Question

Acharya Atre started the ______ newspaper which played an important role in the Samyukta Maharashtra Movement.
a. Prabodhan
b. Sakal
c. Maratha
d. Navakal

Answer 1

Hint: The Samyukta Maharashtra Movement was not an ordinary movement.It is also known as Samyukta Maharashtra Samiti, was an organization formed in 1956 to advocate for a demand for a separate Marathi-speaking state in India. It was founded on February 6, 1956.

Complete step by step answer:
Before the Independence of India, the Indian National Congress had pledged in favor of introducing linguistic states. However, after India became independent, Jawaharlal Nehru and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel were in opposition of linguistic states as they believed that linguistic states pose a threat to the integrity of India. This led to the foundation of the Samyukta Maharashtra Movement, under the leadership of Keshavrao Jedhe on 6 February 1956 causing a great political stir. With Shripad Amrit Dange as the President. Dr. T. R. Naravane as Vice President and S. M. Joshi as General Secretary, Samiti announced its Executive Council. In the second general election of 1957, the Samyukta Maharashtra Samiti defeated Congress by securing 101 seats out of 133 which included 12 seats from Bombay. In this situation, Congress could only form a government with the support of Gujarat, Marathwada, and Vidharba.
The Samyukta Maharashtra Movement received enormous amounts of support from the people of Maharashtra. Many of the prominent activists in this movement included Shreedhar Mahadev Joshi, Shripad Amrit Dange, Narayan Ganesh Gore, and Uddhavrao Patil. Along with this, the Maratha newspaper played a major role in establishing the mass base by acting as a mouthpiece for the movement. Maratha newspapers mainly influenced people to unite for a single cause of the formation of a separate Marathi-speaking state. Later, Bombay was included in the state of Maharashtra and it was considered as the victory of this movement. Other newspapers such as, Navyug, Navakal, Prabhat, Samyukta Maharashtra Patrika, Kesari, etc. have also contributed majorly in connecting people towards the most powerful movement which occurred after the independence of India.

So, the correct answer is Option :

Note: Balasaheb Thackeray used to draw caricatures for the Samyukta Maharashtra movement under his pen name ‘Malva’ which drew extensive attention from the readers and later resulted in the victory of the movement. The Samyukta Maharashtra movement was fought for a period of 5 years.