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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What is the profession of the man that Ram Charan's sister is marrying?
(a) Washerman.
(b) Water carrier.
(c) Leather worker.
(d) Soldier.

2. What does Bakha anticipate his father's reaction will be if he tells him about his day's problems?
(a) He will be angry and want revenge.
(b) He will not understand why Bakha is upset.
(c) He will blame Bakha.
(d) He will make Bakha apologize to the priest.

3. When Bakha gets home, where is he told that his brother has gone?
(a) To Ram Charan's sister's wedding.
(b) To play hockey.
(c) To beg for food in the barracks.
(d) To clean the latrines.

4. What does Bakha do after he sits down in the alley where he has been unable to get any attention from the houses?
(a) He prays.
(b) He plots revenge against the priest.
(c) He falls asleep.
(d) He begins to weep.

5. After he is thrown out of his house, what irony does Bakha see in his father's behavior?
(a) His father is really the lazy one, and yet Bakha is the one who has been turned out of the house.
(b) His father is cruel to him, yet this is also the same father who begged for medicine for him.
(c) His father has punished him by throwing him out, but Bakha does not want to be at home, anyway.
(d) All Bakha wanted to do was get the broom and go clean, as his father wanted him to do.

Short Answer Questions

1. What does his trip to the kitchen cause Bakha to remember?

2. What emotion does Bakha struggle with as his father tells the story of the time he was so ill as a child?

3. What makes Bakha think that the hockey stick is "the best stick that had been manufactured in the world" (95)?

4. What does Charat Singh send Bakha to fetch in the kitchen?

5. Why is Lakha so eager to talk to the town's families about when their daughters will get married?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the significance of Bakha asking Ram Charan to toss him a sugar plum instead of taking it himself?

2. When Bakha is lying under a tree outside the barracks, what does he decide about taking so much time away from work?

3. What is the function of the passage of description of Bakha's family's outdoor kitchen?

4. How does the first woman in the alley houses treat Bakha and the sadhu very differently?

5. How does Bakha react to Chota's suggestion that the friends "catch hold" of the priest one day (84)?

6. What stories about Charat Singh's hockey career does Bakha think about while he is waiting for Charat Singh to appear?

7. How does the younger of the babu's sons end up getting injured?

8. What puzzles Bakha about his having had the courage to ask a sentry for the solar topee when he was a child, and why does it puzzle him?

9. Why do the sweepers all spend so much time outdoors, even when they are not working?

10. What excuse does Bakha give for not bringing more food home, and how does his father's reply make him feel?

(see the answer keys)

This section contains 1,210 words (approx. 5 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample