UPSC Mains 2026 GS1 Q3: model answer
The significance of the Gandhian movements lay in the masses they mobilized. Elucidate.
What the question wants
Explain with examples how Gandhi's campaigns drew in peasants, women, workers, students and regions earlier outside the national movement, and why that mass base mattered.
How to structure it
Intro: Congress before 1917 as an elite body. Body: mobilisation in each movement and the groups drawn in; methods. Conclusion: significance and limits.
- 1Mobilisation in each movement and the groups drawn in
- 2Methods
Model answer
Before 1917 the Congress was largely an English-educated, urban body. Gandhi turned it into a movement of villages.
- 1917Champaran: indigo peasants
- 1920Non-Cooperation: four-anna members, Khilafat
- 1930Salt march: women picket liquor shops
- 1942Quit India: parallel governments
How the masses came in
- Champaran (1917), Kheda (1918): indigo and revenue grievances brought peasants into politics.
- Non-Cooperation (1920–22): the four-anna membership, Khilafat unity, boycotts and national schools; peasants in Awadh, tribals in Andhra, plantation workers in Assam.
- Civil Disobedience (1930): salt, a daily-use issue; women picketed liquor shops in large numbers; the Khudai Khidmatgars in the north-west.
- Quit India (1942): 'Do or Die' turned into a leaderless upsurge, with parallel governments in Ballia, Satara and Tamluk.
Methods: khadi, prabhat pheris, Hindi and regional languages, constructive work in ashrams.
Why it mattered: mass participation gave the Congress legitimacy the British could not deny and built habits of democratic politics.
Limits remained: Muslim participation fell after 1922, and Dalit leaders such as Ambedkar distrusted the Congress.
Keywords, cases and data to drop in
Champaran four-anna membership Salt Satyagraha parallel governments constructive programme
Where most answers lose marks
- A chronology of movements without discussing who joined
- Ignoring women and peasants
- No critical note on limits
Same theme in Prelims
Consider the following assertion :
The genesis of political alliances based on community lay in the very nature of the Montague-Chelmsford Reforms, 1919.
Which of the following statements support/supports the above assertion ?
- 1. Reforms retained and extended the principle of separate electorates.
- 2. Separate electorates were supposed to counter Indian nationalism, which was growing stronger.
- 3. Deprived classes rallied around the favours inherent in separate electorates.
Select the answer using the code given below :
Answer (d) & explanation
All three statements support the assertion (d). Statement 1 is right: the 1919 Act kept separate electorates for Muslims and extended them to Sikhs, Indian Christians, Anglo-Indians and Europeans. Statement 2 is right: the British wanted them to divide the growing national movement. Statement 3 is right: groups that gained from reserved seats organised politically around those favours. So community-based alliances grew from the Act's design, and options (a), (b) and (c) fail.
Notice the history: separate electorates began with the Morley-Minto Reforms (1909) for Muslims. The 1919 Act also brought dyarchy to the provinces. The Communal Award (1932) later tried to extend them to depressed classes, leading to the Poona Pact.
Answer as per the official UPSC answer key.
The artificially fixed rupee-sterling exchange rate prescribed by the Hilton-Young Commission (1926) was adopted by the British Government for which one of the following reasons ?
Answer (a) & explanation
The rate helped remittances and India's creditworthiness (a). The Hilton-Young Commission (1926) fixed the rupee at 1s 6d, against the 1s 4d Indian business wanted. A dearer rupee made the Home Charges and other remittances to Britain cheaper to pay in rupees and kept India's credit good in London. Option (c) is wrong: Indian exporters, cotton included, lost out, since a dear rupee makes exports costly. Option (b) is wrong: helping Indian importers was not the aim. Option (d) is wrong: the issue was the sterling rate, not gold.
Notice the nationalist anger: Purshotamdas Thakurdas wrote a dissent, and the "ratio controversy" fed economic nationalism. The commission also proposed a central bank, leading to the RBI (1935).
Answer as per the official UPSC answer key.
Which one of the following statements about the Eka Movement and Bardoli Satyagraha is correct ?
Answer (c) & explanation
Option (c) is the correct description (c). Bardoli (1928, Surat district) was Vallabhbhai Patel's no-revenue campaign against a 22% land revenue hike. The Eka (unity) movement of 1921–22 rose against rents charged above the recorded amount. Option (a) is wrong: Congress started Eka, but under Madari Pasi it moved outside Congress control. Option (b) is wrong: Eka was led by peasants against taluqdars, and Bardoli was by landholding peasants. Option (d) is wrong: Eka was in Hardoi, Bahraich and Sitapur, and Bardoli is in Gujarat, not Saurashtra.
Notice that Bardoli's women gave Patel the title "Sardar". The Maxwell-Broomfield inquiry cut the hike to 6.03%, a clear win for the peasants.
Answer as per the official UPSC answer key.
Learn the concept
Question text as printed in the official UPSC question paper: https://www.upsc.gov.in/sites/default/files/QP-CSM-26-010926-GENERAL%20STUDIES%20PAPER%20-%20I.pdf The model answer is original Battle IAS work; use it to learn structure, not to memorise.