Read the passage and answer the question:
Two rebels of 1857: Shah Mal
Shah Mal lived in a large village in pargana Barout in Uttar Pradesh. He belonged to a clan of Jat cultivators whose kinship ties extended over chaurasee des (eighty-four villages). The lands in the region were irrigated and fertile, with rich dark loam soil. Many of the villagers were prosperous and saw the British land revenue system as oppressive: the revenue demand was high and its collection inflexible. Consequently cultivators were losing land to outsiders, to traders and moneylenders who were coming into the area. Shah Mal mobilised the headmen and cultivators of chaurasee des, moving at night from village to village, urging people to rebel against the British. As in many other places, the revolt against the British turned into a general rebellion against all signs of oppression and injustice.
Cultivators left their fields and plundered the houses of moneylenders and traders. Displaced proprietors took possession of the lands they had lost. Shah Mal's men attacked government buildings, destroyed the bridge over the river, and dug up metalled roads partly to prevent government forces from coming into the area, and partly because bridges and roads were seen as symbols of British rule. They sent supplies to the sepoys who had mutinied in Delhi and stopped all official communication between British headquarters and Meerut.
Locally acknowledged as the Raja, Shah Mal took over the bungalow of an English officer, turned it into a "hall of justice", settling disputes and dispensing judgments. He also set up an amazingly effective network of intelligence. For a period the people of the area felt that firangi raj was over, and their raj had come.
Shah Mal was killed in battle in July 1857.
Why did the villagers attack the houses of moneylenders and traders in 1857?
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 2
The correct answer is Option (2) → Moneylenders and traders had become symbols of oppression and injustice.
The passage says that, as in many other places, the revolt against the British turned into a general rebellion against all signs of oppression and injustice. It was then that cultivators left their fields and plundered the houses of moneylenders and traders.
Option (1) The moneylenders and traders had started a military campaign against the villagers. — Incorrect. The moneylenders and traders fought no campaign. They were outsiders who were taking over the land of cultivators who could not meet the high revenue demand.
Option (2) Moneylenders and traders had become symbols of oppression and injustice. — Correct. Cultivators were losing their land to the traders and moneylenders coming into the area. So when the revolt became a rebellion against all signs of oppression and injustice, the houses of these men were plundered.
Option (3) Moneylenders and traders were Englishmen. — Incorrect. They were local outsiders who had come into the area, not Englishmen. The English appear separately in the passage, as the officer whose bungalow Shah Mal took over.
Option (4) Shah Mal asked them to attack the moneylenders. — Incorrect. Shah Mal moved from village to village urging people to rebel against the British. The attacks on moneylenders and traders grew out of the cultivators’ own anger at losing their land.
NCERT: Themes in Indian History Part III — Chapter 10: Rebels and the Raj (2026-27)
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