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NCERT Solutions for Class 9th Social Science Chapter 9 Provision of Public Goods — LET'S EXPLORE

Book page 207 Updated on2026-09-08

Q1.
From your surroundings, list two goods or services that are provided by the government (for example: roads, streetlights, parks, police, and so on.).
Answer

Method. Walk from your home to your school and note everything you use on the way that nobody charged you for at the point of use. Then apply the chapter's test to each: is it available to everyone in the area, and would a private company be able to earn a direct profit from it? If the answers are yes and no, it is a public good in the chapter's sense.

What a good answer must contain: two items you can actually point to, not a general list copied from the book, and one line each on who provides them.

Sample answer:

Good or serviceWho provides itWhat it does
The street lights on our roadThe municipal bodyLight the road after dark for everyone who passes — residents, shopkeepers, visitors
The government primary health centreThe State governmentBasic treatment and vaccination for families in the surrounding villages

Others that pass the same test in most neighbourhoods: the tar road itself, the drainage line, the police station, the public park, the government school, the fire service and the panchayat's drinking-water supply. The chapter's own list is roads, bridges, public parks, streetlighting, national defence, sanitation and drainage systems.

Tip: a government office is not the same as a public good. What makes something a public good in this chapter is that it benefits all citizens and that private companies “do not provide it because it does not generate direct profit”.
Q2.
Who does benefit from it?
Answer

Everyone who is present, whether or not they paid anything towards it — and that is the defining feature.

Sample answer, taking the street lights on our road.

Who benefitsHow
Every household on the roadCan move about safely after dark; fewer thefts and accidents
ShopkeepersCan keep shops open into the evening, so they earn more
Students and workers returning lateA lit road is safer, especially for girls and elderly people
People simply passing throughGet the same benefit although they live elsewhere and pay nothing here
Buses, autorickshaws, cyclistsCan see the road, so travel is safer for everyone using it
Why the answer is “everyone”: once the lamp is switched on, nobody can be kept out of its light, and one person walking under it does not leave less light for the next. That is exactly why a private firm cannot sell street light by the unit — it has no way of charging the person who benefits.
Q3.
Why would it be difficult for a private company to provide this service on its own?
Answer

Because the company would have no way of collecting money from the people who use it — the same reason the chapter's neighbourhood park is never built.

Follow the chapter's own arithmetic with street lights instead of a park. Suppose lighting our road needs ₹5,000 from each of the families living on it. Every family reasons: “If the others pay, the lights will come on anyway, and I can walk under them without paying.” If enough families reason that way, not enough money is collected and the lights are never installed, even though every family wants them.

Benefit → available to everyone on the road, payer or not
Payment → each family's own money, and voluntary
Best move for one family → let the others pay
If everyone plays that move → total collected is too little, and nothing is built

Three practical obstacles for the private company:

  • It cannot exclude non-payers. There is no gate on a road and no meter on a lamp post, so a family that refuses to pay still gets the light.
  • There is no direct profit. The chapter's own phrase — such goods “are usually not provided by private companies because they do not generate direct profit”.
  • The cost is large and lumpy. Poles, wiring and maintenance must be paid for in full before a single person benefits, and the benefit is then spread thinly over hundreds of people.
Why government provision solves it: the government does not depend on voluntary contributions. It funds the good out of taxes that everyone pays, so the ‘let the others pay’ move is no longer available — and the good that everybody wanted actually gets built.
Q4.
Imagine the government stops providing this good or service, what problems might people in your area face?
Answer

The good would not simply become costlier — for most people it would disappear, because there is no market that could supply it.

Sample answer: if the street lights on our road were switched off for good.

ProblemWho is hit hardest
Accidents and falls on an unlit road, especially in the monsoonElderly people, small children, cyclists
Theft and unsafe streets after darkEveryone, but especially girls and women returning from school or work
Shops shutting earlier, so earnings fallSmall shopkeepers and vendors
Evening classes, tuition and games given upStudents
Some households buying their own lamps and generatorsPoorer households, who cannot afford them, are left in the dark while richer ones manage

The last row is the important one. If a shared service is withdrawn, what replaces it is a private, unequal version — the families who can pay light their own gate, and the rest of the road stays dark. The chapter's phrase for what public provision is meant to secure is “social welfare, economic development, and equal access to essential services”, and it is the equal access that goes first.

Why this is an economic argument and not only a moral one: an unlit road makes shops close early, keeps workers at home after dark and slows the movement of goods. The loss is spread across everyone's income, not just their comfort — which is why the chapter files public goods under the government's economic role.
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