CBSE Class 12 Sociology Official Sample Question Paper Solution (2022-2023) | Sociology Class 12 - Humanities/Arts PDF Download

 Page 1


MARKING SCHEME 
SOCIOLOGY (039) 
CLASS XII 
 SECTION – A  
1. d. 1 
2. c. 1 
3. c. 1 
4. d. 1 
5. c. 1 
6. d. 1 
7. a. 1 
8. c. 1 
9. a. 1 
10. d. 1 
11. a. 1 
12. b. 1 
13. c. 1 
14. a. 1 
15. a. 1 
16. c. 1 
17. a. 1 
18. a. 1 
19. b. 1 
20. c. 1 
 SECTION - B  
21. - between 1911 and 1921 there was a negative rate of growth of – 0.03%.  
-This was because of the influenza epidemic during 1918–19. 
2 
22. - the British administrators began by trying to understand the complexities of caste in 
an effort to learn how to govern the country efficiently. Some of these efforts took the 
shape of very methodical and intensive surveys and reports on the ‘customs and 
manners’ of various tribes and castes all over the country. 
-This effort had a huge impact on social perceptions of caste and hundreds of petitions 
were addressed to the Census Commissioner by representatives of different castes 
claiming a higher position in the social scale and offering historical and scriptural 
evidence for their claims 
2 
23. -such a general statement is true of individuals in every group. 
-Even for such individuals, it is not true all the time – the same individual may be both 
lazy and hardworking at different times. 
OR 
-greater awareness and hence inclusion. 
-appropriate infrastructure to support and include people with disabilities. 
 
2 
24. -We are able to answer many of these questions because of the way in which we are 
socialised. 
-The socialisation process involves a continuous dialogue, negotiation and even 
struggle against significant others like our parents, family, kin group and our 
community. Our community provides us the language (our mother tongue) and the 
cultural values through which we comprehend the world. It also anchors our self-
identity. 
Or 
? Efforts are required to end the cultural exclusion of diverse groups. 
? State must be able to build multiple and complementary identities. 
? Such responsive policies provide incentives to build a feeling of unity in 
diversity- a “we-feeling”. 
2 
Page 2


MARKING SCHEME 
SOCIOLOGY (039) 
CLASS XII 
 SECTION – A  
1. d. 1 
2. c. 1 
3. c. 1 
4. d. 1 
5. c. 1 
6. d. 1 
7. a. 1 
8. c. 1 
9. a. 1 
10. d. 1 
11. a. 1 
12. b. 1 
13. c. 1 
14. a. 1 
15. a. 1 
16. c. 1 
17. a. 1 
18. a. 1 
19. b. 1 
20. c. 1 
 SECTION - B  
21. - between 1911 and 1921 there was a negative rate of growth of – 0.03%.  
-This was because of the influenza epidemic during 1918–19. 
2 
22. - the British administrators began by trying to understand the complexities of caste in 
an effort to learn how to govern the country efficiently. Some of these efforts took the 
shape of very methodical and intensive surveys and reports on the ‘customs and 
manners’ of various tribes and castes all over the country. 
-This effort had a huge impact on social perceptions of caste and hundreds of petitions 
were addressed to the Census Commissioner by representatives of different castes 
claiming a higher position in the social scale and offering historical and scriptural 
evidence for their claims 
2 
23. -such a general statement is true of individuals in every group. 
-Even for such individuals, it is not true all the time – the same individual may be both 
lazy and hardworking at different times. 
OR 
-greater awareness and hence inclusion. 
-appropriate infrastructure to support and include people with disabilities. 
 
2 
24. -We are able to answer many of these questions because of the way in which we are 
socialised. 
-The socialisation process involves a continuous dialogue, negotiation and even 
struggle against significant others like our parents, family, kin group and our 
community. Our community provides us the language (our mother tongue) and the 
cultural values through which we comprehend the world. It also anchors our self-
identity. 
Or 
? Efforts are required to end the cultural exclusion of diverse groups. 
? State must be able to build multiple and complementary identities. 
? Such responsive policies provide incentives to build a feeling of unity in 
diversity- a “we-feeling”. 
2 
 
25. Policies that promote assimilation are aimed at persuading, encouraging or forcing all 
citizens to adopt a uniform set of cultural values and norms.  
Policies promoting integration insist that the public culture be restricted to a common 
national pattern, while all ‘non-national’ cultures are to be relegated to the private 
sphere. 
2 
26. Kumud Pawade in her autobiography recounts how a Dalit woman became a Sanskrit 
teacher. As a student she is drawn towards the study of Sanskrit, perhaps because it is 
the means through which she can break into a field that was not possible for her to 
enter on grounds of gender and caste. Perhaps she was drawn towards it because it 
would enable her to read in the original what the texts have to say about women and 
the Dalits. 
 
2 
27. What marked these 19th century social reform attempts was the modern context and 
mix of ideas. It was a creative combination of modern ideas of western liberalism and 
a new look on traditional literature. 
 
2 
28. Under the British, the zamindars were given more control over land than they had 
before. Since the colonisers also imposed heavy land revenue (taxes) on agriculture, 
the zamindars extracted as much produce or money as they could out of the cultivators. 
One result of this zamindari system was that agricultural production stagnated or 
declined during much of the period of British rule. 
In Raiyatwari system, the ‘actual cultivators’ rather than the zamindars were 
responsible for paying the tax. Because the colonial government dealt directly with the 
farmers or landlords, burden of taxation was less and cultivators had more incentive to 
invest in agriculture. As a result, these areas became relatively more productive and 
prosperous. 
2 
29. -overwork is built into the structure of outsourced projects in the IT sector: project costs 
and timelines are usually underestimated in terms of mandays, and because mandays 
are based on an eight-hour day, engineers have to put in extra hours and days in order 
to meet the deadlines.  
-Extended working hours are legitimised by the common management practice of ‘flexi-
time’, which in theory gives an employee freedom to choose his or her working hours 
(within limits) but, which in practice, means that they have to work as long as necessary 
to finish the task at hand.  
-But even when there is no real work pressure, they tend to stay late in office either 
due to peer pressure or because they want to show the boss that they are working 
hard. 
(Any two) 
Or 
? Industrial society involves detailed division of labour so people often do 
not see the end result of their work since they are producing only one small 
part of a product. 
? Work is repetitive and exhausting. 
? This leads to alienation for people don’t enjoy their work and see it as 
something they have to do in order to survive, and even that survival 
depends on whether the technology has room for any human labour. 
2 
 SECTION – C  
30. Two broad sets of issues have been most important in giving rise to tribal movements. 
These are issues relating to control over vital economic resources like land and specially 
forests, and issues relating to matters of ethnic-cultural identity. The two can often go 
together, but with differentiation of tribal society they may also diverge. The reasons 
why the middle classes within tribal societies may assert their tribal identity may be 
different from the reasons why poor and uneducated tribals join tribal movements. As 
with any other community, it is the relationship between these kinds of internal 
dynamics and external forces that will shape the future. 
4 
Page 3


MARKING SCHEME 
SOCIOLOGY (039) 
CLASS XII 
 SECTION – A  
1. d. 1 
2. c. 1 
3. c. 1 
4. d. 1 
5. c. 1 
6. d. 1 
7. a. 1 
8. c. 1 
9. a. 1 
10. d. 1 
11. a. 1 
12. b. 1 
13. c. 1 
14. a. 1 
15. a. 1 
16. c. 1 
17. a. 1 
18. a. 1 
19. b. 1 
20. c. 1 
 SECTION - B  
21. - between 1911 and 1921 there was a negative rate of growth of – 0.03%.  
-This was because of the influenza epidemic during 1918–19. 
2 
22. - the British administrators began by trying to understand the complexities of caste in 
an effort to learn how to govern the country efficiently. Some of these efforts took the 
shape of very methodical and intensive surveys and reports on the ‘customs and 
manners’ of various tribes and castes all over the country. 
-This effort had a huge impact on social perceptions of caste and hundreds of petitions 
were addressed to the Census Commissioner by representatives of different castes 
claiming a higher position in the social scale and offering historical and scriptural 
evidence for their claims 
2 
23. -such a general statement is true of individuals in every group. 
-Even for such individuals, it is not true all the time – the same individual may be both 
lazy and hardworking at different times. 
OR 
-greater awareness and hence inclusion. 
-appropriate infrastructure to support and include people with disabilities. 
 
2 
24. -We are able to answer many of these questions because of the way in which we are 
socialised. 
-The socialisation process involves a continuous dialogue, negotiation and even 
struggle against significant others like our parents, family, kin group and our 
community. Our community provides us the language (our mother tongue) and the 
cultural values through which we comprehend the world. It also anchors our self-
identity. 
Or 
? Efforts are required to end the cultural exclusion of diverse groups. 
? State must be able to build multiple and complementary identities. 
? Such responsive policies provide incentives to build a feeling of unity in 
diversity- a “we-feeling”. 
2 
 
25. Policies that promote assimilation are aimed at persuading, encouraging or forcing all 
citizens to adopt a uniform set of cultural values and norms.  
Policies promoting integration insist that the public culture be restricted to a common 
national pattern, while all ‘non-national’ cultures are to be relegated to the private 
sphere. 
2 
26. Kumud Pawade in her autobiography recounts how a Dalit woman became a Sanskrit 
teacher. As a student she is drawn towards the study of Sanskrit, perhaps because it is 
the means through which she can break into a field that was not possible for her to 
enter on grounds of gender and caste. Perhaps she was drawn towards it because it 
would enable her to read in the original what the texts have to say about women and 
the Dalits. 
 
2 
27. What marked these 19th century social reform attempts was the modern context and 
mix of ideas. It was a creative combination of modern ideas of western liberalism and 
a new look on traditional literature. 
 
2 
28. Under the British, the zamindars were given more control over land than they had 
before. Since the colonisers also imposed heavy land revenue (taxes) on agriculture, 
the zamindars extracted as much produce or money as they could out of the cultivators. 
One result of this zamindari system was that agricultural production stagnated or 
declined during much of the period of British rule. 
In Raiyatwari system, the ‘actual cultivators’ rather than the zamindars were 
responsible for paying the tax. Because the colonial government dealt directly with the 
farmers or landlords, burden of taxation was less and cultivators had more incentive to 
invest in agriculture. As a result, these areas became relatively more productive and 
prosperous. 
2 
29. -overwork is built into the structure of outsourced projects in the IT sector: project costs 
and timelines are usually underestimated in terms of mandays, and because mandays 
are based on an eight-hour day, engineers have to put in extra hours and days in order 
to meet the deadlines.  
-Extended working hours are legitimised by the common management practice of ‘flexi-
time’, which in theory gives an employee freedom to choose his or her working hours 
(within limits) but, which in practice, means that they have to work as long as necessary 
to finish the task at hand.  
-But even when there is no real work pressure, they tend to stay late in office either 
due to peer pressure or because they want to show the boss that they are working 
hard. 
(Any two) 
Or 
? Industrial society involves detailed division of labour so people often do 
not see the end result of their work since they are producing only one small 
part of a product. 
? Work is repetitive and exhausting. 
? This leads to alienation for people don’t enjoy their work and see it as 
something they have to do in order to survive, and even that survival 
depends on whether the technology has room for any human labour. 
2 
 SECTION – C  
30. Two broad sets of issues have been most important in giving rise to tribal movements. 
These are issues relating to control over vital economic resources like land and specially 
forests, and issues relating to matters of ethnic-cultural identity. The two can often go 
together, but with differentiation of tribal society they may also diverge. The reasons 
why the middle classes within tribal societies may assert their tribal identity may be 
different from the reasons why poor and uneducated tribals join tribal movements. As 
with any other community, it is the relationship between these kinds of internal 
dynamics and external forces that will shape the future. 
4 
Or 
? Upper caste, urban middle and upper classes have benefitted the most 
from the developmental policies. 
? Their caste status had been crucial in ensuring that these groups had the 
necessary economic and educational resources to take full advantage of 
the opportunities offered by rapid development. 
? In particular, the upper caste elite benefitted from subsidised public 
education especially professional education in science, technology, 
medicine and management.  
? At the same time, they were also able to take advantage of the expansion 
of public sector jobs in the early decades after Independence. 
31. A nation is a peculiar sort of community that is easy to describe but hard to define. We 
know and can describe many specific nations founded on the basis of common cultural, 
historical and political institutions like a shared religion, language, ethnicity, history or 
regional culture. But it is hard to come up with any defining features, any characteristics 
that a nation must possess. For every possible criterion there are exceptions an 
counter-examples. For example, there are many nations that do not share a single 
common language, religion, ethnicity and so on. On the other hand, there are many 
languages, religions or ethnicities that are shared across nations. But this does not lead 
to the formation of a single unified nation of, say, all English speakers or of all Buddhists. 
4 
32. Capitalism in the west emerged out of a complex process of European exploration of 
the rest of the world, its plunder of wealth and resources, an unprecedented growth of 
science and technology, its harnessing to industries and agriculture. What marked 
capitalism from the very beginning was its dynamism, its potential to grow, expand, 
innovate, use technology and labour in a way best assured to ensure greatest profit. 
What marked it too was its global nature. Western colonialism was inextricably 
connected to the growth of western capitalism. This had a lasting impact on the way 
capitalism developed in a colonised country like India 
4 
33. These laws imposed an upper limit on the amount of land that can be owned by a 
particular family. The ceiling varies from region to region, depending on the kind of 
land, its productivity, and other such factors. There were many loopholes and other 
strategies through which most landowners were able to escape from having their 
surplus land taken over by the state. While some very large estates were broken up, in 
most cases landowners managed to divide the land among relatives and others, 
including servants, in so-called ‘benami transfers’ – which allowed them to keep control 
over the land (in fact if not in name). In some places, some rich farmers actually 
divorced their wives (but continued to live with them) in order to avoid the provisions 
of the Land Ceiling Act, which allowed a separate share for unmarried women but not 
for wives. 
4 
34. In Maruti Udyog Ltd. two cars roll off the assembly line every minute. Workers get only 
45 minutes rest in the entire day - two tea breaks of 7.5 minutes each and one lunch 
break of half an hour. Most of them are exhausted by the age of 40 and take voluntary 
retirement. While production has gone up, the number of permanent jobs in the factory 
has gone down. The firm has outsourced all services like cleaning, and security, as well 
as the manufacture of parts. The parts suppliers are located around the factory and 
send the parts every two hours or just-in-time. Outsourcing and just-in-time keeps costs 
low for the company, but the workers are very tense, because if the supplies fail to 
arrive, their production targets get delayed, and when they do arrive they have to run 
to keep up. No wonder they get exhausted. 
OR 
 
Gandhi objected to the craze for machinery, not machinery as such. The craze is for 
what they call labour-saving machinery. Men go on ‘saving labour’ till thousands are 
without work and thrown on the open streets to die of starvation. He wanted to save 
time and labour, not for a fraction of mankind, but for all. He wanted the concentration 
of wealth, not in the hands of the few, but in the hands of all. He believed that when a 
4 
Page 4


MARKING SCHEME 
SOCIOLOGY (039) 
CLASS XII 
 SECTION – A  
1. d. 1 
2. c. 1 
3. c. 1 
4. d. 1 
5. c. 1 
6. d. 1 
7. a. 1 
8. c. 1 
9. a. 1 
10. d. 1 
11. a. 1 
12. b. 1 
13. c. 1 
14. a. 1 
15. a. 1 
16. c. 1 
17. a. 1 
18. a. 1 
19. b. 1 
20. c. 1 
 SECTION - B  
21. - between 1911 and 1921 there was a negative rate of growth of – 0.03%.  
-This was because of the influenza epidemic during 1918–19. 
2 
22. - the British administrators began by trying to understand the complexities of caste in 
an effort to learn how to govern the country efficiently. Some of these efforts took the 
shape of very methodical and intensive surveys and reports on the ‘customs and 
manners’ of various tribes and castes all over the country. 
-This effort had a huge impact on social perceptions of caste and hundreds of petitions 
were addressed to the Census Commissioner by representatives of different castes 
claiming a higher position in the social scale and offering historical and scriptural 
evidence for their claims 
2 
23. -such a general statement is true of individuals in every group. 
-Even for such individuals, it is not true all the time – the same individual may be both 
lazy and hardworking at different times. 
OR 
-greater awareness and hence inclusion. 
-appropriate infrastructure to support and include people with disabilities. 
 
2 
24. -We are able to answer many of these questions because of the way in which we are 
socialised. 
-The socialisation process involves a continuous dialogue, negotiation and even 
struggle against significant others like our parents, family, kin group and our 
community. Our community provides us the language (our mother tongue) and the 
cultural values through which we comprehend the world. It also anchors our self-
identity. 
Or 
? Efforts are required to end the cultural exclusion of diverse groups. 
? State must be able to build multiple and complementary identities. 
? Such responsive policies provide incentives to build a feeling of unity in 
diversity- a “we-feeling”. 
2 
 
25. Policies that promote assimilation are aimed at persuading, encouraging or forcing all 
citizens to adopt a uniform set of cultural values and norms.  
Policies promoting integration insist that the public culture be restricted to a common 
national pattern, while all ‘non-national’ cultures are to be relegated to the private 
sphere. 
2 
26. Kumud Pawade in her autobiography recounts how a Dalit woman became a Sanskrit 
teacher. As a student she is drawn towards the study of Sanskrit, perhaps because it is 
the means through which she can break into a field that was not possible for her to 
enter on grounds of gender and caste. Perhaps she was drawn towards it because it 
would enable her to read in the original what the texts have to say about women and 
the Dalits. 
 
2 
27. What marked these 19th century social reform attempts was the modern context and 
mix of ideas. It was a creative combination of modern ideas of western liberalism and 
a new look on traditional literature. 
 
2 
28. Under the British, the zamindars were given more control over land than they had 
before. Since the colonisers also imposed heavy land revenue (taxes) on agriculture, 
the zamindars extracted as much produce or money as they could out of the cultivators. 
One result of this zamindari system was that agricultural production stagnated or 
declined during much of the period of British rule. 
In Raiyatwari system, the ‘actual cultivators’ rather than the zamindars were 
responsible for paying the tax. Because the colonial government dealt directly with the 
farmers or landlords, burden of taxation was less and cultivators had more incentive to 
invest in agriculture. As a result, these areas became relatively more productive and 
prosperous. 
2 
29. -overwork is built into the structure of outsourced projects in the IT sector: project costs 
and timelines are usually underestimated in terms of mandays, and because mandays 
are based on an eight-hour day, engineers have to put in extra hours and days in order 
to meet the deadlines.  
-Extended working hours are legitimised by the common management practice of ‘flexi-
time’, which in theory gives an employee freedom to choose his or her working hours 
(within limits) but, which in practice, means that they have to work as long as necessary 
to finish the task at hand.  
-But even when there is no real work pressure, they tend to stay late in office either 
due to peer pressure or because they want to show the boss that they are working 
hard. 
(Any two) 
Or 
? Industrial society involves detailed division of labour so people often do 
not see the end result of their work since they are producing only one small 
part of a product. 
? Work is repetitive and exhausting. 
? This leads to alienation for people don’t enjoy their work and see it as 
something they have to do in order to survive, and even that survival 
depends on whether the technology has room for any human labour. 
2 
 SECTION – C  
30. Two broad sets of issues have been most important in giving rise to tribal movements. 
These are issues relating to control over vital economic resources like land and specially 
forests, and issues relating to matters of ethnic-cultural identity. The two can often go 
together, but with differentiation of tribal society they may also diverge. The reasons 
why the middle classes within tribal societies may assert their tribal identity may be 
different from the reasons why poor and uneducated tribals join tribal movements. As 
with any other community, it is the relationship between these kinds of internal 
dynamics and external forces that will shape the future. 
4 
Or 
? Upper caste, urban middle and upper classes have benefitted the most 
from the developmental policies. 
? Their caste status had been crucial in ensuring that these groups had the 
necessary economic and educational resources to take full advantage of 
the opportunities offered by rapid development. 
? In particular, the upper caste elite benefitted from subsidised public 
education especially professional education in science, technology, 
medicine and management.  
? At the same time, they were also able to take advantage of the expansion 
of public sector jobs in the early decades after Independence. 
31. A nation is a peculiar sort of community that is easy to describe but hard to define. We 
know and can describe many specific nations founded on the basis of common cultural, 
historical and political institutions like a shared religion, language, ethnicity, history or 
regional culture. But it is hard to come up with any defining features, any characteristics 
that a nation must possess. For every possible criterion there are exceptions an 
counter-examples. For example, there are many nations that do not share a single 
common language, religion, ethnicity and so on. On the other hand, there are many 
languages, religions or ethnicities that are shared across nations. But this does not lead 
to the formation of a single unified nation of, say, all English speakers or of all Buddhists. 
4 
32. Capitalism in the west emerged out of a complex process of European exploration of 
the rest of the world, its plunder of wealth and resources, an unprecedented growth of 
science and technology, its harnessing to industries and agriculture. What marked 
capitalism from the very beginning was its dynamism, its potential to grow, expand, 
innovate, use technology and labour in a way best assured to ensure greatest profit. 
What marked it too was its global nature. Western colonialism was inextricably 
connected to the growth of western capitalism. This had a lasting impact on the way 
capitalism developed in a colonised country like India 
4 
33. These laws imposed an upper limit on the amount of land that can be owned by a 
particular family. The ceiling varies from region to region, depending on the kind of 
land, its productivity, and other such factors. There were many loopholes and other 
strategies through which most landowners were able to escape from having their 
surplus land taken over by the state. While some very large estates were broken up, in 
most cases landowners managed to divide the land among relatives and others, 
including servants, in so-called ‘benami transfers’ – which allowed them to keep control 
over the land (in fact if not in name). In some places, some rich farmers actually 
divorced their wives (but continued to live with them) in order to avoid the provisions 
of the Land Ceiling Act, which allowed a separate share for unmarried women but not 
for wives. 
4 
34. In Maruti Udyog Ltd. two cars roll off the assembly line every minute. Workers get only 
45 minutes rest in the entire day - two tea breaks of 7.5 minutes each and one lunch 
break of half an hour. Most of them are exhausted by the age of 40 and take voluntary 
retirement. While production has gone up, the number of permanent jobs in the factory 
has gone down. The firm has outsourced all services like cleaning, and security, as well 
as the manufacture of parts. The parts suppliers are located around the factory and 
send the parts every two hours or just-in-time. Outsourcing and just-in-time keeps costs 
low for the company, but the workers are very tense, because if the supplies fail to 
arrive, their production targets get delayed, and when they do arrive they have to run 
to keep up. No wonder they get exhausted. 
OR 
 
Gandhi objected to the craze for machinery, not machinery as such. The craze is for 
what they call labour-saving machinery. Men go on ‘saving labour’ till thousands are 
without work and thrown on the open streets to die of starvation. He wanted to save 
time and labour, not for a fraction of mankind, but for all. He wanted the concentration 
of wealth, not in the hands of the few, but in the hands of all. He believed that when a 
4 
nation adopts the spinning wheel, we not only solve the question of unemployment but 
we declare that we have no intention of exploiting any nation, and we also end the 
exploitation of the poor by the rich. 
35. Old Movements- 
? The old social movements clearly saw reorganisation of power 
relations as a central goal. 
? The old social movements functioned within the frame of political 
parties. 
? Regional in nature 
                New Movements- 
? the ‘new’ social movements were not about changing the distribution 
of power in society but about quality-of-life issues such as having a 
clean environment. 
? New movements do not function within the frame of political parties 
but can work through non-party political formations. 
? Global in nature. 
4 
 SECTION – D  
36. All of the villagers relied on the forest to get firewood, fodder and other daily 
necessities. This conflict placed the livelihood needs of poor villagers against the 
government’s desire to generate revenues from selling timber. The economy of 
subsistence was pitted against the economy of profit. Along with this issue of social 
inequality (villagers versus a government that represented commercial, capitalist 
interests), the Chipko Movement also raised the issue of ecological sustainability. 
Cutting down natural forests was a form of environmental destruction that had resulted 
in devastating floods and landslides in the region. For the villagers, these ‘red’ and 
‘green’ issues were interlinked. While their survival depended on the survival of the 
forest, they also valued the forest for its own sake as a form of ecological wealth that 
benefits all. In addition, the Chipko Movement also expressed the resentment of hill 
villagers against a distant government headquartered in the plains that seemed 
indifferent and hostile to their concerns. So, concerns about economy, ecology and 
political representation underlay the Chipko Movement. 
6 
37. a) -son-preference 
     -raising a daughter implied wasteful investment 
     -dowry 
b) -education 
     -prevention of infanticides 
     -prevention of foeticides 
 
(FOR VISUALLY CHALLENGED CANDIDATES) 
“Demographers and Sociologists have offered several reasons for the decline 
in the sex ratio in India.” Elaborate. 
? Son preference 
? Raising a daughter implied wasteful investment 
? Dowry 
? Lack of awareness and literacy 
? Severe neglect of girl babies in infancy 
? Sex-specific abortions 
? Female infanticides 
 
6 
38. -The Indian state has had special programmes for the Scheduled Tribes and 
Scheduled Castes since even before Independence. 
-Reservations involves the setting aside of some places or ‘seats’ for members 
of the Scheduled Castes and Tribes in different spheres of public life. 
-Caste Disabilities Removal Act of 1850, which disallowed the curtailment of 
rights of citizens due solely to change of religion or caste. 
6 
Page 5


MARKING SCHEME 
SOCIOLOGY (039) 
CLASS XII 
 SECTION – A  
1. d. 1 
2. c. 1 
3. c. 1 
4. d. 1 
5. c. 1 
6. d. 1 
7. a. 1 
8. c. 1 
9. a. 1 
10. d. 1 
11. a. 1 
12. b. 1 
13. c. 1 
14. a. 1 
15. a. 1 
16. c. 1 
17. a. 1 
18. a. 1 
19. b. 1 
20. c. 1 
 SECTION - B  
21. - between 1911 and 1921 there was a negative rate of growth of – 0.03%.  
-This was because of the influenza epidemic during 1918–19. 
2 
22. - the British administrators began by trying to understand the complexities of caste in 
an effort to learn how to govern the country efficiently. Some of these efforts took the 
shape of very methodical and intensive surveys and reports on the ‘customs and 
manners’ of various tribes and castes all over the country. 
-This effort had a huge impact on social perceptions of caste and hundreds of petitions 
were addressed to the Census Commissioner by representatives of different castes 
claiming a higher position in the social scale and offering historical and scriptural 
evidence for their claims 
2 
23. -such a general statement is true of individuals in every group. 
-Even for such individuals, it is not true all the time – the same individual may be both 
lazy and hardworking at different times. 
OR 
-greater awareness and hence inclusion. 
-appropriate infrastructure to support and include people with disabilities. 
 
2 
24. -We are able to answer many of these questions because of the way in which we are 
socialised. 
-The socialisation process involves a continuous dialogue, negotiation and even 
struggle against significant others like our parents, family, kin group and our 
community. Our community provides us the language (our mother tongue) and the 
cultural values through which we comprehend the world. It also anchors our self-
identity. 
Or 
? Efforts are required to end the cultural exclusion of diverse groups. 
? State must be able to build multiple and complementary identities. 
? Such responsive policies provide incentives to build a feeling of unity in 
diversity- a “we-feeling”. 
2 
 
25. Policies that promote assimilation are aimed at persuading, encouraging or forcing all 
citizens to adopt a uniform set of cultural values and norms.  
Policies promoting integration insist that the public culture be restricted to a common 
national pattern, while all ‘non-national’ cultures are to be relegated to the private 
sphere. 
2 
26. Kumud Pawade in her autobiography recounts how a Dalit woman became a Sanskrit 
teacher. As a student she is drawn towards the study of Sanskrit, perhaps because it is 
the means through which she can break into a field that was not possible for her to 
enter on grounds of gender and caste. Perhaps she was drawn towards it because it 
would enable her to read in the original what the texts have to say about women and 
the Dalits. 
 
2 
27. What marked these 19th century social reform attempts was the modern context and 
mix of ideas. It was a creative combination of modern ideas of western liberalism and 
a new look on traditional literature. 
 
2 
28. Under the British, the zamindars were given more control over land than they had 
before. Since the colonisers also imposed heavy land revenue (taxes) on agriculture, 
the zamindars extracted as much produce or money as they could out of the cultivators. 
One result of this zamindari system was that agricultural production stagnated or 
declined during much of the period of British rule. 
In Raiyatwari system, the ‘actual cultivators’ rather than the zamindars were 
responsible for paying the tax. Because the colonial government dealt directly with the 
farmers or landlords, burden of taxation was less and cultivators had more incentive to 
invest in agriculture. As a result, these areas became relatively more productive and 
prosperous. 
2 
29. -overwork is built into the structure of outsourced projects in the IT sector: project costs 
and timelines are usually underestimated in terms of mandays, and because mandays 
are based on an eight-hour day, engineers have to put in extra hours and days in order 
to meet the deadlines.  
-Extended working hours are legitimised by the common management practice of ‘flexi-
time’, which in theory gives an employee freedom to choose his or her working hours 
(within limits) but, which in practice, means that they have to work as long as necessary 
to finish the task at hand.  
-But even when there is no real work pressure, they tend to stay late in office either 
due to peer pressure or because they want to show the boss that they are working 
hard. 
(Any two) 
Or 
? Industrial society involves detailed division of labour so people often do 
not see the end result of their work since they are producing only one small 
part of a product. 
? Work is repetitive and exhausting. 
? This leads to alienation for people don’t enjoy their work and see it as 
something they have to do in order to survive, and even that survival 
depends on whether the technology has room for any human labour. 
2 
 SECTION – C  
30. Two broad sets of issues have been most important in giving rise to tribal movements. 
These are issues relating to control over vital economic resources like land and specially 
forests, and issues relating to matters of ethnic-cultural identity. The two can often go 
together, but with differentiation of tribal society they may also diverge. The reasons 
why the middle classes within tribal societies may assert their tribal identity may be 
different from the reasons why poor and uneducated tribals join tribal movements. As 
with any other community, it is the relationship between these kinds of internal 
dynamics and external forces that will shape the future. 
4 
Or 
? Upper caste, urban middle and upper classes have benefitted the most 
from the developmental policies. 
? Their caste status had been crucial in ensuring that these groups had the 
necessary economic and educational resources to take full advantage of 
the opportunities offered by rapid development. 
? In particular, the upper caste elite benefitted from subsidised public 
education especially professional education in science, technology, 
medicine and management.  
? At the same time, they were also able to take advantage of the expansion 
of public sector jobs in the early decades after Independence. 
31. A nation is a peculiar sort of community that is easy to describe but hard to define. We 
know and can describe many specific nations founded on the basis of common cultural, 
historical and political institutions like a shared religion, language, ethnicity, history or 
regional culture. But it is hard to come up with any defining features, any characteristics 
that a nation must possess. For every possible criterion there are exceptions an 
counter-examples. For example, there are many nations that do not share a single 
common language, religion, ethnicity and so on. On the other hand, there are many 
languages, religions or ethnicities that are shared across nations. But this does not lead 
to the formation of a single unified nation of, say, all English speakers or of all Buddhists. 
4 
32. Capitalism in the west emerged out of a complex process of European exploration of 
the rest of the world, its plunder of wealth and resources, an unprecedented growth of 
science and technology, its harnessing to industries and agriculture. What marked 
capitalism from the very beginning was its dynamism, its potential to grow, expand, 
innovate, use technology and labour in a way best assured to ensure greatest profit. 
What marked it too was its global nature. Western colonialism was inextricably 
connected to the growth of western capitalism. This had a lasting impact on the way 
capitalism developed in a colonised country like India 
4 
33. These laws imposed an upper limit on the amount of land that can be owned by a 
particular family. The ceiling varies from region to region, depending on the kind of 
land, its productivity, and other such factors. There were many loopholes and other 
strategies through which most landowners were able to escape from having their 
surplus land taken over by the state. While some very large estates were broken up, in 
most cases landowners managed to divide the land among relatives and others, 
including servants, in so-called ‘benami transfers’ – which allowed them to keep control 
over the land (in fact if not in name). In some places, some rich farmers actually 
divorced their wives (but continued to live with them) in order to avoid the provisions 
of the Land Ceiling Act, which allowed a separate share for unmarried women but not 
for wives. 
4 
34. In Maruti Udyog Ltd. two cars roll off the assembly line every minute. Workers get only 
45 minutes rest in the entire day - two tea breaks of 7.5 minutes each and one lunch 
break of half an hour. Most of them are exhausted by the age of 40 and take voluntary 
retirement. While production has gone up, the number of permanent jobs in the factory 
has gone down. The firm has outsourced all services like cleaning, and security, as well 
as the manufacture of parts. The parts suppliers are located around the factory and 
send the parts every two hours or just-in-time. Outsourcing and just-in-time keeps costs 
low for the company, but the workers are very tense, because if the supplies fail to 
arrive, their production targets get delayed, and when they do arrive they have to run 
to keep up. No wonder they get exhausted. 
OR 
 
Gandhi objected to the craze for machinery, not machinery as such. The craze is for 
what they call labour-saving machinery. Men go on ‘saving labour’ till thousands are 
without work and thrown on the open streets to die of starvation. He wanted to save 
time and labour, not for a fraction of mankind, but for all. He wanted the concentration 
of wealth, not in the hands of the few, but in the hands of all. He believed that when a 
4 
nation adopts the spinning wheel, we not only solve the question of unemployment but 
we declare that we have no intention of exploiting any nation, and we also end the 
exploitation of the poor by the rich. 
35. Old Movements- 
? The old social movements clearly saw reorganisation of power 
relations as a central goal. 
? The old social movements functioned within the frame of political 
parties. 
? Regional in nature 
                New Movements- 
? the ‘new’ social movements were not about changing the distribution 
of power in society but about quality-of-life issues such as having a 
clean environment. 
? New movements do not function within the frame of political parties 
but can work through non-party political formations. 
? Global in nature. 
4 
 SECTION – D  
36. All of the villagers relied on the forest to get firewood, fodder and other daily 
necessities. This conflict placed the livelihood needs of poor villagers against the 
government’s desire to generate revenues from selling timber. The economy of 
subsistence was pitted against the economy of profit. Along with this issue of social 
inequality (villagers versus a government that represented commercial, capitalist 
interests), the Chipko Movement also raised the issue of ecological sustainability. 
Cutting down natural forests was a form of environmental destruction that had resulted 
in devastating floods and landslides in the region. For the villagers, these ‘red’ and 
‘green’ issues were interlinked. While their survival depended on the survival of the 
forest, they also valued the forest for its own sake as a form of ecological wealth that 
benefits all. In addition, the Chipko Movement also expressed the resentment of hill 
villagers against a distant government headquartered in the plains that seemed 
indifferent and hostile to their concerns. So, concerns about economy, ecology and 
political representation underlay the Chipko Movement. 
6 
37. a) -son-preference 
     -raising a daughter implied wasteful investment 
     -dowry 
b) -education 
     -prevention of infanticides 
     -prevention of foeticides 
 
(FOR VISUALLY CHALLENGED CANDIDATES) 
“Demographers and Sociologists have offered several reasons for the decline 
in the sex ratio in India.” Elaborate. 
? Son preference 
? Raising a daughter implied wasteful investment 
? Dowry 
? Lack of awareness and literacy 
? Severe neglect of girl babies in infancy 
? Sex-specific abortions 
? Female infanticides 
 
6 
38. -The Indian state has had special programmes for the Scheduled Tribes and 
Scheduled Castes since even before Independence. 
-Reservations involves the setting aside of some places or ‘seats’ for members 
of the Scheduled Castes and Tribes in different spheres of public life. 
-Caste Disabilities Removal Act of 1850, which disallowed the curtailment of 
rights of citizens due solely to change of religion or caste. 
6 
-93rd Amendment is for introducing reservation for the Other Backward 
Classes in institutions of higher education. 
-The Constitution abolished untouchability (Article 17) and introduced the 
Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act of 1989. 
-From the pre-Independence struggles and movements launched by people like 
Jyotiba Phule, Iyotheedas, Periyar, Ambedkar and others to contemporary 
political organisations like the Bahujan Samaj Party in Uttar Pradesh or the Dalit 
Sangharsh Samiti of Karnataka, Dalit political assertion has come a long way. 
-Dalits have also made significant contributions to literature in several Indian 
languages, specially Marathi, Kannada, Tamil, Telugu and Hindi. 
OR 
The Independence of India in 1947 should have made life easier for adivasis but this 
was not the case. Firstly, the government monopoly over forests continued. If anything, 
the exploitation of forests accelerated. Secondly, the policy of capital-intensive 
industrialisation adopted by the Indian government required mineral resources and 
power-generation capacities which were concentrated in Adivasi areas. Adivasi lands 
were rapidly acquired for new mining and dam projects. In the process, millions of 
adivasis were displaced without any appropriate compensation or rehabilitation. 
Justified in the name of ‘national development’ and ‘economic growth’, these policies 
were also a form of internal colonialism, subjugating adivasis and alienating the 
resources upon which they depended. Projects such as the Sardar Sarovar dam on the 
river Narmada in western India and the Polavaram dam on the river Godavari in Andhra 
Pradesh displace hundreds of thousands of adivasis, driving them to greater 
destitution. These processes continue to prevail and have become even more powerful 
since the 1990s when economic liberalisation policies were officially adopted by the 
Indian government. It is now easier for corporate firms to acquire large areas of land 
by displacing adivasis. In spite of the heavy odds against them and in the face of their 
marginalisation many tribal groups have been waging struggles against outsiders (called 
‘dikus’) and the state. In post-Independence India, the most significant achievements 
of Adivasi movements include the attainment of statehood for Jharkhand and 
Chattisgarh, which were originally part of Bihar and Madhya Pradesh respectively.