NCERT Solutions for Class 9th English Chapter 7 Carrier of Words (prose) — Reflect and Respond

Book page 203–204 Updated on2026-09-08

Q1.

I. Look at the pictures given below of persons engaged in the same profession. [Four pictures: a 2004 ₹5 stamp marked ‘150 YEARS OF INDIA POST / भारतीय डाक के 150 वर्ष’ showing a dak runner with a spear-and-bells staff, a mail train on a viaduct, an ‘AIR MAIL’ label and an early biplane; a 25-paise INDIPEX-77 stamp captioned ‘EARLY POSTMAN’ showing a turbaned postman in a red tunic with a leather satchel; an old sepia photograph of a turbaned postman in uniform clearing a pillar letter box; a colour drawing of a modern postman in khaki uniform and cap with a mailbag, walking in a desert.] Discuss in pairs and share your answers with your classmates and teacher. 1. Which profession do they belong to?

Answer

All four pictures show postmen — people who carry and deliver the post. The pictures are arranged as a small history of the same profession in India, and reading them in order is the point of the exercise.

Picture	What it shows	What it tells you about the job
1. ₹5 stamp, ‘150 YEARS OF INDIA POST’ (2004)	A dak runner jogging with a spear hung with bells, a steam mail train crossing a viaduct, an ‘AIR MAIL’ label and an early biplane	Mail has been carried by foot, by rail and by air — but the runner is still in the picture
2. 25-paise INDIPEX-77 stamp, ‘EARLY POSTMAN’	A postman in a red tunic and turban, barefoot, with a leather satchel	The uniform and the bag are old; the walking is older still
3. Sepia photograph	A turbaned postman in uniform clearing a pillar letter box under a tree	Collection as well as delivery — the postman is the link at both ends
4. Colour drawing	A modern postman in khaki uniform and cap, mailbag on his shoulder, standing in sand dunes	This is Khetaram’s world — the desert, the khaki, the bag

Why the book opens here: the four pictures stretch across roughly a hundred and fifty years, yet the bag on the shoulder does not change. That is exactly the chapter’s claim — the technology around the post has changed completely, but at the last stretch of road a human being still walks. Look at picture 4 again after you finish reading: it is a portrait of the man you are about to meet.

Q2.

I. 2. Do they face any difficulties while doing their duty?

Answer

Yes — and the pictures themselves hint at most of them.

Distance covered on foot. The runner in picture 1 and the barefoot postman in picture 2 have no vehicle at all; the man in picture 4 is standing in soft sand where, as the chapter will say, “even bicycles can’t ply”.
Weather. Khaki cloth and a turban are the only shelter in a desert; a postman works in the sun, the rain and the cold because the mail does not wait.
Weight. Every one of the four is carrying a bag, and the bag gets heavier the further he goes.
Loneliness and risk. The runner carried bells on his spear to warn animals away — the empty stretch between two settlements was his to cross alone.
Emotional weight. A postman does not only deliver paper. He is the one who hands over news of a birth, a marriage, a failure or a death.

Tip: keep this list beside you while you read. Almost every item on it comes back as a hard fact in the chapter — the 28-kilo limit, the 20 km walk, the 50-degree heat, the sandstorms, the letter with the torn corner.

Q3.

I. 3. How does their profession affect the people they meet?

Answer

A postman changes the day of everyone he reaches, because he is the carrier of news — and in remote places, of money.

He ends waiting. In places with no phone, the postman is the only channel to a son working far away. People watch the path for him.
He brings the means to live. A money order in his bag may be the month’s food for a family.
He is trusted with private matters. Where many cannot read, the postman reads the letter aloud and writes the reply — so he knows the family’s joys and troubles.
He carries grief too. The same man who brings news of a wedding brings news of a death, and people learn to read his face before he speaks.

Why this matters for the chapter: the piece you are about to read is not really about the post office. It is about what one dependable person means to people whom no other service reaches — “the sole link between the oases of humanity in India’s extremes and their faraway families.”

Q4.

II. Discuss in groups. 1. How can ‘words’ be ‘carried’?

Answer

Words are carried whenever they are moved from the person who said them to the person meant to hear them. The phrase in the chapter’s title is doing two jobs at once, and it is worth separating them.

Sense	How words travel	Example
Literal	Words are written on paper, and the paper is physically carried	A letter in Khetaram’s mailbag, walked 20 km across the dunes
Technological	Words are turned into signals and sent along wires or through the air	A telegram, a phone call, an email, a message on a phone
Human	Words are held in memory and passed on by a person	A messenger’s spoken message; a grandmother’s story told to a grandchild

The title’s second meaning: a carrier of words is not only a man with a bag. Khetaram reads the letters out and writes the replies — so he carries the words in his voice and in his hand as well as on his shoulder. That is why the chapter can end with a poem that asks what words are worth once they arrive.

Q5.

II. 2. Who could be a carrier of words?

Answer

Anyone who moves a message from one mind to another. The obvious answer is ‘a postman’, but the exercise wants you to widen the list before you read.

The postal chain — the Gramin Dak Sewak, the postman, the mail train, the mail van, the courier.
The older messengers — the harkara or dak runner with his bells, the pigeon-post, the drummer who announced a proclamation in the village square.
People who speak for others — a translator, an interpreter, a newsreader, a journalist, a teacher.
Writers and singers — a poet, a letter-writer, a folk singer carrying a story across generations.
Machines — the telegraph, the telephone, the internet; and now the cell phone that may make Khetaram a Gramin Sanchar Sewak.

Did you know? The word dak once meant the relay itself — a chain of runners posted a few kilometres apart, each handing the bag to the next. The staff with bells warned wild animals off the track and told the next runner he was coming.

Q6.

II. 3. What are the means for people to stay connected?

Answer

Two families of means — those that carry a physical object, and those that carry a signal.

Means	How it works	What it is good for
Post — postcard, inland letter, envelope, parcel, money order, speed post	A physical object is carried by rail, road, air and finally on foot	Reaches places no other service reaches; can carry money and documents; can be kept and re-read
Telegram (now discontinued in India)	A short message sent by wire, charged by the word	Speed, when speed was scarce — greetings and condolences
Telephone, mobile phone	Voice carried as a signal	Instant, two-way, works for people who cannot read or write
Internet — email, messaging, video call	Text, voice and picture carried as data	Cheap, instant, many-to-many
Radio, television, newspapers	One voice carried to many listeners	News and warnings, including to people with no phone
Meeting in person	Words, face and gesture together	The one means that carries tone and body language whole

The chapter’s point: a means is only as good as its reach. In Somarad the phone lines are still 50 km away and “the area was devoid of any other network service” — so the postal service, the oldest means on this list, is the only one that actually arrives.

Q7.

III. Read the words given in the box below and place them in their appropriate context in the following passage. [Box: slumped | dunes | defying | hamlets | signals | devoid] We stepped out of the vehicle at the end of the road. Immediately, our body sent 1. _________ that our decision to visit the sand 2. _________ in the afternoon was insane. We had passed a few 3. _________ on our way to the desert. We could not find even a single soul outdoors, 4. _________ the blazing sun. Even the camels were 5. _________ in the little shade offered by the khejri trees. In this remote place people relied on Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) to connect to the world as the area was 6. _________ of any other network service.

Answer

The completed passage reads:

Immediately, our body sent 1. signals that our decision to visit the sand 2. dunes in the afternoon was insane.
We had passed a few 3. hamlets on our way to the desert.
We could not find even a single soul outdoors, 4. defying the blazing sun.
Even the camels were 5. slumped in the little shade offered by the khejri trees.
… the area was 6. devoid of any other network service.

How each blank is fixed — use grammar first, meaning second:

1. signals — “our body sent” needs an object, a plural noun. Only signals and dunes and hamlets are nouns, and a body sends signals (heat, thirst, a pounding head).
2. dunes — “the sand ______” must be the noun that goes with sand. Sand dunes is fixed.
3. hamlets — “a few ______ on our way” needs a countable noun for places; the book glosses hamlets as ‘settlements’.
4. defying — this blank needs an -ing form that governs “the blazing sun”. Defying means openly going against; nobody was outdoors braving that sun.
5. slumped — “the camels were ______” needs a past participle after were. Slumped = sunk down heavily, all shape gone out of the body.
6. devoid — the fixed pattern is devoid of, and the sentence supplies the ‘of’.

Tip: every one of these six words returns in the chapter — Khetaram’s shoulder is “slumped”, his footprints run “along sand beds and dunes”, he reaches “far-flung hamlets”, his body “sends blazing signals”, he works “defying all elements of the harshest desert”, and villages were once “devoid of schools and primary healthcare centres”. The box is a preview of the vocabulary, not a random word list.

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