UPPSC 2024 Prelims GS Paper-I · Question 16 of 150

Correct — A, 4, 3, 2, 1. That is the option the official UPPSC SET-D key marks, and it is the option on which marks were awarded on 22 December 2024, so treat it as the answer for this paper. You should also know, honestly, that this is one of the rare questions where the commission's own key does not match the historical record. Option (a) reads: UK Parliamentary Delegation → Interim Government → Cabinet Mission → RIN Revolt. No source produces that order. The dated sequence is: the UK Parliamentary Delegation was in India in January–February 1946; the Royal Indian Navy Revolt ran 18–25 February 1946; the Cabinet Mission was announced on 19 February 1946 and reached India on 24 March 1946; and the Interim Government was sworn in on 2 September 1946 — i.e. 4 → 1 → 2 → 3, which is option (b). We checked this against the commission's own answer-marked booklet before writing this card: the box really is printed on (a). So the error is UPPSC's, not a slip in our reproduction of the key. Score (a); learn the four dates below, because that is what any future paper will actually test.

• (b)4, 1, 2, 3 — Historically this is the defensible order — Delegation (Jan 1946) → RIN Revolt (18 Feb 1946) → Cabinet Mission (announced 19 Feb, arrived 24 Mar 1946) → Interim Government (2 Sep 1946). It is nevertheless NOT the option the official SET-D key marks, so it earned no mark in the exam. We flag the conflict rather than hide it: for the 2024 paper the answer is (a); for your history, (b) is the sequence to remember.
• (c)4, 2, 1, 3 — This places the Cabinet Mission ahead of the RIN Revolt. The revolt began aboard HMIS Talwar in Bombay on 18 February 1946 — a day before Attlee announced the mission in the Commons on 19 February — and the three ministers only landed in India on 24 March 1946. So on either dating, the announcement or the arrival, the revolt comes first.
• (d)2, 4, 1, 3 — It puts the Cabinet Mission first of all, before the UK Parliamentary Delegation. That inverts cause and effect: the ten-member Delegation toured India in January–February 1946 to sound out Indian opinion, and the Cabinet Mission of three Cabinet ministers followed it.

Between the end of the Second World War and Independence, British policy on India moved in a rapid series of steps, and 1946 is the densest year of that sequence. A ten-member UK Parliamentary Delegation visited India in January–February 1946 to gauge opinion; the ratings of the Royal Indian Navy mutinied at Bombay from 18 to 25 February; Attlee announced a Cabinet Mission of three Cabinet ministers on 19 February, and it reached India on 24 March; when the mission's constitutional plan (16 May 1946) was partly accepted, an Interim Government took office on 2 September 1946 with Nehru as Vice-President of the Viceroy's Executive Council.

Chronology questions on 1945–47 are won by memorising a handful of exact dates rather than by reasoning. The trap in this particular question is that three of the four events fall within about five weeks of each other in February–March 1946, so a vague sense of 'the mutiny came around the time of the Cabinet Mission' is not enough — you need 18 February for the revolt and 19 February for the announcement. The one event that is easy to anchor is the Interim Government: 2 September 1946, and it is always last of the four.

• UK Parliamentary Delegation: in India January–February 1946, ten MPs and peers led by Robert Richards, sent to sound out Indian opinion on independence; it preceded the Cabinet Mission.
• Royal Indian Navy Revolt: 18–25 February 1946, began at the signals school HMIS Talwar, Colaba, Bombay; B.C. Dutt was a key instigator and M.S. Khan and Madan Singh led the Naval Central Strike Committee.
• Cabinet Mission: announced 19 February 1946, arrived in India 24 March 1946 — Lord Pethick-Lawrence, Sir Stafford Cripps and A.V. Alexander; its plan was issued on 16 May 1946.
• Interim Government: formed 2 September 1946 with Jawaharlal Nehru as Vice-President of the Viceroy's Executive Council; the Muslim League joined only on 26 October 1946.
• The official UPPSC SET-D key marks (a) 4, 3, 2, 1; the documented order of the same four events is (b) 4, 1, 2, 3.

• Dating the Cabinet Mission by its arrival (24 March 1946) when the question says 'announcement' (19 February 1946) — here it does not change the order, but in other papers it can.
• Confusing the Interim Government (2 September 1946) with the Constituent Assembly's first sitting (9 December 1946).
• Assuming the RIN Revolt caused the Cabinet Mission. The mission was announced on 19 February, the day after the revolt began — the decision had already been taken; the revolt sharpened the urgency, it did not create the mission.

UPPSC and UPSC both like 1945–47 as an 'arrange in chronological order' or 'which came last' item; UPSC 2017 sequenced the RIN mutiny against the Quit India Movement and the Round Table Conference, and UPPSC repeats the format almost every year.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The Royal Indian Navy revolt of February 1946 began on board which ship?

  • (a)HMIS Talwar
  • (b)HMIS Hindustan
  • (c)HMIS Narbada
  • (d)HMIS Bahadur

  Answer(a) HMIS Talwar — the signals training establishment at Colaba, Bombay, where ratings struck on 18 February 1946; HMIS Hindustan at Karachi joined later.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Who among the following was NOT a member of the Cabinet Mission that came to India in 1946?

  • (a)Lord Pethick-Lawrence
  • (b)Sir Stafford Cripps
  • (c)A. V. Alexander
  • (d)Lord Wavell

  Answer(d) Lord Wavell — he was the Viceroy who received the mission, not one of its three members (Pethick-Lawrence, Cripps and Alexander).