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History Optional PYQ Master Pack · Model answer

Discuss ‘the safety valve’ theory. Does it satisfactorily explain the foundation of the Indian National Congress?

  • UPSC 1991
  • Early Indian Nationalism

The "safety-valve" theory claims that the Indian National Congress (1885) was engineered by the colonial state to defuse revolutionary discontent, but sustained archival scrutiny since the 1950s has largely discredited it as myth rather than history.

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What the full answer covers

  • Origins of the Theory
  • The Theory's Career Across Ideological Camps
  • Why the Theory Does Not Hold: The Case Against
  • What Actually Explains the Congress's Foundation

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