AI-generated practice question — model-generated for extra practice, not a previous-year CBSE board question.
Women used print actively both as readers and writers in nineteenth-century India.
As writers: Rashsundari Debi secretly learnt to read in her kitchen and wrote Amar Jiban (1876), the first full-length autobiography in Bengali. Kailashbashini Debi wrote books exposing how women were imprisoned at home, kept ignorant, and treated unjustly. Tarabai Shinde and Pandita Ramabai wrote passionately about the miserable lives of upper-caste Hindu women, especially widows.
As readers: Journals carried syllabi and reading material for home-based education. A Tamil woman character noted that books gave her more than half her life's happiness, showing how print widened women's world despite social confinement.
Source: Chapter 5, Section 8.1 — Women and Print
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The examiner expects named examples (Rashsundari Debi, Kailashbashini Debi, Tarabai Shinde) and a clear distinction between women as writers (articulating experience) and readers (accessing education/knowledge despite restrictions). Mentioning Amar Jiban specifically scores well. Avoid writing a long essay — two well-supported examples with names and details are enough for 3 marks.