NCERT Solutions for Class 5th The World Around Us Chapter 6 The Northeast market picture — Write
Book page 102 Updated on2026-09-19
Q1.
The picture on page 102, redrawn.
Look at the picture. Identify three things being sold in the market.
Answer
Three easy ones: cane and bamboo baskets, hand-woven cloth, and earthen pots of pickle and honey. Look at the ground in front of the people in the picture on page 102 — the goods are laid out there.
What is on sale
Where to look in the picture
Cane and bamboo baskets
Four round open baskets on the ground at the left, in front of the weaver
Hand-woven cloth
Bright striped shawls and stoles with fringes, hung over stands at the centre-right
Earthen pots with cloth-tied lids
Three reddish clay jars — pickle or honey, tied over with cloth
Small bottles
Little pale bottles beside the pots — honey or chilli pickle
Brooms of broom grass
The tall bundle of pale yellow stalks standing behind the cloth
A woven cane mat or shield
The flat piece with a red and blue pattern, on the right of the cloth
Bananas
A hand of green-yellow bananas at the right, near the bushes
Cloth being woven then and there
The woman at the left is weaving striped cloth on a bamboo loom
Any three, for example — cane baskets, hand-woven shawls, pots of honey and pickle
Notice what they all have in common: every single thing on sale was made by hand from something that grows right there — bamboo and cane for the baskets, cotton and wool for the cloth, broom grass for the brooms, clay for the pots, fruit and honey from the forest. Nothing had to be brought from far away. That is what "living with nature" looks like in a market.
Answer from the picture, not from memory. Put your finger on each thing you name before you write it down. That is how a careful observer works.
Q2.
The picture on page 102, redrawn.
Identify the festival from the above picture.
Answer
It is Bihu, the festival of Assam. The two women in the middle of the picture are doing the Bihu dance.
The clues that prove it:
The dancers wear a cream cloth with a broad red and gold border. That dress is the mekhela chador, the traditional dress of Assam.
They have both arms raised and are bending sideways — the well-known step of the Bihu dance.
There are flowers in their hair, and one of them is smiling towards the crowd.
Behind them a market and a village fair are going on, with cloth, baskets and food on sale. Bihu is a village festival held with just such a fair.
The setting fits — green hills, a river, houses on stilts, an elephant and a hornbill. This is Assam and its neighbours.
What Bihu is about: Bihu marks the farming year in Assam. The big one, Bohag Bihu or Rongali Bihu, comes in April, when the new year begins and the fields are being sown. People wear new clothes, sing Bihu songs, dance to the dhol and the pepa (a horn made from a buffalo horn), and give one another a woven gamosa, a white cloth with red borders. Two more Bihus fall at other points of the farming year.
An honest note: the picture shows people from several Northeastern communities together — one wears a feathered headdress and another a woven cap with a red tassel. So a classmate might name a different Northeastern festival, such as Nagaland's Hornbill Festival. If you say Bihu, point to the mekhela chador and the dance step. Always give the clue along with the name.
Q3.
Why do you think the houses are built on bamboo structures?
Answer
Because bamboo grows all round them, and a bamboo house on stilts is exactly right for a wet, hilly, shaky place. Look at the picture — the houses stand on posts with a floor raised above the ground.
Reason
Why it matters in the Northeast
Bamboo grows everywhere there
It is right outside the village, so it costs nothing and can be cut and used at once
It grows back fast
A bamboo clump gives new poles in a few years, so the forest is not finished off
Light but strong
Two or three people can carry the poles up a hill path where no truck can go
Raised on stilts, above flood water
The Northeast gets very heavy rain and rivers rise fast. The floor stays dry.
Away from damp, snakes and insects
The ground stays wet for months; a raised floor keeps the family off it
Air flows underneath
The house stays cool and the floor dries quickly
Bamboo bends instead of breaking
This is an earthquake region. A springy bamboo frame sways and survives where a heavy wall would crack
Useful space below
Firewood, tools and animals are kept under the raised floor
Easy to repair
A damaged pole is simply replaced. No cement, no machine, no mason needed
The big idea: A good house is not the same everywhere. It is made of whatever the land gives, and shaped by whatever the weather does. In the Northeast the land gives bamboo and the weather gives rain, floods and earth tremors — so the house is a light bamboo box standing on legs. In a hot desert the same house would be wrong; there you need thick mud walls to keep the heat out.
Look at your own village or street: what are the roofs made of, and why? Sloping tin or thatch where it rains hard; flat concrete where it does not. The answer is always in the weather and in what grows nearby.
Q4.
The picture on page 102, redrawn.
What animals do you see in the picture?
Answer
An elephant and a hornbill are the two clear animals in the picture. There are also butterflies among the flowers.
Animal
Where it is in the picture
What it tells you
Elephant
In the bushes behind the people, on the right
Wild elephants live right beside the villages here. The chapter says ghost pepper is even used to keep them away from crops.
Hornbill
Perched on a branch at the bottom right, with a huge yellow bill
The hornbill is the best-known bird of the Northeast. Nagaland's biggest festival is named after it.
Butterflies
Small pink shapes among the flowers on the right
Many kinds of butterfly live in these hill forests
Why the animals are drawn so close to the market: that is not a mistake by the artist. In much of the Northeast, forest and village sit side by side. An elephant may walk past the edge of a field, and a hornbill may nest in a tree the village has protected for years. People and wild animals share the same hillside.
Look again for smaller ones. A picture like this usually hides more than you spot the first time. Go over it slowly with a finger — the sky, the bushes, the ground — before you write your answer.
Q5.
The picture on page 102, redrawn.
What does this picture tell you about the people who live with nature in the Northeast of India?
Answer
It tells you that here nature is not somewhere people go — it is where they live, work, dress, dance and earn.
They make things from what grows around them. Baskets from cane and bamboo, brooms from broom grass, pots from clay, cloth on a bamboo loom. Nothing comes from a factory far away.
They build with the forest. The houses are bamboo, raised on stilts, roofed with thatch — made to suit heavy rain and hilly ground.
Skill stays in the family. The woman is weaving in the open, in front of everyone. Weaving is learnt at home, from mother to daughter, and every community has its own pattern.
They share the land with wild animals. An elephant stands in the bushes and a hornbill sits on a branch, a few steps from the market. Nobody has driven them away.
Their festivals follow nature. The Bihu dance in the picture marks the farming year — the new season, the sowing, the harvest.
Many communities live side by side. You can see at least four different traditional dresses in one small scene. Each has its own weave, its own headgear, its own language.
The market is the meeting place. People come to sell what they made, buy what they need, meet, dance and talk — all in the same spot.
Sample answer: The picture shows that the people of the Northeast take almost everything they need from the hills and forests around them — bamboo for their houses, cane for baskets, grass for brooms, thread for the cloth being woven on the spot. Wild animals like an elephant and a hornbill are right there beside the village, and nobody seems afraid or angry about it. Their festival, Bihu, is about the farming season. So nature is not something separate from their life. It is their house, their work, their clothes and their calendar all at once.
Why this way of living matters: when a family's food, house and earnings all come out of the forest nearby, protecting that forest is not charity — it is common sense. This is what the chapter means by living in harmony with nature: taking what you need, leaving enough to grow back, and making room for the animals that were there first.