Series Q3SPR Q.P. Code

Roll No. [] Candidates must write the Q.P. Code on

the title page of the answer-book.

NOTE

1. Please check that this question paper contains 15 printed pages.
2. Q.P. Code given on the right hand side of the question paper should be written on the title page of the answer-book by the candidate.
3. Please check that this question paper contains 13 questions.
4. Please write down the Serial Number of the question in the answer-book at the given place before attempting it.

<math>(\mathbf{V})</math> 15 minute time has been allotted to read this question paper. The question paper will be distributed at 10.15 a.m. From 10.15 a.m. to 10.30 a.m., the candidates will read the question paper only and will not write any answer on the answer-book during this period.

ENGLISH (Elective)

Time allowed: 3 hours

Maximum Marks: 80

General Instructions:

Read the following instructions very carefully and strictly follow them:

1. This question paper has 13 questions. All questions are compulsory.
2. This question paper contains three sections — Section A, B and C. Section A: Reading, Section B: Grammar and Writing, Section C: Literature and Fiction.
3. Separate instructions are given with each part and question, wherever necessary.
4. Do not exceed the prescribed word limit while answering the questions.

28* P.T.O.

<math>1 * P a g e</math>

SECTION A Reading

<math>(20 \text{ marks})</math>

1. Read the passage given below and answer the questions that follow:

12

1. visited the pine knoll, my place of peace and power.

1. in my affairs, involvements with other people and their troubles, and

an entire monsoon had come between me and the grassy, pine-topped slope facing the Hill of Fairies (Pari Tibba to the locals). Now I tramped through late monsoon foliage — tall ferns, bushes festooned with flowering convolvulus — and crossed the stream by way of its little

bridge of stones before climbing the steep hill to the pine slope.

1. puff of wind came across the valley from the distant snows. A

long-tailed blue magpie took alarm and flew noisily out of an oak tree. The cicadas were suddenly silent. But the trees remembered me. They bowed gently in the breeze and beckoned me nearer, welcoming me home. Three pines, a straggling oak and a wild cherry. I went among them and acknowledged their welcome with a touch of my hand against their trunks — the cherry's smooth and polished; the pine's patterned and whorled; the oak's rough, gnarled, full of experience. He'd been there the longest, and the wind had bent his upper branches and twisted a few, so that he looked shaggy and undistinguished. But like the philosopher who is careless about his dress and appearance, the oak has secrets, a hidden wisdom. He has learnt the art of survival!

1. many years, the cherry tree is exactly seven years old. I know, because I planted it.

(5) One day I had this cherry seed in my hand, and on an impulse I

thrust it into the soft earth, and then went away and forgot all about it. A few months later I found a tiny cherry tree in the long grass. I did not expect it to survive. But the following year it was two feet tall. And then some goats ate its leaves, and a grass cutter's scythe injured the stem, and I was sure it would wither away. But it renewed itself, sprang up even faster; and within three years it was a healthy, growing tree, about five feet tall. 28* <math>2 * P a g e</math>