A Letter to God NCERT Solutions Class 10 English

Hello dear students, in this post, ‘A Letter to God NCERT Solutions Class 10 English’, I’ll provide comprehensive solutions of class 10th NCERT English systematically.

We’ve already covered the summary of A Letter to God in another post; you can read that as well to understand this story better.

Before You Read – Activity 2 (Money Order Form)

(i) In addition to the sender, the form has to be signed by the ________

the payee (the receiver of the money). At the post office, the witness/identifier and the paying official also sign the “For Official Use Only” portion.

(ii) The ‘Acknowledgement’ section of the form is sent back by the post office to the ________ after the ________ signs it.

sent back to the sender, after the payee (receiver) signs it.

(iii) The ‘Space for Communication’ section is used for ________

writing a short message to the receiver – for example, why the money is being sent, or a brief personal note. Only a few lines are allowed; no separate letter can be enclosed.

(iv) The form has six sections. The sender needs to fill out ________ sections and the receiver ________

The sender fills out three sections: the Money Order form itself, the sender’s name and address in the Acknowledgement, and the Space for Communication. The receiver fills out two sections: the signature of the payee on the official-use part and on the Acknowledgement. The remaining section is filled in by the post office (for official use only).

Oral Comprehension Check (Page 5)

1. What did Lencho hope for?
Ans. Lencho hoped for a good downpour, or at least a heavy shower.
His field of ripe corn needed water badly, and rain at that moment would have guaranteed him a rich harvest. That is why he kept looking at the sky towards the north-east all morning.

2. Why did Lencho say the raindrops were like ‘new coins’?
Ans. Because for a farmer, rain at the right time means money. Rain would ripen the crop, the crop would be sold, and money would come in.
In his happiness, Lencho even divided them by size – the big drops were ten-cent pieces, and the small ones were five-cent coins. Shining raindrops also look like newly minted coins.

3. How did the rain change? What happened to Lencho’s fields?
Ans. A strong wind began to blow and the rain turned into a hailstorm. Huge hailstones, looking like new silver coins, fell continuously for a whole hour on the house, the garden, the hillside and the cornfield. The field turned white, as if it had been covered with salt. Not a single leaf was left on the trees, all the flowers were gone, and the corn was completely destroyed.

4. What were Lencho’s feelings when the hail stopped?
Ans. Lencho was filled with deep sadness and despair. Standing in the middle of his ruined field, he told his sons that even a plague of locusts would have left more behind than the hail had. He knew the family would have no corn and would go hungry that year. Yet in the midst of this sorrow, one hope remained alive in his heart – help from God.

Oral Comprehension Check (Page 6)

1. Who or what did Lencho have faith in? What did he do?
Ans. Lencho had complete, unshakeable faith in God. He had been taught that God sees everything, even what is hidden deep in one’s conscience. So the following Sunday, at daybreak, he wrote a letter to God asking for a hundred pesos, enough to sow his field again and to live on until the new crop came. He wrote ‘To God’ on the envelope, stamped it himself and dropped it into the mailbox at the town post office.

2. Who read the letter?
Ans. The postman, who also helped at the post office, opened the mailbox and read the address. Laughing heartily, he took the letter to his boss, the postmaster, who also read it.

3. What did the postmaster do then?
Ans. The postmaster first laughed, but almost at once he turned serious. He admired the writer’s tremendous faith and decided not to let that faith be shaken. He resolved to answer the letter. Since goodwill, ink and paper were not enough, he collected money, he asked his employees to contribute, gave a part of his own salary, and persuaded several friends to give something “for an act of charity”. He could not gather the full hundred pesos, so he sent Lencho a little more than half, in an envelope containing a letter signed with a single word: God.

Oral Comprehension Check (Page 7)

1. Was Lencho surprised to find a letter for him with money in it?
Ans. No, he showed not the slightest surprise. His confidence in God was so complete that he had fully expected a reply with the money in it.

2. What made him angry?
Ans. He became angry when he counted the money and found only seventy pesos instead of the hundred he had asked for. In his mind, God could neither make a mistake nor refuse him what he had requested, so he concluded that the post office employees had stolen the remaining thirty pesos. He immediately wrote another letter calling them “a bunch of crooks”.

A Letter to God Thinking about the Text Question Answer

1. Who does Lencho have complete faith in? Which sentences in the story tell you this?
Ans. Lencho has complete faith in God. The following sentences show this:

• In the hearts of everyone in that lonely house there was a single hope: help from God.
• All through the night Lencho thought only of his one hope: the help of God, whose eyes, as he had been taught, see everything, even what lies deep in one’s conscience.
• He wrote a letter addressed “To God”; it was nothing less than a letter to God.
• Lencho showed not the slightest surprise on seeing the money; such was his confidence.
• God could not have made a mistake, nor could He have denied Lencho what he had requested.

2. Why does the postmaster send money to Lencho? Why does he sign the letter ‘God’?
Ans. The postmaster sent money to Lencho because he was afraid that if the letter went unanswered, the poor farmer would lose his belief in God. He signed the letter ‘God’ because he wanted Lencho to believe that God had answered his prayer. The postmaster’s aim was to protect that faith, not to take credit.

3. Did Lencho try to find out who had sent the money to him? Why/Why not?
Ans. No, he did not try at all. For him there was nothing to find out; he was certain that the money had come from God, exactly as he had asked. Such doubt never entered his mind; his faith left no room for it. He was concerned only with the amount being short, not with the sender’s identity.

4. Who does Lencho think has taken the rest of the money? What is the irony in the situation?
Ans. Lencho thinks the post office employees have taken the remaining thirty pesos, and he calls them “a bunch of crooks”.
The irony is that these very employees are the ones who gave the money out of kindness. The postmaster contributed a part of his own salary and the employees gave from their pockets. Instead of gratitude, they receive the accusation of theft. There is a further irony in the fact that Lencho, who trusts an unseen God completely, does not trust the human beings he can actually see.

5. Are there people like Lencho in the real world? What kind of a person would you say he is?
Ans. Yes, people like Lencho certainly exist in the real world: simple, hardworking, deeply religious people whose faith in God is absolute and who never question it.
Lencho is naive and unquestioning: he believes a letter can reach God by post and that God will reply by mail. He is also comical in his simplicity; the idea of “starting up a correspondence with God” is amusing, and so is his demand for the balance amount. He may appear a little ungrateful, since he suspects the very people who helped him, but this is not out of greed or selfishness; it flows from his unshakeable belief that God cannot make a mistake. At the same time, he is hardworking, honest and immensely optimistic.

6. There are two kinds of conflict in the story: between humans and nature, and between humans themselves. How are these conflicts illustrated?

Human versus nature: Lencho depends entirely on nature for his living. The rain he prayed for turns into a destructive hailstorm that flattens his ripe corn in a single hour, strips the trees of their leaves and leaves the field white as salt. All the family’s labour is destroyed, and they face hunger. Man is shown to be helpless before nature’s fury.

Human versus human: This appears in the second half of the story. The postmaster and his staff quietly help a stranger out of their own pockets, yet Lencho suspects them of dishonesty and calls them crooks. The kindness of human beings is repaid with distrust, a conflict born of misunderstanding rather than of malice.

A Letter to God Thinking about Language

I. Names for storms

II. Matching the meanings of ‘hope’

III. Relative Clauses

1. (which) I often go to Mumbai, which is the commercial capital of India.

2. (who) My mother, who cooks very well, is going to host a TV show on cooking.

3. (whose) These sportspersons, whose performance has been excellent, are going to meet the President.

4. (whose) Lencho prayed to God, whose eyes see into our minds.

5. (whom) This man, whom I trusted, cheated me.

IV. Using Negatives for Emphasis

1. The trees lost all their leaves. → Not a leaf remained on the trees.

2. The letter was addressed to God himself. → It was nothing less than a letter to God.

3. The postman saw this address for the first time in his career. → Never in his career as a postman had he known that address.

V. Metaphors

Speaking

Have you ever been in great difficulty, and felt that only a miracle could help you? How was your problem solved?

Sample answer: Yes. A week before my board practical examination I fell seriously ill and could not attend school for ten days. The syllabus was large and I felt certain I would fail. It seemed only a miracle could save me. Then my class teacher and two of my classmates began visiting me every evening with their notes, and explained the difficult experiments to me. I recovered in time, prepared with their help, and scored well. Looking back, the “miracle” was really the kindness of the people around me, much as in Lencho’s story, where the help he believed came from God actually came from ordinary human beings.

Writing

Design a poster for your area on how to save water during summer and when it is available in excess.

Sample poster matter:

SAVE EVERY DROP, SAVE LIFE

Water is precious. Do not waste it.

In summer, when water is scarce:

• Close taps tightly; repair every leaking tap and pipe at once.
• Use a bucket instead of a shower or a running tap.
• Reuse the water from washing vegetables and rice for your plants.
• Water the garden early in the morning or after sunset to reduce evaporation.

In the rainy season, when water is in excess:

• Harvest rainwater from rooftops into a storage tank.
• Build recharge pits and soak pits to refill the groundwater.
• Clean and revive the ponds, wells and step-wells of your locality.
• Plant trees: they hold the soil and the water together.

Remember: A dripping tap can waste hundreds of litres a month.

SAVE WATER TODAY, SO THAT TOMORROW IS NOT DRY.

Listening (the letter under ‘In This Lesson’)