NCERT Solutions Exploring Society: India and Beyond Chapter 12 –166End of chapter — Questions and activities

Because my own right to religion is made of exactly the same material as theirs. The chapter describes the right to freedom of religion as allowing “every person to choose, practise, and share their religion freely, while ensuring that no one is forced to follow, propagate or fund a particular religion” (Articles 25–28). A right stated in those words cannot belong to one community only — it either protects everybody or it protects nobody.

Three reasons, taken from the chapter:

• India is a diverse country where people follow many different religions. In a country like that, respect is not politeness; it is the condition on which the diversity survives peacefully.
• The state itself is required to be even-handed. State-run or government-aided schools are not allowed to promote any particular religion. This “helps protect India’s diversity and keeps all faiths equal in the eyes of the state.”
• It is a Fundamental Duty. Duty 5 is to promote harmony among all people; Duty 3 is to protect India’s unity, integrity and sovereignty. Duty 6 asks us to preserve culture and heritage — and religious traditions are a large part of that heritage.

Hurt first, then embarrassed, then quiet — and it is that last stage that does the real damage.

The chapter shows both sides of this feeling in two of its stories:

• Mina, ignored after her classmates found she could not afford the trip, “felt hurt and left out”.
• Kruti, teased for her accent, was invited into the badminton team and “finally felt like she belonged”.

Sample answer: “I would feel hurt, and then I would pretend I did not mind, which is worse. I would stop asking to join in, because being refused a second time is harder than the first. And I would probably decide the fault was mine — that I was not interesting or good enough — even when the real reason had nothing to do with me. Knowing this is why I would not let it happen to someone else in my class.”

Because a right on paper and a right in daily life are two different things, and the distance between them is closed by people, not by the text of the Constitution. The chapter gives at least five reasons.

1. Most discrimination is invisible. It happens through “taking a jibe at somebody, excluding someone or being unwilling to include someone in a project or a celebration”. Nothing is formally refused, so there is nothing to point at. The chapter names the consequence: it is difficult to prove, and hence difficult to penalise.
2. Law binds the state; attitudes are changed by society. Article 15 forbids discrimination on grounds of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth, and Article 17 abolished untouchability. But no article can make a group of students stop whispering. That is the work of duties, which are moral and social responsibilities.
3. Old inequality carries forward. The chapter says differences among people “can be due to inequality and discrimination which may have been carried historically too”. A right announced today does not undo generations of unequal starting points — which is precisely why equity measures are needed alongside equality.
4. A right has to be claimed to work. You must know you have it and be able to reach someone who will act. The chapter observes that children “may not understand their rights or be able to stand up for themselves, or access help against unfair treatment”. That is why a helpline like Childline 1098 exists at all.
5. Bystanders let it continue. In the Rohan caselet, “everyone around notices this behaviour of the group” — and nothing happens. Guaranteed rights do not enforce themselves in a corridor.

Yes — and the chapter itself gives one, carefully and without taking sides.

The chapter’s example. On cultural and educational rights it writes: “On one hand, the Constitution seeks to protect the rights of minorities, while on the other, it also upholds equality and non-discrimination on the basis of religion. At times, these two aims can seem to be in conflict. Some people feel that minority protections (the special rights and safeguards given to groups with a different religion, language, or culture) may go against the idea of secularism.” Notice how the book reports the debate — “some people feel” — and does not settle it. Your answer should do the same.

A school-level example. The Sports Day box: a student’s right to freedom of speech ran up against the duty to follow school rules about uniforms. Both were real, and the teachers’ reminder did not deny the right — it simply said the rule holds until it is changed.

An everyday example. My right to express my opinions freely, and my duty to listen to and respect other people’s views without causing harm. A student who shouts a classmate down is using a right in a way that breaks a duty.

Because a democracy decides by participation, and every group that is mocked out of the conversation is a set of views the decision never heard. The chapter’s closing line is exact: “Democracy is strengthened through enabling and facilitating participation of all.”

Three ways it works, each with an example from the chapter:

1. Better decisions. Smt. Amita’s reading club had only a few confident readers of English. Once regional-language books, storytelling and puppetry from the region were included, membership grew and all children began to participate irrespective of their fluency in a particular language. The club did not merely become fairer — it became better.
2. Legitimate decisions. At the town festival, Meena was told girls should not speak on stage and Ravi was kept out of the library stall. A debate held without Meena is not the town’s debate. When the changes were made, everyone clapped as the children came on stage together — the closing ceremony meant something because nobody had been left out of it.
3. A country that holds together. Duty 3 is to protect India’s unity, integrity and sovereignty, and the chapter’s illustration of it is two classmates who argued over language differences and were encouraged to learn phrases from each other’s languages — “showing unity in diversity”. Respect turns a difference into something shared instead of something contested.

It makes participation easier and self-restraint harder. Both halves are visible in the chapter itself, so the honest answer is not one word but a comparison.

The answer in one line: technology has made it far easier to take part and rather harder to behave well while taking part — so it strengthens citizenship exactly to the extent that people carry their duties online as carefully as they claim their rights.

It would look like a society with an excellent Constitution and a miserable daily life — because each person’s right is made out of everybody else’s duty. Work through the chapter’s own pairs and watch each right collapse:

The chapter also names the second casualty: trust. Its picture of a healthy society is the Green Park Colony morning — children collecting wrappers, parents clearing drains, older students putting out water for street dogs, senior citizens guiding everyone. Take away the duties and none of that Sunday happens. As the little girl said, “It’s our duty to care for our neighbourhood.” Nobody could have ordered it.

By doing the small things that remove a barrier rather than the large things that need permission. Here is a practical list, each item tied to what it actually removes.

a) A school does not allow girls to join a mathematics or science club.

This is discrimination on the ground of sex, and it is barred twice over by the articles listed on page 154: Article 14 — equality before the law for all persons; Article 15 — no discrimination on grounds of religion, race, caste, sex, or place of birth. The chapter adds, under cultural and educational rights, that no student can be denied admission to a government institution because of religion, caste, race or language.

Steps, in order:

1. Ask for the reason in writing. Very often there is no rule at all, only a habit that nobody has questioned. A written request forces the reason into the open.
2. Raise it with the class teacher, then the principal, with the article numbers. A school that is shown Article 15 usually does not want the argument.
3. Take it to the parents’ body or school management committee if the principal refuses.
4. Complain to the education authorities — a government or government-aided school is bound by these guarantees.
5. As a last step, the courts. Denial of a fundamental right can be taken to court under the right to constitutional remedies (Article 32), which is what makes these rights “not just promises on paper”.

b) A fellow student has dropped out of school because they are forced to work in a welding shop.

This is child labour in hazardous work — the chapter describes exactly this: “when children are made to work instead of going to school, particularly in hazardous situations”. A welding shop, with fire, hot metal and fumes, is plainly of that kind. What the law says:

• Articles 23–24 ban human trafficking, forced labour and child labour.
• In general, children below the age of 14 are not allowed to be employed; they may help only in non-hazardous family enterprises, and only during vacations or after school hours. There is a ban on work in places such as factories, mines, or restaurants.
• Article 21A guarantees free and compulsory education for ages 6–14, and Fundamental Duty 11 puts on parents and guardians the duty to see that the child gets it.

Steps, in order:

1. Tell your teacher or principal, with the name of the student, the address of the shop and when they work there. Do not go and argue with the employer yourself.
2. Call Childline 1098 — free, available all over the country, easy to remember by counting backwards from 10.
3. What follows is shown by the chapter’s 2015 case: a team visits, the children are found and rescued, given medical care and looked after, and the culprits are arrested.
4. Get the student back into school. Rescue is not the end. Near the fair ground, the children who were kept busy cleaning “were enrolled in school after volunteers stepped in” — that is the step that makes the rescue last.
5. Look at why the family sent the child. If the reason was money, the child returns to work unless the family gets help. The right to life includes the right to livelihood, and a neighbour or teacher who talks to the parents can matter — as the neighbour did who convinced a father to keep sending his daughter to school.

How to make one. A charter that a teacher writes is a notice; a charter the class writes is an agreement. So: discuss it in groups, collect the rules everyone can accept, write each right with its matching duty beside it, keep it short enough to read in a minute, have everyone sign it, put it on the wall, and review it once a month — striking out what is not working and adding what the class has learnt.

What a good charter must contain: (i) rights and duties in pairs, never a list of rules only; (ii) a clear line on discrimination that names the grounds; (iii) at least two concrete inclusion measures, not just good intentions; (iv) what happens when the charter is broken, and who a student can go to.

Sample answer — Charter of Class VIII-B

1. Our rights and the duties that go with them

2. Non-discrimination. No student in this class will be treated differently because of caste, religion, ethnicity, disability, race, physical appearance, gender or economic background. This includes the invisible kinds — leaving someone out of a group, whispering about them, or not choosing them for a team.

3. Inclusion — what we will actually do.

• Group and team members are rotated every month, and roles (reader, writer, presenter, artist) rotate too.
• Class events and trips are planned at a cost every family can meet; costs are never discussed in front of the class.
• Discussion may be in the language a student is comfortable in; the class library keeps books in more than one language.
• Seating, the noticeboard and any activity are arranged so that a classmate using a wheelchair, or one who reads or writes slowly, can take part on an equal basis with others.

4. If the charter is broken. Any student may raise it directly with the person, with the two class representatives, or with the class teacher. The first response is to stop the behaviour and set it right — not to punish. Repeated breaking of the charter goes to the class teacher.

Signed by every student and the class teacher, ______ (date). To be read aloud and reviewed on the first Monday of each month.