Read the passage and answer the questions given below it.
On her first morning Hema reached the school before the peon. The gate still stuck at the same place, and she still had to lift it on its hinge, as she had at nine. Inside, the Class Five room smelt of wet chalk and phenyl. Someone had painted the walls a hopeful green since her time. The map of India still said Bombay.
She pinned up her charts, paper planets and a sun of yellow crepe, and stepped back. They looked smaller than they had on her hostel bed in Pune.
Joshi Sir came in at ten past eight, as he always had, the register under one arm. He was headmaster now, and greyer, but he still cleared his throat before he spoke.
“Very colourful,” he said, with a pointed glance at the crepe sun. “In my day we managed with the blackboard.”
“Children remember what they can see, Sir.”
“Children remember what they are made to repeat.” He set the register on her table, squared it with the table’s edge, and left. Hema found she was standing very straight, hands behind her back, as she used to at nine.
The children rushed in, then went quiet, watching her. A thin girl in the front row put up her hand before anyone had asked anything.
“Madam, the last madam stayed one year. Will you also go back to the city?”
A few of them giggled. Hema laughed too, a moment late. She had an answer ready. She had practised it on the bus. Now it seemed to her the kind of thing one says to visitors.
“Open your books,” she said instead, “to page twelve.”
Outside, the gate banged shut on its old hinge.
According to the passage, which of the following had changed at the school since Hema was a pupil there?
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 4
The correct answer is Option (4) → The classroom walls had been redone in a new colour.
The passage says that someone had painted the walls “a hopeful green since her time”. So the colour of the walls is new.
Why the Other Options are Incorrect?
Option 1: The gate had been repaired and now opened easily. — Incorrect. Contradicted: The gate “still stuck at the same place”. Hema still has to lift it to open it.
Option 2: A new map of India had taken the place of the old one. — Incorrect. Contradicted: The map “still said Bombay”. This old name shows that the map is the same old one.
Option 3: Joshi Sir now came to school later than he used to. — Incorrect. Contradicted: He comes at ten past eight “as he always had”. His time has not changed.