Regionalism in India can be understood with reference to:
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 3
The correct answer is Option (3) → Ethnicity
Option (3) Ethnicity — Correct. Regionalism in India is rooted in India’s diversity of languages, cultures, tribes, and religions, and it is encouraged by the geographical concentration of these identity markers in particular regions. These shared markers of language, culture and descent are the stuff of ethnic identity; the old presidencies were large multi-ethnic and multilingual provinces, later reorganised into linguistic states.
Note: The chapter does not name ethnicity as the basis of regionalism. It roots regionalism in the languages, cultures, tribes and religions that are concentrated in particular regions, and it calls the old presidencies multi-ethnic provinces. Shared markers of language, culture and descent are what ethnicity means, so Option (3) is reached by reasoning from the chapter.
NCERT (2025-26): “6.2 Regionalism in the Indian Context … Regionalism in India is rooted in India’s diversity of languages, cultures, tribes, and religions. It is also encouraged by the geographical concentration of these identity markers in particular regions, and fuelled by a sense of regional deprivation. Indian federalism has been a means of accommodating these regional sentiments (Bhattacharyya 2005). After Independence, initially the Indian state continued with the British-Indian arrangement dividing India into large provinces, also called ‘presidencies’. (Madras, Bombay, and Calcutta were the three major presidencies; incidentally, all three cities after which the presidencies were named have changed their names recently). These were large multi-ethnic and multilingual provincial states constituting the major political-administrative units of a semi-federal state called the Union of India.…” |