The Adventure

Q1. “You neither travelled past nor the future. You were in the present experiencing a different world.”
Explain briefly.

Ans – Professor Gaitonde, after a collision with a truck, saw different mental pictures in his active mind
about Indian history. In one such picture he saw that the Marathas had won the Battle of Panipat and
the British were marginalized. Professor Rajendra Deshpande, through the present statement tried to
explain Professor Gaitonde’s experience rationally on the basis of lack of determination in quantum
history.

Q2. “You have passed through a fantastic experience or more correctly a catastrophic experience.”
Explain briefly.

Ans – Professor Deshpande refers to Professor’s Gaitonde’s vision of Indian history he has had following
a collision with a truck. Since he was preparing a lecture on the result of Marathas’ Battle of Panipat, his
vision showed that the Marathas had won it and changed the course of Indian history. Professor
Deshpande dubs Professor Gaitonde’s experience as a catastrophic experience on the basis of lack of
determinism in quantum theory.

Q3. Gangadharpant could not help comparing the country he knew with what he was witnessing around
him. Explain briefly.

Ans – It is a historical fact that the Marathas lost the Battle of Panipat and this loss turn India into a slave
of Britishers for the next 150 years. India lost all her respect and identity. In a state of transition,
Gangadharpant changed the state of history. He imagined that Marathas won the Battle of Panipat and
became a powerful, strong and united entity. They remained in power till the twentieth century and
were gradually replaced by democratically elected bodies. Consequently, India of the past, according to
the Professor Gaitonde’s imagination, was exceptionally different from the real one.

Q4. Explain the statement: “The lack of determinism in quantum theory!”

Ans – According to this theory, the electrons don’t take the same trajectory path when shot from the
same nucleus like the planets do. Different routes are taken by them and so scientific law can explain
why those routes are taken. Professor Deshpande applied this theory to rationally explain Professor
Gaitonde’s different experiences of history while living in the present.

Q5. Explain the statement: You need some interaction to cause a transition.”

Ans – Professor Gaitonde could not explain where he had spent two days before returning to Pune as his
memory had gone blank. As such, he failed to comprehend how a person could move between two
totally different worlds at a time – the present time and sometime in the past. His friend Rajendra
Deshpande explained that according to catastrophe theory, small changes in circumstances can lead to
sudden shifts in behaviour. Just before his accident, Professor Gaitonde was speculating about the
course Indian history would have taken had the Marathas won the Battle of Panipat and it resulted in his
belief that the Marathas had actually had defeated Abdali.

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Q6. Why did Professor Gaitonde decide to never preside over meetings again?

Ans – The Professor was still dimly conscious of the rough treatment he had been mated out at the Azad
Maidan during his mental journey to the Indian history. There he was prevented from chairing the
meeting and was showered with eggs and tomatoes by the angry crowd. He did not want it to happen in
his real life too. Moreover, following Deshpande’s rational explanation of his catastrophic experience, he
must have realised the utterly useless nature of the speculative view of history he was to take up in his
lecture. So, he decided never to preside over meetings again.

Q7. How did Professor Gaitonde meet with his accident? How did it affect it?

Ans – Professor Gaitonde was hit by a truck while he was going for his evening stroll. He lost
consciousness. Though physically he was inactive, his mind was ticking constantly, moving from one
place to another, gaining new experiences. On gaining consciousness, he was able to recall each and
every moment of his sojourn in the Indian history.

Q8. Describe the Professor’s shift into the British period.

Ans – The train in which Professor was travelling in his imagination stopped at a small station called
Sardah where an Anglo-Indian checked their permits. He talked to a fellow traveler, Khan Sahib, about
the various trains and stations for the reaching the destinations. Khan Sahib discussed his business and
also he showed him Union Jacks painted on the carriages. The Professor was startled to see the
headquarters of East India Company, English departmental stores instead of Indian handloom shops and
British banks.

Q9. List the various things seen by Professor Gaitonde when he was wandering in the British Raj.

Ans – Professor Gaitonde noticed an Anglo-Indian in uniform in the train who checked everybody’s
permits. He also took note of the tiny Union Jack painted on each carriage. He was surprised to see the
headquarters of East India Company. The buildings around him were of Victorian style and there were
offices of British companies. There were Boots and Woolworth departmental stores and British banks
like Lloyds and Barclays.

Q10. Why did Professor Gaitonde look for his son?

Ans – Professor Gaitonde was confused when he saw the headquarters of East India Company. His vision
of history told him that it had wound up its operations in 1857, so it was very strange that the office was
still there. He decided to meet his son who worked in an office in Bombay in the present time, so that he
could find out what was happening around him.

Q11. Why did Professor Gaitonde decide to go to the Town Hall Library?

Ans - Professor Gaitonde was confused when he saw the headquarters of East India Company. His vision
of history told him that it had wound up its operations in 1857, so it was very strange that the office was
still there. He decided to meet his son who worked in an office in Bombay in the present time, so that he
could find out what was happening around him. But once again the events confused him as he could not
locate him. In his bewildered state of mind, he decided to go to the Town Hall Library to verify the facts
and resolve the confusion.

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Q12. What facts of the history surprised the professor? Why?

Ans – At the Town Hall Library, Professor Gaitonde went through the different volumes of history. In the
first four volumes, things were exactly the same as he remembered them but the fifth volume took him
by surprise. It claimed that the Battle of Panipat was won by Marathas led by Sadashivrao Bhau, and his
nephew, the young Vishwasrao and that Abdali had been chased away. Vishwasrao and his brother
Madhavrao expanded Maratha influence all over India.

Q13. What historic changes in India did Professor Gaitonde imagine? How did India emerge with these
changes?

Ans – Professor Gaitonde imagined that Maratha ruler Vishwasrao had the upper hand and East India
Company had become weak. Even the Mughal regime played a puppet in the Maratha hands. The
Maratha ruler realized the importance of technological advancement and decided to set up his own
technology centers in which East India Company aided him. In the twentieth century, Peshwa rule was
replaced by democracy. The country had become self-reliant and progressive.

Q14. How did the people react when they saw Professor Gaitonde in the president’s chair?

Ans – The people around could not near to see Professor Gaitonde occupy the president’s chair because
they were against the practice of somebody presiding over the lecture. First of all, the speaker stopped
in the mid-way. The audience shouted at the Professor asking him to vacate the chair. The Professor
tried to justify his action. The crown was in no mood to relent but the Professor was also over-zealous.
When the crown could not take it anymore, they threw tomatoes, eggs and other objects at him and
finally lifted him off the stage.

Q15. After listening to Professor Gaitonde, what explanation was given by Professor Deshpande?

Ans – Deshpande connected science and history. He applied the theory of catastrophe and non-
determinism in quantum theory to explain Professor Gaitonde’s experience. He said that what Professor
had just narrated was simply an enlargement of the thought he had had before he met with an accident.
Before the accident, his thought process was focussed on the Battle of Panipat in Indian history and his
mind elaborated those very points to create a different world picture.

Q16. How does the story “The Adventure” reveal that there is no absolute or final reality?

Ans – The story “The Adventure” very clearly projects the idea which Nietzsche had propounded – that
the facts about the things or an event are not always final, they can be interpreted in various ways
according to the view points of the interpreters. To believe that there is only one interpretation of a
phenomenon or incident leads to dogmatism and fanaticism. Even science, which based on logic, fails to
reach the final conclusion of researchers. We know that the theories which are considered to be the
final interpretations of certain aspects of subjects do lose their relevance with the passage of time and
new theories replace them.

The chapter reveals that history too is written from the perspective of the writer; sometimes historical
facts get distorted because of the minds of the historians pre-occupied with some specific ideas. The
idea of non-determinism in Quantum Theory of Physics, says the science researcher, Deshpande, can be
applied to history and suggests that at one time different views of the world may be formed by different
people. Not only does Prof. Gaitonde’s interpretation of the Battle of Panipat differ from the actual

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Incidents, there are other historians who have given similarly distorted views. The story emphasizes the
catastrophe theory according to which “it seems that so far as reality is concerned, all alternatives are
viable but the observer can experience only one of them at a time.” To put it in simple words, reality is
not essential or fundamental but relative.

Q17. Summarize the ending of the story in your words.

Ans – Prof. Gaitonde, after undergoing this adventurous journey, was discussing it with a physicist
Rajendra Deshpande who tried to give a very logical and scientific explanation for it. Prof. Deshpande
referred to the factor of non-determinism in the quantum theory as well as the theory of ‘catastrophe’
to explain the ‘different’ outcome of the Battle of Panipat between the Marathas and Ahmed Shah
Abdali as seen by Prof. Gaitonde. He felt that all this was a figment of the Prof’s imagination. He was of
the view that as Prof was thinking of his lecture about the different outcomes of the Battle of Panipat
which he was to deliver, he thought of all this. When, after explaining Prof Gaitonde’s fantastic but
unreal experience, Prof Deshpande suggested that the historian could now base his one thousandth
lecture on real history rather than the speculative one, the Prof replied that he had resolved never to
address any gathering! In fact, he had already sent his regrets and apologies to the organisers of the
Panipat Seminar.