Hi Everyone!! This article will share Sujan Harbola Questions & Answers.
In my previous posts, I have shared the questions and answers of The Happy Prince, Trapped and Underground so, you can check these posts as well.
Sujan Harbola Questions & Answers
Question 1: Choose the correct option:
1. When the robin returned Sujan’s call, Sujan realised______
(a) that he had learnt the robin’s song.
(b) that it lived in the drumstick tree.
(c) how sweetly the robin sang.
2. Haran visited Dibakar’s shop because__________
(a) he needed to buy grocery.
(b) he wanted Sujan to be withdrawn from school.
(c) Sujan did not know the five times table.
3. Sujan became a harbola because_________
(a) he wanted to be as famous as Kartik.
(b) he wanted to attend the king’s daughter’s wedding.
(c) he loved to imitate the cries of birds and animals.
4. The king wanted proof that tigers existed there because_____
(a) he thought that Sujan was lying.
(b) he had been told that Chanrali forest was full of tigers.
(c) he wanted to hunt tigers even if they had not harmed him.
Question 2: Read the lines and answer the questions:
1. “What have you learnt at the pathshala in all this time?”
(a) Who said this to whom?
Answer: Dibakar, Sujan’s father, said these words to Sujan.
(b) What did the listener say?
Answer: Sujan said that he had learnt the call of 22 different birds. He explained that there was a banyan tree behind his pathshala and all sorts of birds came there.
(c) How did the speaker respond to the listener’s words?
Answer: Dibakar realised that his son, Sujan, was not interested in studies. Seeing that Sujan was interested in mimicking birds, he asked Sujan if he wanted to be a harbola or a vocal mimic. He even suggested that Sujan could make a living by performing vocal mimicry for audiences.
2. “I don’t take apprentices.”
(a) Who said this to whom?
Answer: Kartik said this to Sujan.
(b) When and why did the person say this?
Answer: Kartik said this when Dibakar, Sujan’s father, took Sujan to meet Kartik, the harbola, in the next village. When Sujan went to meet Kartik, the latter saw that Sujan was far more talented than he was. He was astonished by Sujan’s skills and rather jealous as well and so he said that he did not take apprentices. He also realised that as an apprentice, Sujan would not have anything new to learn from him.
(c) What did the listener say?
Answer: When Sujan went to meet Kartik, he realised that he knew many more cries than Kartik. So, when Kartik refused to take Sujan as his apprentice, Sujan asked Kartik to help him by telling him how Kartik had got started.
3. “Aren’t there any tigers in this forest?”
(a) Who said this to whom? Where were they?
Answer: The King of Jabarnagar said this to Sujan. They were in the middle of Chanrali forest, which was very near Sujan’s village, Khira.
(b) How did the listener show the speaker that there were tigers in the forest?
Answer: After the king promised that he would not harm the tiger, Sujan cupped his hands around his mouth, leaned forward, took a deep breath, and gave out a roar. It was exactly like that of a tiger and so, in a flash, a tiger roared from within the forest. In this way, Sujan could show the king that there were tigers in the forest.
(c) What did the speaker tell the listener after that?
Answer: The king was very impressed by Sujan’s talent. He invited Sujan to perform as a harbola at his daughter’s wedding, which was to be held the following month. She was to marry the prince of Ajabpur.
4. “But what harm has it done to you?”
(a) Who spoke this line? To whom was it spoken?
Answer: Sujan spoke to the king.
(b) Who is the ‘it’ referred to here?
Answer: ‘It’ refers to tigers.
(c) What is the speaker referring to? What does it tell you about the speaker?
Answer: Sujan was telling the king that if he got to hear a tiger, he should not kill it. The speaker loved animals and did not want them to be killed.
Question 3: What did Sujan do when he was punished?
Answer: When he was punished, Sujan stood in a corner, and he listened to the calls of nightingales, brain fever birds and cormorants and waited eagerly to get home to practise these cries, after school.
Question 4: What do you think of Dibakar’s reaction when Haran asked him to withdraw Sujan from school? Give reasons for your answer.
Answer: Dibakar did not scold Sujan for not concentrating on his studies but understood what his son really wanted to do. He was very supportive and guided Sujan to do what he was good at and what would make him happy.
Question 5: Was Kartik impressed by Sujan’s skill? Why didn’t he take him as an apprentice? Support your answer with facts from the text.
Answer: Though Kartik was impressed with Sujan’s skills, he did not take him as an apprentice because he was jealous of him. Even though he was a ‘harbola’ for 20 years, Kartik did not know even half the cries that Sujan did. Sujan could mimic the ‘shehnai’, doing his own accompaniment on the ‘tabla’; he could make the sound of a trumpet; and of dancers’ anklets.
Question 6: Find sentences in the text which say that Sujan:
(a) Loved mimicking birds and animals.
Answer:
- But Sujan sat with his palm-leaf notebook, listening to the cries of birds.
- from where he listened to the calls of nightingales, brain-fever birds and cormorants and waited eagerly to practise these cries after school.
- He loved to walk around the fields and woods, listening to the cries of birds and beasts and imitating them. When the birds responded to his cries by calling back, his heart danced in delight.
(b) Was a very talented harbola.
Answer:
- Even his mother, Dayamoyee, said, “How lovely, little one, I’ve never heard the cry of a bird in a human voice before!”
- “I’ve learnt the call of 22 different birds,”
- He had mastered the cries of cows, calves, sheep and goats too. His mooing brought people out of their huts, thinking a long-lost calf had suddenly returned. The washerman’s donkey pricked up his ears and brayed in response to Sujan’s brays, wondering where this other donkey was. When Sujan mimicked the neighing of horses outside the zamindar’s house, the groom often wondered whose horse it was.
- As for birds, Sujan had mastered the calls of at least a hundred varieties – crows, kites, sparrows, jackdaws, cuckoos, pigeons, doves, parrots, mynahs, nightingales, tailor-birds, snipes, woodpeckers, barn owls and many more.
- Like humans, birds too mistook his mimicry for the real thing.
- Kartik had been working as a harbola for 20 years but Sujan realised that Kartik did not know even half the cries that he did.
- Sujan could mimic the shehnai, doing his own accompaniment on the tabla; he could make the sound of a trumpet; and of dancers’ anklets.
- Kartik, astonished by Sujan’s skills, was too jealous to say anything.
- The king was very surprised. “You have an amazing gift,” he said.
So, these were Sujan Harbola Questions & Answers.