Ncert Solutions for Class 10 English Chapter 2 – The Thief’s Story
Page No 8:
Question 1:
Who does ‘I’ refer to in this story?
Answer:
In this story, ‘I’ refers to the thief.
Question 2:
What is he “a fairly successful hand” at?
Answer:
He was “a fairly successful hand” at stealing and robbing people.
Question 3:
What does he get from Anil in return for his work?
Answer:
When Hari asked Anil if he could work for him, Anil said that he could not pay him. Finally, the agreement was that if he would cook, then Anil would feed him. However, Anil soon found out that he did not know how to cook. Therefore, he taught him how to cook and later, how to write his name. He promised he would teach him how to write whole sentences and how to add numbers. Apart from this, when Hari went out to buy the day’s supplies, he would make a profit of a rupee a day.
Page No 10:
Question 1:
How does the thief think Anil will react to the theft?
Answer:
The thief thought that on discovering the theft, Anil’s face would show a touch of sadness. The sadness would not be for the loss of money, but for the loss of trust.
Question 2:
What does he say about the different reactions of people when they are robbed?
Answer:
In his short career as a thief, he had made a study of men’s faces when they lost their goods. He said that the greedy men showed fear; the rich men showed anger and the poor men showed acceptance.
Question 3:
Does Anil realize that he has been robbed?
Answer:
Yes, Anil had realized that he had been robbed. He knew this probably because all the notes were wet and damp from the rain. However, he did not say anything to the thief and behaved normally.
Page No 13:
Question 1:
What are Hari Singh’s reactions to the prospect of receiving an education? Do they change over time? (Hint: compare, for example, the thought: “I knew that once I could write like an educated man there would be no limit to what I could achieve” with these later thoughts: ‘Whole sentences, I knew, cloud one day bring me more than a few hundred rupees. It was a simple matter to steal − and sometimes just as simple to be caught. But to be a really big man, a clever and respected man, was something else.”) What makes him return to Anil?
Answer:
Initially, when Anil offered to educate him, he thought of it as a bright prospect for himself. He knew that once he could write such as an educated man, there would be no limit to what he could achieve in his field. For him, the motivation behind getting educated was robbing people. However, later, when he had stolen Anil’s money and then missed his train in which he would have escaped, he realized that he had completely forgotten about the whole sentences that Anil had promised to teach him to write. He thought about getting educated in a different light. He thought that it was a simple matter to steal and be caught, but to be a really big, clever and respected man was something else. He was inspired by the trusting and simple nature of Anil. This motivation to earn someone’s trust and be respectable made him return to Anil.
Question 2:
Why does not Anil hand the thief over to the police? Do you think most people would have done so? In what ways is Anil different from such employers?
Answer:
Anil does not hand over the thief to the police because he realized that Hari had learnt his lesson and had changed for the better. Otherwise, he would never have come back and kept the money at the same place from where he had stolen it. Anil even knew how Hari cheated him of a rupee a day while buying the day’s supplies. But he never said anything to him. This is such a case where most people would have handed him over to the police. Anil was different from such employers because he was a modest and trusting man. He had offered to teach Hari how to cook and also to educate him. When he found out that Hari had stolen the money, but had kept it back, he knew that it was Hari’s conscience that had made him do so. Hari could have easily run off with the money, but he did not. This made Anil give him another chance and build him into a better person that he could already see him becoming.
