NCERT Solutions Poorvi Chapter 4 –192Waiting for the Rain (Kamakshi Balasubramanian) — Let us think and reflect (Extracts)

Book page 191 Updated on2026-09-05

Q1.

Extract 1 — (i) What does the first line of the extract tell us about Velu's beliefs?

Answer

The line — '…I can't see how talking to astrologers will bring rain' — tells us that Velu is a practical, rational man who trusts experience and evidence rather than ritual.

He gives a reason rather than simply refusing: 'The rains came all these years without any such consultations.' That is an argument from evidence — it worked before without astrologers, so astrologers are not the cause.
He is not mocking anyone. His neighbours' suggestion is met with disagreement, not contempt.
And he does not simply reject and sit still. He immediately looks for a better source of information and travels to the weather office in the city.

Why the writer establishes this early: Because it makes the ending mean something. If Velu were a superstitious man, being persuaded by an old woman under a tree would be ordinary. He is exactly the opposite — a man who wants explanations and checks them — so when he thinks 'Perhaps she is right', we know he has been convinced by the idea itself, not by her authority.

Q2.

Extract 1 — (ii) Complete the following sentence with a suitable reason. 'Velu is determined to seek information about the rain because ___________________.' (he was at a loss of words/he wants to find a practical solution to the drought affecting his farm)

Answer

Velu is determined to seek information about the rain because he wants to find a practical solution to the drought affecting his farm.

Why: His actions are all attempts to do something. He rejects the astrologers because they will not help practically, and then 'he decided to go to the weather ofÏce in the city and talk to someone' — a journey of real effort for a man with no money and a long walk back. That is the behaviour of someone hunting for a workable answer, not of someone who has run out of words.

Why the other option fails: 'At a loss of words' means unable to speak. The story does use the phrase 'at a loss', but with its other meaning — puzzled, not knowing what to do — and it uses it after the visit, not as the reason for it: 'Velu, too, was at a loss.' Watch how the same phrase changes meaning with context.

Q3.

Extract 1 — (iii) Complete the table with reference to Velu's weather office visit. — Expectation (What I think will happen) / Outcome (What actually happened)

Answer

Expectation (what Velu thought would happen)	Outcome (what actually happened)
The weather office is where trained people study the sky, so someone there would be able to tell him when the clouds would gather and the rain would come.	They told him plainly that 'they couldn't really tell him when the sky would gather clouds and bring rain'.
Experts would have an explanation for why the monsoon had failed this year when it had never failed in six.	They had none. 'We are at a loss ourselves!' they exclaimed. 'So many favourable conditions but still no rain. Very odd!'
He would come home with something useful he could act on — a date, a warning, a plan.	He came home with nothing. 'Velu, too, was at a loss,' and 'He walked back to the village, tired, and dejected.'

Why the visit had to fail: This is the turning point of the story. Velu has now tried the two things a person normally tries — belief and science — and neither has worked. Only after both have been exhausted does he stop, sit down in the shade, and be still long enough to listen to someone. Had the weather office given him a forecast, he would have walked straight past the old woman.

Tip: An expectation-and-outcome table is not a summary. Each row must be a genuine pair — one thing he assumed, and the line from the text that overturns it.

Q4.

Extract 1 — (iv) Complete the following sentence with a suitable option. 'The absence of rain despite favourable conditions, shows ___________________.' A. lack of astrological knowledge B. ineffectiveness of farmers like Velu C. delay in understanding the weather D. unpredictability of nature

Answer

D. unpredictability of nature.

Why: The officials themselves cannot account for it — 'So many favourable conditions but still no rain. Very odd!' If every measurable condition is right and the rain still does not come, then the missing factor is not knowledge but nature's own unpredictability. This is also the idea the old woman will build on: nature is not a machine that responds to inputs, it is 'a mother' with reasons of her own, and 'Nature knows a thing or two'.

Why the others fail: A blames astrology, which Velu has already dismissed and which the extract never raises. B blames the farmers — but Velu's land 'never failed him' and he worked 'season after season'; nothing suggests failure on his part. C is close but wrong in kind: this is not a delay in understanding that better study would fix, since the experts already have all the data and it still does not explain the drought.

Q5.

Extract 2 — (i) The old woman's advice was accompanied with a soft tone and a smile. What does that tell us about her?

Answer

It tells us that she is gentle, patient and completely sure of what she is saying — she does not need to raise her voice to be believed.

Kindness. She is speaking to a stranger who has just been sharp with her about her smiling, and she answers 'softly, smiling'. She takes no offence.
Wisdom held lightly. She is telling Velu that his whole way of thinking about his land is mistaken. A soft tone lets her say something hard without making him defensive — which is exactly why he ends up puzzled rather than angry.
Calm certainty. People argue loudly when they are unsure. She simply states her idea and lets it work. 'Go home, my son, Nature knows a thing or two… go home,' she says, and gets up and walks away without waiting to see whether she has convinced him.
Warmth. Calling him 'my son' and smiling as she speaks makes advice sound like care rather than correction.

How the writer builds her: We are told almost nothing about the old woman — no name, no village, no history. Everything we know comes from four physical details: wrinkled skin, sparkling eyes, a widening smile, and a soft voice. Kamakshi Balasubramanian uses so little because the character is meant to feel less like a person Velu meets than like a voice the land itself might have.

Q6.

Extract 2 — (ii) Fill in the blank with the correct option from those given below. 'The old woman's advice ___________ Velu, at that moment.' A. failed to impress B. confused C. scared D. made sense to

Answer

B. confused.

Why — and the words 'at that moment' are the key: The extract itself supplies the evidence. 'Rest? Let the land rest? I don't understand,' Velu says, and the writer adds that he 'looked at her, a little puzzled'. Puzzled and confused are the same state. The idea only makes sense to him later — 'Velu began to understand' comes several lines further on, after she has explained that the earth is old and that Nature is a mother to all of us.

Why the others fail: A is wrong because he is clearly struck by what she says — he questions it instead of dismissing it. C has no support at all; nothing here frightens him. D is what becomes true, but not 'at that moment' — and a question that fixes a moment in time is testing whether you noticed the sequence.

Q7.

Extract 2 — (iii) State one thing about the old woman when she referred to Velu as 'my son', while offering advice.

Answer

Calling him 'my son' shows that she speaks to him with a mother's or grandmother's affection rather than as a stranger correcting him — she has taken him into her care, and that is what allows her to tell him he is wrong without wounding him.

Why the word matters more than it looks: Velu had addressed her as 'Amma' — mother — when he first spoke, so the relationship was already offered from his side. She accepts it and answers in kind. And the word connects directly to the idea she is about to teach him: 'Nature is a mother to all of us. To you and to me. And to the trees, the water and the soil. She takes care to give her children the rest they need.' Velu is her son in the same way that he, the trees and the soil are all Nature's children — the form of address is the argument in miniature.

Tip: The question asks for one thing. Give one, clearly, and back it with the text — a list of four guesses is worth less than a single supported point.

Q8.

Extract 2 — (iv) Complete the following sentence with a suitable explanation. 'The difÏculty that the old woman mentions is due to the fact that ________________.'

Answer

The 'difficulty' the old woman mentions is due to the fact that Velu does not realise the earth is old and has been working for thousands of years — he thinks of the land as something he works on, so the idea that it too could be tired and in need of rest is one he has no way of grasping. She says it exactly: 'Yes, my son, that is the difficulty. You don't realise that the earth is old…'

What kind of 'difficulty' she means: Not a difficulty of circumstance — she is not talking about the drought. She means a difficulty of understanding: the real obstacle is in Velu's head, not in the sky. He had asked 'What do you mean? Can anyone work too hard?' and she answers by shifting the scale from one man's six years to the earth's thousands. Once he sees the land as old, the rest follows on its own — and a few lines later, 'Velu began to understand.'

Notice the structure of the conversation: she never tells him what to do. She asks a question ('shouldn't someone let the land rest a bit?'), names the obstacle, and then gives him a picture — the land 'lying undisturbed, staring at the sky, resting'. Advice given as a picture is far harder to argue with than advice given as an instruction.

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