Directions (next ten questions) : Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below. Certain words are given in bold in the passage to help you locate them while answering some of the questions.
By the mid-nineteenth century, the educated Indian had become sufficiently aware of both his rich historical heritage and the subject state of his current existence. Nostalgia and a sense of racial identity grew as Indians gradually perceived the oppressiveness of alien rule. In the early nineteenth century, Orientalist scholars associated with the Fort William College, Kolkata helped considerably to unearth several obscure Indian texts and traditions, thereby, also creating a new awareness and sensitivity among Indians about their cultural heritage.
In the first half of the nineteenth century, particularly in some parts of the country, patriotism was not grossly inconsistent with an undisguised support for the continuation of British rule. Writers of this period from many centuries of ‘tyrannical’ and ‘unprogressive’ governance of earlier rulers. Many people of this time, in fact, made an important distinction between the pragmatic gains to be made from a short-term tutelage under British rule and a long-term objective of securing independence from it. Through such thoughts ultimately proved to be naïve and over-optimistic, in the 1820s and 1830s the advantages of British rule seemed to outweigh its disadvantages. In a letter written in reformer Raja Rammohan Roy (1774-1833) opposed an official move to open a Sanskrit College on the ground that it would produce no positive or progressive influence on the educated Hindu. He felt rather than indulge in abstract metaphysical speculation as was likely to be the result of a purely Sanskritic education, Indians would profit far more by imbibing the best of modern European civilization—pragmatism and a rational, scientific outlook. Social usefulness more than anything else, was now to be the true measure of things. In fact, his emphasis on rationality and a commonsense approach to religion led some of his friends and admirers to call him a ‘religious utilitarian’.
