NCERT Solutions for Class 9th English Chapter 1 Bharat Our Land (poem) — Critical Reflection

1. The word ‘mighty’ refers to the immense strength, height and majesty of the Himavant. The next line proves that this is what is meant — “there’s no equal anywhere on earth” is a statement about scale and power, not about beauty or age.

2. (ii) emphasise a point. These are rhetorical questions: the poet already knows the answer and expects the reader to supply it. “Which other river can match her grace?” means no river can, and “what scriptures else to name with them?” means there are none. Options (i) and (iii) fail because the tone of the whole extract is confident, not doubtful — a hesitant poet does not write “there’s no equal anywhere on earth”. Option (iv) fails because genuine inquiry expects information back; the poet wants agreement, not an answer.

3. Because the Ganga gives constantly and asks for nothing. Her water irrigates the fields of the plain, supplies the towns along her banks, supports fishing and boat traffic, and is believed to purify those who bathe in her — and she does all of this for everyone alike, without choosing. Generosity is a moral quality, so by giving it to a river the poet does two things at once: he personifies her, and he makes the land itself seem benevolent rather than merely fertile.

4. Because a river in the plains moves the way a graceful person moves — smoothly, unhurriedly and without any abruptness. The Ganga does not fall or crash; she winds in long curves, spreads and glides, and keeps the same unbroken motion for hundreds of kilometres. The word also carries its second sense: grace as a blessing conferred. So the line describes both how the river looks and what she is believed to bestow. In one word the poet turns a body of water into a woman walking.

5. unmatched. The line before the blank decides it — “what scriptures else to name with them?” asks whether any other scripture can even be placed beside the Upanishads. That is a claim about uniqueness, not about quantity. Abundant would mean there is a great deal of wisdom in them, which is true but is not what this rhetorical question says.

Through one grammatical choice repeated four times: “is ours”. The poem does not say the Himalaya is high or the Ganga long; it says they belong to us. Identity in this poem is a matter of inheritance, and the reader is being handed a share in it.

Look at what is claimed. Two things from nature — Himavant and the Ganga. Two things from thought — the Upanishads and Brahma-knowledge. Three kinds of people — warriors, sages and musicians. One teacher — the Buddha. A country made of only mountains and rivers would be a place; a country made of only books would be an idea. By claiming both, Bharati defines heritage as land and mind together.

The verbs matter too. “Gallant warriors have lived here”, “many a sage has sanctified this land”, “Brahma-knowledge has taken root”, “the Buddha preached his dhamma here.” All are in the perfect tense — completed actions whose results are still present. The heritage is not something that happened; it is something that is still standing, and the word “here” pins every one of them to the same soil.

That his attitude is devotion rather than admiration — and that he wants company in it.

Three inferences, each from a different word in the phrase:

• “she” — he does not think of India as a territory. She is a person, and the affection in the line is the affection owed to a mother or a revered woman. That is why the poem can call her generous, graceful and peerless in the same breath.
• “peerless” — an absolute, not a comparative. He is not claiming India is better than other countries, which would invite argument; he is placing her outside comparison altogether. This is the language of reverence, not of rivalry.
• “let’s” — the crucial word. He could have written “I praise her”. Instead he issues an invitation, so private feeling becomes a collective act. A patriot who only feels is content; a patriot who says “let us” wants a nation to feel it with him.

And because the phrase returns — closing the first stanza, then the last — the attitude is shown to be settled rather than a passing burst of feeling. Everything between the two appearances is offered as evidence for a verdict he had already reached.

It suggests that India’s holiness has been earned by human lives, over a very long time, and by many people rather than one.

Take the line apart:

• “many a sage” — the archaic construction means “sage after sage”. Not one founder, not one revelation, but a succession. India’s spiritual heritage is presented as cumulative, built up in layers.
• “has sanctified” — the present perfect: the action is finished but its effect is still here. And the sages are the subject of the verb, which means holiness is something they did, not something the land was born with. Sanctity here is the residue of lives of meditation, teaching and renunciation.
• “this land” — geography is made sacred by what happened on it. That is why India has tirthas: the place is holy because of who lived, taught or died there.

The line also fits its neighbours. It stands beside “Gallant warriors have lived here” and “The divinest music has been heard here”, so the sage takes his place among the country’s makers — bravery, holiness and art treated as three forms of the same greatness.

By placing them in the same stanza, in parallel lines, so that neither can outrank the other:

Warriors stand for the strength that protects a civilisation; music stands for the beauty it produces. The poet is arguing that a nation is great only when it has both — courage without art is mere force, art without defence does not survive. The stanza is built so that the two claims are grammatically identical: “have lived here” and “has been heard here”, the same adverb of place closing both lines. India is the common ground on which the sword and the song meet.

The arrangement is deliberate in a second way. Between the warrior and the musician he puts the sage — so the stanza reads courage, wisdom, beauty, and then closes with “all auspicious things are found”, gathering the three into one. Greatness in this poem is never a single quality; it is a completeness.

By four methods, and it is worth noticing that not one of them is an order to feel proud.

• It names things the reader already loves. The Himalaya, the Ganga, the Upanishads, the Buddha. Pride is not manufactured; it is awakened by objects the reader has known since childhood.
• It uses the possessive. “Is ours”, four times over, and “let’s praise her”. The reader is never a spectator being told about India — he is a co-owner being reminded of what he holds.
• It offers evidence before the verdict. Eight lines of mountain, river and scripture come before the first “she’s peerless”. The conclusion arrives only after the case has been made, so it feels deserved rather than asserted.
• It gives pride a chorus. The chant-like rhythm and the returning refrain make the poem something to be said aloud with others. A feeling shared in a group is stronger than the same feeling held alone — which is exactly why national songs are written this way.

And notice the breadth of the grounds it chooses: nature, scripture, arms, music, philosophy. Pride built on only one of these would be narrow, and easily hurt. Bharati distributes it, so that a reader who cares nothing for battles can still find his own reason in the third stanza.