NCERT Solutions Poorvi Chapter 1 The Wit that Won Hearts (prose) — Let us discuss
Book page 7 Updated on2026-09-05
Q1.
I. Rectify the following false statements from the text.
1. The queen insulted the king by speaking against the quality of his poem.
Answer
Corrected: The queen never said a word against the poem. She had asked for the king to recite it and she yawned — “not once, but several times” — only because she “was so exhausted after a tiring day”. It was the king who read the yawns as an insult; the queen offered none.
Why the difference matters: The whole story turns on this. If the queen had really criticised the poem there would be a real quarrel to settle. Because she did not, the only thing Rama has to remove is a wrong interpretation — and a joke is enough to remove that.
Q2.
2. Tenali Rama immediately went to the king and convinced him to talk to the queen.
Answer
Corrected: Rama did nothing immediately. He told the queen, “this needs a well-planned approach, and I may need time to find the right strategy.” He waited until the next morning and then raised the matter in open court — indirectly, through the paddy seeds — without ever mentioning the queen or the quarrel.
Tip: Watch how carefully the text protects Rama’s method. He never “convinces” the king of anything; he arranges the evidence so that the king convinces himself.
Q3.
3. The courtiers admired the king’s poem and praised his literary talent.
Answer
Corrected: The courtiers avoided the poem altogether. The queen reports that when the king “tried reciting it to his ministers, they all avoided him, making excuses.” Not one of them praised it; it was only after everyone else had escaped that the king came to the queen “seeking an audience” late in the evening.
Q4.
4. The ministers in the court were eager to hear Tenali Rama’s idea about paddy cultivation.
Answer
Corrected: They mocked it. “A murmur swept through the room.” One courtier “known for his sarcasm” whispered, “I wonder if these are magic seeds! Next, he’ll claim they grow without water,” another muttered, “Perhaps he found them on the moon!”, and “Snickers rippled through the court.” Even the king called the claim “absurd”.
Why Rama lets them laugh: The mockery is useful to him. It makes the court relax, and a relaxed court laughs at the yawning-farmer joke instead of noticing whom the joke is really aimed at.
Q5.
5. The king never realised his mistake and continued to stay angry with the queen.
Answer
Corrected: He realised it in court, the moment he yawned himself. “His mind raced back to the quarrel with the queen… He realised how unfair he had been.” That same evening he went to her and said, “I have been foolish. I see now that I overreacted. I let my pride blind me. I’m so sorry.” The quarrel ended and “the palace brimmed once again with joy and laughter.”