NCERT Solutions for Class 11 English Hornbill Chapter 7 The Adventure

NCERT Solutions for Class 11 English

The Adventure NCERT Solutions for Class 11 English Hornbill Chapter 7

The Adventure NCERT Text Book Questions and Answers

The Adventure About the Author

Jayant Vishnu Narlikar (born 19 July 1938) is an Indian astrophysicist. He developed with Sir Fred Hoyle the conformal gravity theory, known as Hoyle-Narlikar theory. In 1966, Fred Hoyle established Institute of Theoretical Astronomy in Cambridge, and Narlikar served as the founding staff member of the institute during 1966-72. In 1972, Narlikar took up Professorship at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR) in Mumbai, India.

The Adventure Main Theme

The author, Jayant Vishnu Narlikar, is an astrophysicist of international repute. This is another science fiction that he has offered to his readers. The story contains an episode of a person being in another dimension of history. The basic premise is “What would have been the state of affairs if a certain crucial event had taken place differently?” The event in question here is the Third Battle of Panipat. The author has visualised the situation as if Marathas won the war and Vishwas Rao remained alive to lead his people.

Prof. Gaitonde travels to Bombay which is under the British. He feels it is different from how he knows it to be. He looks for traces of his son in the city but does not find any. He consults history books written by himself and finds a different account of the battle of Panipat. The Marathas won the battle and became very powerful and had influence all over India. In the twentieth century, they put up centres of science and technology with the help of the British. In the twentieth century, India moved towards democracy, but the Sultanate of Delhi continued and Bombay remained a British territory. In this India, ruled by the Marathas, the people were confident and self-reliant.

Prof. Gaitonde wanted to know how this had happened. He looked at the history books again and discovered that Vishvas Rao did not die of bullet injury. A bullet brushed past his ear and he was in no danger.In the evening, after the library closed, Prof. Gaitonde went to Azad Maidan where a meeting was in progress. He noticed that there was no chairperson. He himself went up to the dais and started speaking. The public, however, chased him away.

After this, he found himself in the present time speaking to his friend, Rajendra. He still had the ‘Bakhar’ In his pocket from the library and had been missing for two days.

Where had he gone? His friend Rajendra tried to rationalise this experience on the basis of two theories— the catastrophe theory or ‘a crucial event gone the other way’ and the lack of determinism in the quantum theory, which means that the behaviour of electrons in atoms cannot be predicted. Rajendra says that ‘catastrophic situations offer radically different alternatives for the world to proceed. Therefore, there was a bifurcation in the battle of Panipat and Prof. Gaitonde experienced a different world not in past or future but at the present time.

How this happened is a mystery to science. Prof. Gaitonde had a collision with a truck and was thinking of the Battle of Panipat at that moment. Probably, that caused the transition.

The Adventure Understanding the text

I. Tick the statements that are true.

Question 1.
The story is an account of real events.
Answer:
For discussion only—to be conducted by the teacher as spoken activity. Any point of view may be taken.

Question 2.
The story hinges on a particular historical event.
Answer:
For discussion only—to be conducted by the teacher as spoken activity. Any point of view may be taken.

Question 3.
Rajendra Deshpande was a historian.
Answer:
False

Question 4.
The places mentioned in the story are all imaginary.
Answer:
False

Question 5.
The story tries to relate history to science.
Answer:
True

II. Briefly explain the following statements from the text.

Question 1.
“You neither travelled to the past nor the future. You were in the present experiencing a different world.”
Answer:
The story is based on the theory that catastrophic situations offer radically different alternatives. Prof. Gaitonde experienced a different world where he spent two days. In that world a catastrophic event, the Third Battle of Panipat, had a different outcome.

Question 2.
“You have passed through a fantastic experience: or more correctly, a catastrophic experience.”
Answer:
Prof. Gaitonde had experienced living in a different world which had a different history. The bifurcation took place in the Battle of Panipat, which had a different outcome. In this world Marathas had won the Battle and Vishwas Rao had remained alive to lead India. Consequently, the British presence in India was confined to Bombay, Calcutta and Madras.

Question 3.
Gangadharpant could not help comparing the country he knew with what he was witnessing around him.
Answer:
The country which Prof. Gaitonde knew had endured British rule for two centuries, whereas in the other world they had a very minor presence. The Marathas had supremacy all over India. The Mughals were confined to Delhi. The Peshwas had taken steps to ensure scientific and technological advance in the twentieth century.

Question 4.
“The lack of determinism in quantum theory !”
Answer:
The behaviour of very small systems like atoms and their constituents, cannot be predicted definitively even if all the physical laws governing those systems are known. For example, if an electron is shot, it cannot be said with certainty where it will go. This is lack of determinism in the quantum theory.

Question 5.
“You need some interaction to cause a transition.”
Answer:
Rajendra was not quite clear about how the transition from this world to another was made by
Prof. Gaitonde. He explained the occurrence thus. At the time of the collision with a truck
Prof. Gaitonde was thinking about the Catastrophe Theory and its role in wars. He was also thinking about the Battle of Panipat. Perhaps the neurons in his brain acted as a trigger. This interaction brought about the transition.

The Adventure Talking about the text

Question 1.
Discuss the following statements in groups of two pairs, each pair in a group taking opposite points of view.

(i) A single event may change the course of the history of a nation.
Answer:
The following points may be discussed. the death/survival of a leader, e.g. what if Mahatma Gandhi had died before India got free.
(i) the outcome of a war, e.g. what if Italy and Germany had won the Second World War.

(ii) Reality is what is directly experienced through the senses.
Answer:

• Reality may be extra sensory, e.g. the experiment of ghosts, etc.
• Reality may be intuitive, e.g. extra sensory perception.
• Reality may exist in another dimension of time or space.

(iii) The methods of inquiry of history, science and philosophy are similar. Discuss.
Answer:

• Similar — because analysis, reasoning, inference are employed.

Question 2.
(i) The story is called ‘The Adventure’. Compare it with the adventure described in ‘We’re Not Afraid to Die…’
Answer:
‘The Adventure’ is not a narration of real events; ‘We’re Not Afraid to Die is ….’

• ‘The Adventure’ is based on a hypothesis; ‘We’re Not’ is based on real incidents.
• ‘We’re Not…’ is a story of a family’s courage, resourcefulness and bonding together.

The Adventure’ has none of these because it is not a real story.

(ii) Why do you think Professor Gaitonde decided never to preside over meetings again?
Answer:

• because he had a bad experience in Azad Maidan.

The Adventure Thinking about language

Question 1.
In which language do you think Gangadharpant and Khan Sahib talked to each other? Which language did Gangadharpant use to talk to the English receptionist?
Answer:
Gangadharpant and Khan Sahib talked to each other in English G. spoke to the receptionist too the English.

Question 2.
In which language do you think Bhausahebanchi Bakhar was written?
Answer:
Bhausahebanchi Bakhar written a Marathi.

Question 3.
There is mention of three communities in the story: the Marathas, the Mughals, the Anglo-Indians. Which language do you think they used within their communities and while speaking to the other groups?
Answer:
The Marathas spoke in Marathi, the Mughals in Persian or Urdu, the Anglo-Indians in English.

Question 4.
Do you think that the ruled always adopt the language of the ruler?
Answer:
The ruled learn the language of the rulers for business official work and jobs. In the interaction within then communities they use their own language. Thus Indians learnt Persian under the Mughals and English under the British but used their own languages too.

The Adventure Thinking Working with words

I. Tick the item that is closest in meaning to the following phrases.

Question 1.
to take issue with
(i) to accept
(ii) to discuss
(iii) to disagree
(iv) to add
Answer:
(iii) to disagree

Question 2.
to give vent to
(i) to express
(ii) to emphasise
(iii) suppress
(iv) dismiss
Answer:
(i) to express

Question 3.
to stand on one’s feet
(i) to be physically strong
(ii) to be independent
(iii) to stand erect
(iv) to be successful
Answer:
(ii) to be independent

Question 4.
to be wound up
(i) to become active
(ii) to stop operating
(iii) to be transformed
(iv) to be destroyed
Answer:
(ii) to stop operating

Question 5.
to meet one’s match
(i) to meet a partner who has similar tastes
(ii) to meet an opponent
(iii) to meet someone who is equally able as oneself
(iv) to meet defeat
Answer:
(iii) to meet someone who is equally able as oneself

II. Distinguish between the following pairs of sentences:

Question 1.
(i) He was visibly moved.
(ii) He was visually impaired.
Answer:
(i) One could see that he was emotionally touched.
(ii) He was blind.

Question 2.
(i) Green and black stripes were used alternately.
(ii) Green stripes could be used or alternatively black ones.
Answer:
(i) One green and one black stripe were used many times in the same order.
(ii) Black stripes could be used in place of green ones.

Question 3.
(i) The team played the two matches successfully.
(ii) The team played two matches successively.
Answer:
(i) The team won the two matches they played.
(ii) The team played two matches one after the other.

Question 4.
(i) The librarian spoke respectfully to the learned scholar.
(ii) You will find the historian and the scientist in the archaeology and natural science sections of the museum respectively.
Answer:
(i) spoke with respect.
(ii) in the given order.

Noticing form

The story deals with unreal and hypothetical conditions. Some of the sentences used to express this notion are given below.
1. If I fire a bullet from a gun in a given direction at a given speed, I know where it will be at a later time.
2. If I knew the answer I would solve a great problem.
3. If he himself were dead in this world, what guarantee had he that his son would be alive?
4. What course would history have taken if the battle had gone the other way?
Notice that in an unreal condition, it is clearly expected that the condition will not be fulfilled.
Answer:
Read the notes and examples.
Notice the use of would, and the conditional clauses to express conditions that cannot be fulfilled.

The Adventure Thinking Things to do

Question 1.
Read the following passage on the Catastrophe Theory downloaded from the Internet.
Answer:
Originated by the French mathematician, Rene Thom, in the 1960s, catastrophe theory is a special branch of dynamical systems theory. It studies and classifies phenomena characterized by sudden shifts in behaviour arising from small changes in circumstances.

Catastrophes are bifurcations between different equilibria, or fixed point attractors. Due to their restricted nature, catastrophes can be classified on the basis of how many control parameters are being simultaneously varied. For example, if there are two controls, then one finds the most common type, called a ‘cusp’ catastrophe. If, however, there are more than five controls, there is no classification.

Catastrophe Theory has been applied to a number of different phenomena, such as the stability of ships at sea and their capsizing, bridge collapse, and, with some less convincing success, the fight- or-flight behaviour of animals and prison riots.

II. Look up the Internet or an encyclopaedia for information on the following theories.

(i) Quantum theory
(ii) Theory of relativity
(iii) Big Bang theory
(iv) Theory of evolution
Answer:
To be done by the student.