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History Optional PYQ Master Pack · Model answer

“The vernacular press in the nineteenth century was both newspaper as well as ‘viewspaper’ that enlightened the dormant masses”. Comment.

  • UPSC 2008
  • Social and Cultural Developments

The description of the nineteenth-century vernacular press as both "newspaper" and "viewspaper" captures a genuine duality — a press that carried news while simultaneously manufacturing the opinion and consciousness of an emerging Indian public.

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What the full answer covers

  • The Newspaper Function: Information for a New Readership
  • The Viewspaper Function: Opinion, Debate and Mobilisation
  • Impact on Society: Political Awareness and Cultural Renaissance
  • Repression and the Limits of "Enlightenment"

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