parishad sits at the hinge between two phases of politics in the hills. It began as a petitioning platform of lawyers, teachers and retired officials asking the administration to lift specific burdens on Kumaon.
Within a few years its politics had moved towards Congress-style agitation, and the men who trained in it went on to the Constituent Assembly, to provincial ministries and to the national cabinet.
That is why the same small set of names attaches to very different events in Uttarakhand's history, and why a stem has to be read for which event it names.
- The first conference of the Kumaon Parishad was held at Almora in 1917 and was presided over by Jai Dutt Joshi, a retired deputy commissioner.
- This paper prints the name as 'Jadutt Joshi'; it appears elsewhere as Jai Dutt Joshi or Jaidutt Joshi.
- Hargovind Pant was among the founders of the Kumaon Parishad and later sat in the Constituent Assembly for the hill districts of the United Provinces.
- Hargovind Pant was elected deputy speaker of the Uttar Pradesh legislature (the former United Provinces) on 4 January 1951.
- Badri Datt Pandey edited Almora Akhbar in 1913 and, after it was closed down, launched the weekly Shakti on 15 October 1918.
- Badri Datt Pandey was given the title 'Kumaon Kesari' for his part in the Coolie-Begar movement of 1921.
- In 1918 Badri Datt Pandey travelled to Calcutta as a Kumaon Parishad leader to invite Gandhi to the region; Gandhi had prior commitments.
- Govind Ballabh Pant was awarded the Bharat Ratna in 1957.
The highlighted line answers the stem; the other three names answer different questions.
- The stem asks who chaired, not who founded; a name central to the founding story need not be the name in the chair.
- Almora is both the town where the Parishad took shape and the venue of the 1917 conference, so recognising the place settles nothing about the person.
- Badri Datt Pandey's prominence dates from Shakti in 1918 and the agitation of 1921; attaching him to a 1917 chair runs his career backwards.
- Two different Pants stand in the option list — Hargovind and Govind Ballabh — and reading only the surname collapses two separate careers.
- The keyed name is printed here as 'Jadutt Joshi'; an unfamiliar transliteration can look like a filler option and be dismissed on sight.
The Parishad's conference record can be entered from any of its parts — the year of a session, the town it met in, the person in the chair, or what a session resolved. A stem can fix two of these and demand the third.
The same material also arrives from the person's side: a name is given and the demand is for the body he founded, the paper he edited or the movement he led.
Holding the names as a table with columns, rather than as a list, answers both shapes.
UKPSC_2025_PRE_GSI_Q802025Same organisation and the same conference-by-conference record. That stem asks where the fourth conference of the Kumaon Parishad was held; this one asks who chaired the first, at Almora in 1917. The attribute demanded differs — a venue there, a presiding officer here — and it is a later session, so one fact will not answer both. Together they show that the sessions are learnt as year, place and chair rather than as a single date.
- practice — not a real PYQ
The first conference of the Kumaon Parishad was held in which year and at which place?
- (a)1915, Nainital
- (b)1916, Haldwani
- (c)1917, Almora
- (d)1914, Ranikhet
Answerc — 1917, Almora. The Parishad's opening conference met at Almora in 1917 with Jai Dutt Joshi, printed in the UKPSC paper as Jadutt Joshi, in the chair; Almora is also the town in which the Parishad itself took shape.Options a, b and d each attach a different year to the first conference, so each fails on the year alone, whatever the town beside it.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Which leader of Kumaon was given the title 'Kumaon Kesari' for his part in the Coolie-Begar movement of 1921?
- (a)Hargovind Pant
- (b)Jai Dutt Joshi
- (c)Badri Datt Pandey
- (d)Govind Ballabh Pant
Answerc — Badri Datt Pandey. The title followed his leadership of the Coolie-Begar agitation of 1921; he had earlier edited Almora Akhbar and had launched the weekly Shakti on 15 October 1918.Hargovind Pant (a) is remembered as a founder of the Kumaon Parishad and a Constituent Assembly member for the hill districts. Jai Dutt Joshi (b) is remembered for chairing the Parishad's first conference at Almora in 1917.
Govind Ballabh Pant (d) is remembered for provincial and national office and the Bharat Ratna of 1957.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Which figure associated with the Kumaon Parishad went on to head the government of the United Provinces as Premier and later to serve as Union Home Minister?
- (a)Badri Datt Pandey
- (b)Govind Ballabh Pant
- (c)Hargovind Pant
- (d)Jai Dutt Joshi
Answerb — Govind Ballabh Pant. He led the United Provinces as Premier from 1937, headed Uttar Pradesh as Chief Minister after Independence, then held the Union Home Ministry; he received the Bharat Ratna in 1957.Hargovind Pant (c) sat in the Constituent Assembly for the hill districts and was elected deputy speaker of the Uttar Pradesh legislature (the former United Provinces) on 4 January 1951, an office of the legislature and not the premiership.
Badri Datt Pandey (a) was the journalist and agitator titled 'Kumaon Kesari'. Jai Dutt Joshi (d) was the retired deputy commissioner who chaired the Parishad's 1917 conference.