CBSE Question Paper 2007 class 12 English Elective NCERT

General Instructions:

• Answer all questions.
• Your answers should be to the point. Stick to the word limit where given.

1. Read the extracts given below and answer the questions that follow :

(a) Ants also use the direction of the sun’s rays in finding their way. A mirror was once used to change the direction of the light rays falling onto the path. The sunshine first had fallen from the west. Now, it showed from the east onto the moving army of ants. They turned about and traveled in the other direction.

(i) In what way is the direction of the sun’s rays helpful to the ants? (1)

(ii) With what intention was the mirror used? (2)

(iii) What was revealed by this experiment? (2)

OR

I think the essence of wisdom is emancipation as far as possible from the tyranny of the here and the now. We cannot help the egoism of our senses. Sight and sound and touch are bound up with our own bodies and cannot be made impersonal. Our emotions start similarly from ourselves.

(i) Wherein lies the essence of wisdom? (2)

(ii) Why can’t our senses be made impersonal ? ( 2)

(iii) Which elements other than our senses are not impersonal? (1)

(b) Incidentally one may also become bankrupt because in the progress of the hunt, which naturally takes one sooner or later to Beauchamps Place and other similar zones, one sees far too many fascinating things. For those whose will is weak, whose purse is slender, and whose acquisitiveness or generosity is highly developed, London is, at the moment, no safe city.

(i) Which ‘hunt’ is referred to here? (1)

(ii) What danger is inherent in such a hunt ? ( 2)

(iii) For whom is the city of London not a safe city ? ( 2)

OR

To an ever-increasing degree, chemicals used for the control of insects, rodents, or unwanted vegetation contribute to these organic pollutants. Some are deliberately applied to bodies of water to destroy plants, insects larvae, or undesired fishes. Some come from forest spraying that may blanket two or three million acres of a single state with spray directed against a single insect, pest-spray that falls directly into streams or that drips down through the leafy canopy to the forest floor, there to become part of the slow movement of seeping moisture beginning its long journey to the sea.

(i) What contributes to the organic pollutants? (2)

(ii) For what purpose are some chemicals deliberately used? ( 2)

(iii) Where does the long journey of the chemical spray end? (1)

2. Answer the following questions in about 150 words each :

(a) How do newspapers cater to the interests of different groups of readers? (6)

OR

“The study of literature is the study of words”. What does this mean?

(b) What advantages, in the opinion of the author, would result from the unification of the world? (6)

OR

Why is an earthquake a natural disaster?

3. Answer the following questions in about 60 words each :

(a) Why should a reader read a book with an open mind? (4)

OR

Why does the author call books about success absurd?

(b) What did Amrita Sher-Gil think of the Indian painters? ( 4)

OR

In what sense is fanaticism the greatest enemy of wisdom?

4. Answer the following question in about 150 words :

Raja is the leading character in ‘A Tiger for Malgudi’. Comment. (10)

OR

Describe the aptness of the title of the novel, ‘The Financial Expert’.

5. Answer the following questions in about 60 words each :

(a) What was Raja’s opinion of human beings when he was in the circus? (3)

OR

How did Margayya lose his red account book?

(b) Describe Captain’s relationship with his wife as revealed in ‘A Tiger for Malgudi’. (2)

OR

Describe Margayya’s Lakshmi puja.

6. Answer the following question in about 150 words :

Justify the idea that ‘War is futile’ as shown in the play, ‘A Night of the Trojan War’. (10)

OR

Bring out the contrast in the personality of the mother before and after her meeting with Mrs. Fitzgerald.

7. Answer the following questions in about 60 words each :

(a) Although the convict is set free at the end yet he is not free. Comment. (3)

(b) “Why should one man have the lives of fifty in his hand ?” What do these words show of Diego’s attitude to Columbus? (2)

8. (a) Do as directed : (5)

(i) These walls are (all that /all which) remain of the city. (Choose the correct alternative)

(ii) The girl who is in the green sari is the Secretary of the association.

(Identify the relative clause)

(iii) You are advised to be careful. (Rewrite as interrogative clause’)

(iv) They are late? (Add question tag)

(v) Do you have some more money? (Indicate the part of the sentence that denotes theme)

(b) Do as directed :

(i) Break the following words into separate syllables by putting a dot or slash (. /) after each syllable: (2)

attribute, compliment, vis-a-vis, impoverish

(ii) Mark the ‘stress’ on the following words (2)

record (as verb), asleep, preserve, picturesque

(iii) What is the falling tone? ( 1)

9. Read the passage given below and answer in your own language the questions that follow:

In the concrete jungle, the Yamuna Biodiversity Park (YBP) is like an oasis. A group of scientists is attempting to restore the original ecosystem of the Yamuna floodplains.

The park stands on a plot that was almost barren until the team started the uphill task of restoration in 2002. The objective was to preserve the flora and fauna because the species were becoming extinct.

However, the experts encountered several difficulties in their work. For one, the Jharoda villagers allegedly illegally occupy some parts of the site. Besides, as the area was prone to water logging, the soil’s salt content was very high.

To create the wetland, around 2,30,000 cubic metres of soil was dug out of the low-ly|ng area. The extracted soil has been utilised to form mounds in the central portion of the 157-acre park. With a maximum width of about 120 metres, the 1.8 km long, horse shoe-shaped wetland surrounds these landscaped mounds. An arched bridge stands on its narrowest point. The soil was used to landscape the area in such a manner mat seepage will go down into the wetland.

YBP has a smaller wetland too, and CEMDE plans to create one more. A month ago, DDA allotted an additional 330 acres of “fertile” land for the second phase of the project. Lying northeast of the park, the new land extends up to the river front. “There will be a series of wetlands over 80-100 acres of the new stretch. “We will also create grasslands and flood plain forests, which have become extinct due to urbanisation”, says Prof. Babu, the Head of CEMDE. The vegetation will include tiger and lemon grass 90-200 cms high, medium grasses 45-90 cms in height and smaller varieties that grow 10-60 cms high.

At present, about six acres are dotted with as many as 400 varieties of trees including primitive cultivars found along the Yamuna basin. Also being set up is a butterfly park that’ll have 150 species of honey-producing plants. After the wetland, one takes a peep into the medicinal garden, where scores of colourfull butterflies flap over a plant.

Says Prof. Babu, “Once the grassland is ready, plenty of wildlife will come here on its own.” The 500-odd-acre biodiversity spot in the making is a pilgrimage venue for science students. Delhi University colleges have been asked to visit the park. “We going to be a heaven for birds and a paradise for bird-lovers,” says Prof. Babu. “By creating more wetlands (more birds can be attracted), we can turn this area into a bird sanctuary.”

The cormorant’s habitat is disturbed (in Delhi). And the darter is rare in Delhi because of habitat restriction. This is the first year that these birds have started nesting here. Between 3.30-4 p.-m. the bird population goes up to over 400. Their food requirement is two-three-inch long fish,, which are available here.

(i) Which two difficulties did the experts face in developing Yamuna Biodiversity Park (YBP)? (2)

(ii) What has been done to check the seepage? (2)

(iii) What different Varieties of vegetation are proposed in YBP? (2)

(iv) In what sense will tlje, YBP,be a pilgrimage for science students? ( 2)

(v) Which birds have started nesting here? Why ? (2)

10. Read the poem given below and answer the questions that follow:

Heaven from all creatures hides the book of fate,

All but the page prescribed, their present state;

From brutes what men, from men what spirits know;

Or who could suffer being here below?

The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed today,

Had he thy reason, would he skip and play?

Pleased to the last, he crops the flowery food,

And licks the hand just raised to shed his blood.

Oh blindness to the future: Kindly given

That each may fill the circle marked by Heaven;

Who sees with equal eye, as God of all,

A hero perish, or a sparrow fall,

Atoms or systems into ruin hurled,

And now a bubble burst, and now a world.

(Alexander Pope)

(i) What has God denied to human beings? (1)

(ii) What has God revealed to us? (1)

(iii) Why does a lamb lick the hand of one who is going to kill him? (1)

(iv) How has God shown his kindness to man ? (1)

(v) How does God view the death of a sparrow or that of a hero? (1)

11. There has been an unusual price rise of many commodities of daily use which has caused hardship to the common man. As a newspaper reporter, draft a report in 100-125 words highlighting this problem and suggesting suitable measures to control prices of essential commodities. (5)

12. Write an essay in 200-250 words on any one of the following topics : (10)

(i) Terrorism – a serious threat to national harmony,

(ii) Prime Minister’s concern for the common man.

(iii) Increasing atrocities on women.

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