Social Science Class 10 Important Questions History Chapter 6 Work, Life and Leisure

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Social Science Class 10 Important Questions History Chapter 6 Work, Life and Leisure

Short Answer Question3 Marks

Question 1.
What was the impact of industrialization and urbanization on the family life in Britain in the nineteenth century? Explain. (2012)
Answer:
The industrialization and urbanization in Britain in the 19th century transformed the family in terms of function and shape. The family as an institution had broken down as the ties between members of households loosened, and among the working class the institution of marriage tended to break down. Women of the upper and middle classes in Britain faced increasingly higher levels of isolation, although their lives were made easier by domestic maids who cooked, cleaned and cared for young children on low wages.

The new city life encouraged the spirit of individualism and freedom from the collective values among both men and women. But men and women did not have equal access to the new urban space. Women lost their industrial jobs and were forced to withdraw into their homes. The public space became increasingly a male preserve, and the domestic sphere was seen as the proper place for women.

Question 2.
What was the status of the women folk in the conservative industrial towns? (2013)
Answer:
Position of women in Britain at the end of the 18th century and early 19th century. Life in the industrial city of London began to change and transform in various ways –

  1. Ties between members of the household weakened. Women of the upper and middle class faced the problem of isolation although their lives were made easy by domestic servants who worked for them.
  2. Women from the lower social classes had some control over their lives. They worked for wages as domestic maids who cooked, cleaned, and looked after young children.
  3. Public space was mainly a male preserve. Only the domestic sphere was seen as a proper place for women. After the Chartism Movement, women came to participate in political movements for suffrage and the right to vote.

Question 3.
What steps were taken by the British State to provide housing for working classes between 1919-1939 (during the War period)? (2012)
Answer:
Between the two World Wars, the responsibility for housing the working classes was accepted by the British State and a million houses, most of them single family cottages, were built by local authorities. Meanwhile, the city had extended beyond the range where people could walk to work, and the development of suburbs made new forms of mass transport, absolutely necessary, which led ultimately to the setting up of railways.

Question 4.
What were the steps taken to clean up London in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries? (2012, 2015)
Answer:

  1. Demands were made for new ‘lungs’ for the city and some attempts were made to bridge the difference between the city and the countryside through a Green Belt around London.
  2. Attempts were made to decongest localities, green the open spaces, reduce pollution and landscape the city.
  3. Large blocks of apartments were built and rent control was introduced in Britain during the First World War to ease the impact of a severe housing shortage.
  4. Architect and planner Ebenezer Howard developed the principles of the ‘Garden City’, a pleasant space full of plants and trees, where people would both live and work. Such green spaces were believed to produce better quality citizens.
  5. Raymond Unwin and Barry Parker developed the Garden suburb of New Earswick based on Howards idea. It had common gardens and beautiful spaces but could eventually be afforded by only the well-off workers.

Question 5.
Explain the benefits of London Tube railway for the population in the city. (2014)
Answer:
Benefits of London Tube railway:

  • The London underground railway partially solved the housing crisis by carrying large masses of people to and from the city. The population in the city became more dispersed.
  • Better-planned suburbs and a good railway network enabled large numbers to live outside Central London and travel to work.
  • The new conveniences wore down social distinctions.

Question 6.
How did air pollution become a nuisance for the Londoners? What steps were taken to solve the problem? (2015, 2014)
Answer:
The congestion in the 19th century industrial city of London led a yearning for clean country air. Because of widespread use of coal in homes and industries, air pollution led to bad tempers, smoke-related illnesses and dirty clothes. Demands were made for new ‘lungs’ for the city and some attempts were made to bridge the difference between the city and the countryside through a Green Belt around London.

  1. Factory owners and steam engine owners were told invest on technologies that would improve their machinery. However, it was not easy to monitor the smoke as owners got away with small adjustments to their machines that didn’t help to stop the smoke.
  2. Despite hurdles and opposition from the industries, the Smoke Abatement Acts of 1847 and 1853 were passed. However, these did not always work to clear the air.
  3. Attempts were made to decongest localities, green the open spaces, reduce pollution and landscape the city.
  4. Large blocks of apartments were built and rent control was introduced.
  5. Architect and planner Ebenezer Howard developed the principles of the ‘Garden City’, a pleasant space full of plants and trees, where people would both live and work.

Question 7.
How was Bombay turned into an industrial city? (2015)
Answer:
At first, Bombay was the major outlet for cotton textiles from Gujarat. Later, in the 19th century, the city functioned as a port through which large quantities of raw materials, such as cotton and opium, would pass. Gradually, it also became an important administrative centre in Western India, and then, by the end of the 19th century, a major industrial centre.

Bombay became the capital of the Bombay Presidency in 1819 after the Maratha defeat in the Anglo- Maratha war. The city quickly expanded. With the growth of trade in cotton and opium, large communities of traders and bankers as well as artisans and shopkeepers came to settle in Bombay. The establishment of textile mills led to a fresh surge in migration.

Bombay had its first cotton textile mill established in 1854. By 1921, there Were 85 cotton mills with about 1,46,000 workers. A large number of people flowed in from the nearby district of Ratnagiri to work in the Bombay mills. Women formed as much as 23% of the mill workforce in the period between 1919 and 1926. After that their number dropped.

Bombay dominated the maritime trade of India till well into the twentieth century.

Question 8.
‘The Chawls of Bombay were a small cosmopolitan community in themselves’. Explain the statement. (2012)
Answer:
With the rapid and unplanned expansion of the Bombay city, the crisis of housing became acute by mid 1850s. The arrival of textile mills increased the pressure on Bombay’s housing. The working people who migrated from various parts lived in thickly populated Chawls. Chawls are multi-storeyed structures built in the native parts of the town. Each Chawl was divided into smaller one room tenements which had no private toilets.

The homes being small, streets and neighbourhoods were used for a variety of activities such as working, washing, sleeping and various types of leisure activities. The magicians, monkey players and acrobats used to regularly perform their act in an open space in the middle of four Chawls. Liquor shops and akharas came up in any empty spot. These were also the place for the exchange of news about jobs, strikes, riots or demonstrations.

Question 9.
When was the Rent Act passed in Mumbai (Bombay)? What was its aim? What was the impact? (2013, 2014)
Answer:
The Rent Act was passed in Mumbai (Bombay) in the year 1918.
Aim: To solve the problem of housing, the Rent Act was passed with the aim of keeping the rents reasonable.
Impact However, it had the opposite effect of producing a severe housing crisis, since landlords withdrew houses from the market.

Question 10.
Examine the living conditions of different sections of society in Bombay prior to reclamation. (2015)
Answer:
Living conditions of different sections of society in Bombay prior to reclamation-

  • Bombay had sprawling, spacious and palatial private bungalows and governmental mansions where usually the European elite and the richer Parsi, Muslim and upper class traders lived.
  • More than 70% of the working people lived in the thickly populated chawls of Bombay.
  • Each chawl was divided into smaller one room tenements which had no private toilets. Due to high rents, workers shared homes either with relatives or caste fellows. People had to keep the windows of their rooms closed even in humid weather due to close proximity of filthy gutters, privies, buffalo stables, etc. Water was scarce and people often quarreled every morning for a turn at the tap. Living conditions were poor.

Question 11.
How did the development or expansion of Bombay (Mumbai) differ from London? State any three points of difference between the two. (2014)
Answer:
Difference between the expansion of Bombay and London:

  1. Town planning in London emerged from fears of social revolution and planning in Bombay came about as a result of fears about the plague epidemic.
  2. Bombay was a crowded city. Every Londoner in 1840s enjoyed an average space of 155 square yards while Bombay had a mere 9.5 square yards. By 1872, when London had an average of 8 persons per house, the density of Bombay was as high as 20.
  3. The city of Bombay began to develop along with the development of trade in agricultural goods whereas London began to develop after the industrial revolution.
  4. Bombay began to develop after European settlements there whereas London was developed by its own people.

Question 12.
State any three causes of air-pollution in Calcutta in the 19th century. (2017 D, 2013)
Answer:
Calcutta had a long history of air pollution:
City development everywhere occured at the expense of ecology and environment. Kolkata (Calcutta) was also not an exception. It too had a long history of air pollution.

  1. High levels of pollution were a consequence of the huge population that depended on dung and wood as fuel in their daily life.
  2. The main polluters were the industries and establishments that used steam engines run on coal. The city was built on marshy land the resulting fog combined with smoke generated thick block fog.
  3. The railway line introduced in 1855 brought a dangerous new pollutant into the picture—coal from Raniganj. The high content of ash in Indian coal was a problem.
  4. In 1920, the rice mills of Tollygunge began to bum rice husk instead of coal leading to air filled with black soot falling like drizzling rain.

Question 13.
What was the status of the women folk in the conservative industrial towns? (2017 OD)
Answer:
Position of women in Britain at the end of the 18th century and early 19th century:
Life in the industrial city of London began to change and transform in various ways-

  1. Ties between members of the household weakened. Women of the upper and middle class faced the problem of isolation although their lives were made easy be domestic servants who worked for them.
  2. Women from the lower social classes had some control over their lives. They worked for wages as domestic maids, who cooked, cleaned, and looked after young children.
  3. Public space was mainly a male preserve. Only the domestic sphere was seen as a proper place for women. After the Chartism Movement, women came to participate in political movements for suffrage and the right to vote.

Long Answer Questions (LA) 5 Marks

Question 14.
Describe the role of industrialisation in shaping of the modern cities in England. (2015)
Answer:
Industrialisation changed the form of urbanisation in the modem period. The early industrial cities of Britain such as Leeds and Manchester attracted large numbers of migrants to the textile mills set up in the eighteenth century.

  • During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, London became a centre for international trade and commerce and attracted a large number of traders and merchants from all over the world. It also became the refuge of democrats fleeing from the despotic regime. For example, large communities from all over Europe came and settled in London.
  • London was a powerful magnet for migrant population even when it did not have large factories. According to the historian Gareth Stedman Jones, “It became the city of clerks and shopkeepers, of small masters and skilled sweated out workers, of soldiers and servants, of casual labourers, street sellers and beggars.”
  • Apart from the dockyard, five major types of industries employed large number of workers:
    1. clothing and footwear,
    2. wood and furniture,
    3. metals and engineering,
    4. printing and stationery and
    5. precision products such as surgical instruments, watches and objects of precious metal.
  • By 1950, one out of 9 people in England and Wales lived in London. It was a colossal city with a population of 4 million (between 1810-1880). In addition, after 1840s, the building activities intensified in the city (construction of roads, railway lines, stations, tunnels, drainage and sewer) and attracted many more workers from outside making the city highly populated.
  • During the First World War, London began manufacturing motor cars and electrical goods and the number of large factories increased.

Question 15.
‘The function and the shape of the family were completely transformed by life in the industrial city.’ Explain. (2012)
Answer:
In the eighteenth (18th) century, the family had been a unit of production and consumption as well as of political decision-making. There was a big change in the older pattern.

  1. Ties between members of household loosened.
  2. The institution of marriage among the working class tended to break down.
  3. Women of the upper and middle classes in Britain, on the other hand, faced increasingly higher level of isolation, although their lives were made easier by maids who cooked, cleaned and cared for young children on low wages.
  4. Women, who worked for wages, had some control over their lives, particularly among the lower social classes.
  5. By the twentieth century, the urban family had been transformed yet again, partly by experience of the wartime work done by women who were employed in large numbers. The family now consisted of much smaller units.

Question 16.
How did marginal groups threaten the city of London? What was the root cause of this problem? How did the authorities in London try to solve this problem. (2012)
Answer:
London grew, crime flourished and became a matter of concern for the police and philanthropists. 20,000 criminals were listed living in the city who were in fact poor people and lived by stealing lead from roofs, food from shops, lumps of coal and clothes drying on hedges. The cheats, tricksters, pickpockets and petty thieves disturbed the law and order situation of the city. This happened due to mismatch between huge influx of labour from surrounding rural areas and the opportunities available to earn livelihood. In an attempt to discipline the population, the authorities imposed high penalties for crime and offered work to those who were considered the deserving poor.

Question 17.
Why did the underground railway soon become a necessity in London? Mention any three disadvantages of this system. (2013)
Answer:
London, like other old cities, became very crowded after the Industrial Revolution, when people began pouring in. The major problem, which cropped up, was of housing. Factory and workshop owners did not house the migrants. Instead, individual land-owners put up cheap tenements for the working class which were neither safe nor properly ventilated. Attempts were made to decongest the city of London and solve the housing crisis. Meanwhile, the city had extended beyond the range where people could walk to work. Thus, the development of suburbs made new forms of mass transport absolutely necessary. The London underground railway (set up in 1863) solved the housing crisis by carrying large masses of people to and from the city.
Three disadvantages of the underground railway:

  1. The underground railway added to the mess and unhealthiness of the city.
  2. To make approximately two miles of railway, 900 houses had to be destroyed. Thus, London tube rail led to massive displacement of the London poor.
  3. The underground railway was considered a menace to health due to the lack of oxygen created in the compartments by smoking pipes, fumes of gas lamps and coal dust.

Question 18.
Explain any five sources of entertainment for the common people of London in the nineteenth century. (2012, 2014)
Or
How did people from different classes organised their leisure time in England? (2014)
Answer:

  1. The concept of ‘London Season’ was an annual feature for the wealthy Britishers. Several cultural events such as the opera, the theatre and classical music performance were organized for an elite group of 300-400 families in the late eighteenth century.
  2. Meanwhile, the working class met in pubs to have drinks, exchange news or to discuss politics.
  3. In the nineteenth century some libraries, art galleries and museums were established to provide people with a sense of history and encourage them to take pride in the achievements of the British. To encourage people to visit the above mentioned places, the entry fee was waived.
  4. Music halls were popular among the lower classes. By the early twentieth century, cinema became the great mass entertainment for mixed audiences.
  5. Holidaying by the sea became popular among the industrial workers, who enjoyed the benefits of the sun and the bracing winds.

Quesstion 19.
Describe the emergence of Bombay as a city of film industry in the 20th century. (2013)
Answer:
Bombay with its expansion in trade, business and industries in the 19th century attracted a large number of migrants to come here and fulfill their dreams.

Despite massive overcrowding and difficult living conditions, Bombay (Mumbai) appears to many as mayanagari

  • a city of dreams.
  •  Many films of Bombay deal with the arrival in the city of new migrants and their pressures of daily life. Even some songs from films like CID (1956) and Guest House (1959) speak of the contradictory aspects of the city.
  • By 1925, Bombay had become India’s film capital, producing films for a national audience.
  • Most of the people in the film industry were themselves migrants who came from cities like Lahore, Calcutta, Madras and contributed to the national character of the film industry. Those who came from Lahore, then in Punjab, were very important for the development of the Hindi film industry. Many famous writers like Ismat Chugtai and Saadat Hasan Manto were associated with Hindi cinema.
  • Bombay films have contributed greatly to produce an image of the city as a blend of dreams and reality of slums and star bungalows.

Question 20.
Throw some light on Bombay chawls.
Answer:
Chawls were multi-storeyed structures which had been built from at least the 1860s in the ‘native’ parts of the town.

  1. Like tenements in London, these houses were largely owned by private landlords, such as merchants, bankers and building contractors, looking for quick ways of earning money from anxious migrants.
  2. Each chawl was divided into one-room tenements, which had no private toilets.
  3. Many families could reside at a time in a tenement. High rents forced workers to share homes, either with relatives or caste fellows who were streaming into the city. Average occupants in one room used to be 4 or 5.
  4. People had to keep the windows of their rooms closed even in humid weather due to the close proximity of filthy gutters, privies, buffalo stables, etc.
  5. Inadequate supply of water led to frequent quarrels among residents for a turn at the tap. Rooms were usually kept clean. Due to small rooms, neighbourhoods were used for a variety of activities, such as cooking, washing and sleeping. Liquor shops and Akharas had come up on empty spots.
  6. People, who belonged to the depressed classes and lower castes, were kept out of many chawls and often had to live in shelters made of corrugated sheets, leaves or bamboo poles.

Question 21.
Explain the land reclamation process in Bombay (Mumbai).
Answer:

  1. Seven islands of Bombay were joined into one landmass over a period of time. The need for additional commercial place in mid-nineteenth century led to the formulation of several plans for the reclamation of more land from sea. Both private companies and government were involved.
  2. In 1864, the Black Bay Reclamation Company won the right to reclaim the western foreshore from the tip of Malabar Hills to the end of Colaba. Reclamation often meant levelling of hills around Bombay.
  3. By 1870, the city had expanded 22 square km. As the population continued to increase, every bit of available area was built over and new areas were reclaimed from the sea.
  4. A successful reclamation project was undertaken by the Bombay Port Trust, which built a dry dock between 1914 and 1918 and used the excavated earth to create the 22 acre Ballad Estate. Subsequently the famous Marine Drive of Bombay was developed.