Read the passage and answer the questions given below it.
The first bicycles reached India in the late nineteenth century. They came in with British officials and missionaries, and with a few rich Indians. Almost all of them were imported, and the price was far beyond what a farmer could pay. In a village, a bicycle was a novelty. Children ran behind it, and old men broke off their talk to stare at a man sitting high on two thin wheels.
This began to change after independence, when Indian factories started making bicycles in large numbers. Ludhiana in Punjab became the best-known centre. Firms such as Hero grew there from small units into big makers. As prices came down, the machine moved from the officer’s veranda to the farmer’s courtyard.
What it brought was distance. A milkman could now reach the town before his milk turned sour. A postman could cover several villages in a day. A small trader could tie a sack to the carrier and try a weekly market that had once been out of reach.
For children, and for girls most of all, the change went deeper. The nearest high school was often in another village, too far to walk, and many parents did not want their daughters on long, lonely roads. When state governments began to give bicycles to schoolgirls, as Bihar did from 2006, many more girls joined high school. On many rural roads today, the morning traffic is a line of girls in school uniform, riding two or three abreast, bags in the front basket.
Which of the following is the most suitable title for the passage?
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 2
The correct answer is Option (2) → How the Bicycle Widened Village Life
This title covers the whole passage.
- The passage tells how the bicycle reached villages, first as a rare import and then as a cheaper Indian machine.
- Most of it is about what the bicycle did there. Milkmen, postmen, traders and schoolgirls could all go farther. That is how village life was widened.
Why the Other Options are Incorrect?
Option 1: The Bicycle Makers of Ludhiana — Incorrect. Too narrow: Ludhiana and its firms take up only two sentences of the passage.
Option 3: The Story of Transport in Modern India — Incorrect. Too broad: The passage is about the bicycle alone, not about buses, trains or other transport.
Option 4: A Gift from British Officials to Villages — Incorrect. Misread: British officials brought bicycles in for their own use. The passage does not say they gave them to villages.