NCERT Solutions Exploring Society: India and Beyond Chapter 12 Visible and invisible discrimination — LET’S EXPLORE

Both caselets are examples of the invisible or indirect discrimination the chapter describes, but on two different grounds.

Both grounds are in the chapter’s own definition: discrimination is mistreating a person or group because of their caste, religion, ethnicity, disability, race, physical appearance, gender, sexuality, or economic background.

Two further things are worth noticing, because they are where the answer gets sharper:

• Rohan’s case has bystanders. The caselet says “everyone around notices this behaviour of the group.” Discrimination that is watched in silence is being permitted. The chapter’s own model is the opposite: Sonali and Harshada saw Kruti being teased and stepped in.
• Mina’s case begins with a real barrier, not with cruelty. The cost of the trip kept her out first; the ignoring came afterwards. Her friends turned a problem of money into a judgement about her character — “was not of their status”. Removing the barrier, not judging Mina, is what inclusion would mean here.

The chapter gives the pattern to follow in its very first story: Sonali and Harshada told the bullies to stop — and then invited Kruti to join their badminton team. Two steps, always in that order: stop the behaviour, then include the person. Stopping alone leaves the person still outside.

Sample answer — Rohan’s group:

• Stop using the nickname myself, from that moment, without waiting for anyone else.
• Say plainly and without a speech that it is not funny — “Call him Rohan.” A single person refusing to join in changes what the group thinks is normal.
• Pass him the ball. Being picked for the team settles the matter far better than an argument about it does.
• If it does not stop, tell the class teacher or sports teacher. This is not “telling tales”; it is the step the chapter recommends for exactly this situation.

Sample answer — Mina’s group:

• Stop the whispering — say that she has her reasons and that they are nobody’s business.
• Do not discuss the cost of the trip in front of her; nothing makes exclusion sting more.
• Quietly ask the class teacher whether the school has any support for students who cannot meet the cost, so that the barrier is dealt with rather than Mina.
• Keep including her in everything that costs nothing — group work, games, the class WhatsApp of jokes — so that one trip does not become a permanent boundary.

This is a personal question, so no book can answer it for you — and you should not copy an answer as though it were your own experience. What a good answer must contain is this:

1. What happened, in plain factual sentences — where, when, who.
2. On what ground — the chapter’s list is your checklist: caste, religion, ethnicity, disability, race, physical appearance, gender, sexuality, economic background.
3. Whether it was visible or invisible — were you actually stopped from doing something, or were you left out, laughed at, ignored?
4. How it affected you. The chapter notes that discrimination affects people both psychologically and physically, and creates a social barrier that hampers them from enjoying their fundamental rights.
5. Whether anyone stood up for you, and what difference that made.

If you have not faced discrimination yourself, that is a perfectly good answer — write instead about something you saw, and be honest about whether you were one of the people who noticed and said nothing, like the students standing around Rohan.

Sample answer: “When I joined this school in Class 6 I spoke Marathi at home and my Hindi had a strong accent. Two boys imitated the way I said certain words for about a month, and I stopped answering questions in class even when I knew the answer. Nobody had taken away my right to speak — I simply stopped using it. A classmate finally told them to stop, and asked me to read out in a group presentation. That was the week I started answering again.”

Answer honestly — including if the answer is “nothing”, which is the most common one and is worth writing down, because it tells you what you would do differently now. Then set out the steps that are available, from smallest to largest:

1. Name it to yourself. Deciding “this is not a joke, this is discrimination” is the step that makes every later step possible.
2. Say so at the time, briefly and without insult. “Don’t call me that.”
3. Tell a trusted adult — a parent, class teacher or principal — with dates and details, not just feelings. Details are what allow an adult to act.
4. Use the school’s own channel — the class teacher, the counsellor, the student council, the complaint box.
5. For a child in danger — being made to work, being hurt, being unsafe — call Childline 1098, the national helpline. The 2015 case in the chapter began with exactly one such call.
6. Where a fundamental right is actually denied — for example a government school refusing admission on the ground of religion, caste, race or language — the matter can go to court. That is the right to constitutional remedies (Article 32), and the chapter calls it the reason our rights are “not just promises on paper”.

Sample answer: “At first I did nothing, because I thought complaining would make it worse. After two weeks I told my mother, and she spoke to my class teacher. The teacher did not punish anyone; she made the whole class do a group activity in pairs she chose herself, and I was put with one of the two boys. It stopped within a week. What I learnt is that telling one adult early would have saved me those two weeks.”