Comprehension:
Read the passage given below and answer the questions that follow:
My grandmother didn’t approve of Tridib.He is a loafer and a wastrel,I would sometimes hear her saying to my parents; he doesn’t do any proper work,lives off his father’s money.To me she would only allow herself to say with a sardonic little twist of her mouth:I don’t want to see you loafing with Trideb;Tridib wastes his time.
It didn’t sound terrible, but, in fact, in my grandmother’s usage there was nothing very much worse that could be said of anyone. For her time was like a toothbrush: it went mouldy if it wasn’t used. I asked her once what happened to wasted time.She tossed her small silvery head, screwed up her long nose and said: It begins to stink.
As for herself,she had been careful to rid our little flat of everything that might encourage us to let our time stink. No chessboard nor any pack of cards ever came through our door;there was a battered Ludo set somewhere but I was only allowed to play with it when I was ill.She didn’t even approve of my mother listening to the afternoon radio play more than once a week. In our flat all of us worked hard at whatever we did;my grandmother at her schoolmastering;I at my homework;my mother at her housekeeping; my father at his job in a company.
Our time wasn’t given the slightest opportunity to grow mouldy.
That was why I loved to listen to Tridib: he never seemed to use his time, but his time didn’t stink. Sometimes Trideb would drop in to see us without warning. My grandmother, for all her disapproval of him, would be delighted whenever he came- partly because she was fond of him in her own way,but mainly because Tridib and his family were our only rich relatives, and it flattered her to think that he had gone out of his way to come and see her.
But of course, she knew, though she wouldn’t admit it, that he had really come to nurse his stomach.
The grandmother's comparison of time to “a toothbrush” that “goes mouldy” chiefly serves to:
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 1
The correct answer is Option (1) → Emphasize time as a measurable, economic resource to be invested for profit
Note: The given answer is as per the official NTA Answer Key. However, there appears to be a discrepancy in the key: the correct answer should be Option (4) → Moralize idleness by casting unused time as a matter of personal hygiene and impurity, as explained below.
The grandmother says that time is "like a toothbrush: it went mouldy if it wasn't used", and that wasted time "begins to stink". Mould and stink are images of dirt and decay, the language of hygiene, and she uses them to condemn idleness as a moral fault.
Option 1: Emphasize time as a measurable, economic resource to be invested for profit — Should be Incorrect. (But this is the correct answer in the NTA Answer Key.) The grandmother does want time to be used, and the family works hard. But the toothbrush image says nothing about measuring time or investing it for money or profit. It is about time rotting when it is not used.
Option 2: Suggest that leisure, like art, should be preserved carefully — Incorrect. Contradicted: she is against leisure: no chessboard or cards are allowed in the flat, and even the radio play is limited to once a week.
Option 3: Portray time as cyclical and naturally self-renewing if left alone — Incorrect. Contradicted: time left alone does not renew itself in her view. It "goes mouldy" and "begins to stink".
Option 4: Moralize idleness by casting unused time as a matter of personal hygiene and impurity — Should be Correct. (Incorrect as per NTA) To moralize is to judge something as right or wrong. A toothbrush is an object of daily hygiene. By saying that unused time goes mouldy and stinks like one, she makes idleness a kind of uncleanliness, a moral failing.
Advice for the exam: In the real exam, mark the answer that is grammatically or factually correct. If NTA’s provisional answer key marks a different option, challenge it during the answer-key challenge window and give the reason in one or two lines.