Which of the following statements challenges the idea that every nation must have a separate state of its own?

A nation may exist across different states, with some members living outside the territory of their original state.

The correct answer is Option 1: A nation may exist across different states, with some members living outside the territory of their original state.

Option 1: A nation may exist across different states, with some members living outside the territory of their original state — Correct. This challenges the idea that every nation must have its own separate state because members of the same nation can live as citizens or residents of different states. For example, the chapter explains that many Jamaicans live outside Jamaica, showing that a nation does not necessarily require a single state.

Option 2: A state can only be recognised when its citizens belong to the same cultural community — Incorrect. A state does not require all its citizens to belong to the same cultural community. States can include diverse cultural groups.

Option 3: A nation and a state always have a perfect one-to-one relationship in modern times — Incorrect. Although the one-to-one relationship between nation and state has become common in recent times, it is not universally true and does not challenge the idea of separate states.

Option 4: A state may contain people belonging to different nationalities and cultural communities within its territory — Incorrect. This statement is true, but it challenges the idea that one state must represent only one nation, rather than the idea that every nation must have a separate state.

NCERT: The criterion that comes closest to distinguishing a nation is the state. Unlike the other kinds of communities mentioned before, nations are communities that have a state of their own. That is why the two are joined with a hyphen to form the term nation-state. Generally speaking, in recent times there has been a one-to-one bond between nation and state (one nation, one state; one state, one nation). But this is a new development. It was not true in the past that a single state could represent only one nation, or that every nation must have its own state. For example, when it was in existence, the Soviet Union explicitly recognised that the peoples it governed were of different ‘nations’ and more than one hundred such internal nationalities were recognised. Similarly, people constituting a nation may actually be citizens or residents of different states. For example, there are more Jamaicans living outside Jamaica than in Jamaica – that is, the population of ‘non-resident’ Jamaicans exceeds that of ‘resident’ Jamaicans. A different example is provided by ‘dual citizenship’ laws. These laws allow citizens of a particular state to also – simultaneously – be citizens of another state. Thus, to cite one instance, Jewish Americans may be citizens of Israel as well as the USA; they can even serve in the armed forces of one country without losing their citizenship in the other country.