BHIC 105 Solved Guess Paper for the 2026 Term-End Examinations is a 14-question preparation set with written-out answers for History of India-III (c. 750-1206 CE), the Semester III core paper of BA (Honours) History. Every question in it was chosen after reading the last six Term-End papers line by line, not by guessing what sounds important.
Most students reach this course with the same problem. The syllabus runs to 17 units and roughly a thousand pages, the paper asks for only five answers, and there is no reliable way to tell which five topics deserve the last fortnight. That gap is what this paper closes.
The course itself sits in the IGNOU Bachelor of Arts (Honours) History programme and is examined in two Sections, so a student who prepares only Cholas and feudalism can walk into the hall and find they cannot legally attempt five questions. The selection here deliberately spreads across both Sections.
BHIC 105 Key Facts at a Glance
- Course code: BHIC 105
- Course title: History of India-III (c. 750-1206 CE)
- Programme: Bachelor of Arts (Honours) History, BAHIH, Semester III
- Credits: 6
- Units in syllabus: 17
- Term-End paper: 100 marks, 3 hours
- To attempt: any five questions of eight, at least two from each Section
- Word length per answer: about 400 words
- Short-note questions: Q4 and Q8, any two at 10 plus 10 marks
- Guess paper size: 14 questions across 17 pages
- Sessions covered: June 2026 and December 2026
- Enquiry: WhatsApp 9899436384
What the BHIC 105 Solved Guess Paper Includes
The file is a 17-page PDF containing 14 questions, each with a complete written answer, a block and Section tag, a priority rating and a record of the sessions in which that topic last appeared. Nothing in it is a heading with bullet points underneath. Every question is answered as you would write it in the hall.
Twelve of the 14 are full 20-mark essay questions. The remaining two are short-note sets, each carrying four options from which you attempt two. That mirrors the structure of the actual paper, where Q4 and Q8 are always short notes.
Each answer follows a fixed internal shape: a definition paragraph, a named scholar, four to seven numbered analytical points, and a short evaluative conclusion. Examiners at this level mark for structure as much as for content, and an answer that starts with a definition and closes with a judgement reads as a trained answer.
The paper also carries two closing pages that are easy to overlook. One sets out the exam pattern and the word targets. The other lists what not to over-prepare, which for most students saves more time than any list of important topics.
BHIC 105 Sample Questions with Full Answers
Five of the 14 questions are reproduced below in full so you can judge the answer quality before you enquire. These five are shown exactly as they appear in the file, with their Section tags and priority ratings intact. The other nine questions, including two of the four short-note options in each set, are in the paid PDF.
Biographies as a Historical Source
Question: Analyse the importance of biographies or charitas as a source for reconstructing the history of the early medieval period in India.
Meaning of charitas
Charitas were historical biographies. Romila Thapar explains that the word charita carries the sense of moving, doing and going, and so refers to the activities of a person.
Nature and significance
- Post-Gupta historical writing took three forms, charitas, prasastis and vamsavalis. Charitas were biographies composed largely as kavyas about persons in authority.
- Thapar holds that the charita articulated a historical consciousness, because it deals with the actions of a particular person, indicates their cause and purpose, and places them in time and space.
- The best known charita is Banabhatta's Harshacharita, on Harshavardhana of Kannauj, his bid for sovereignty and his reign.
- New courts needed capable court poets to compose biographies that would legitimise the dynasty and publicise the deeds of its kings.
- Sandhyakaranandin's Ramacharita, of the early twelfth century, centres on the Pala king Ramapala and gives insight into the Kaivarta revolt, read by many historians as the first peasant revolt. It also justified Ramapala's accession over his elder brother Mahipala.
- Other examples include Padmagupta's Navasahasankacharita on Sindhuraja of Malwa, Bilhana's Vikramankadevacharita on the Chalukya king Vikramaditya VI of Kalyani, and Hemchandra's Kumarapalacharita on Kumarapala of Anahilawada.
- Their limitation is that charitas were never intended as critical history and worked mainly as literature, yet they remain an indispensable source.
Conclusion. Biographies fill the gap left by the Puranas, which after the middle of the first millennium CE stopped carrying dynastic lists. That absence makes charitas essential for early medieval political history.
Chola Local Administration, Ur and Nadu
Question: Write a note on Chola local administration with reference to the ur and the nadu.
Meaning of local administration
The ur was the assembly of non-brahmana landholders of a village, and in ur villages the land was held in common.
The ur
- The ur was the assembly of non-brahmana landholders of a vellanvagai or peasant village. Holding land was a prerequisite for membership.
- Its functions covered supervision of village lands, including sale, purchase and gift. Cultivators were generally referred to as vellalas.
The nadu
- The nattars were the representatives and chief landholders of the nadu, mostly vellalas holding the title Velan, whose main occupation was agriculture.
- Subbarayalu treats the ur as a small fractional component of the nadu, since a number of urs together constituted a nadu.
- The nadu was the smallest unit for revenue administration. Nattu-vari was its land revenue and the nattuk-kanakku was the personnel responsible for the revenue register.
Brahmadeya and royal officers
- The brahmadeyakkilavars were the brahmana donees of brahmadeya land, while the nagarattars were the trading community of the nagaram. Many nadus had a brahmadeya as the main village and many did not.
- Under Rajaraja I the older nadus were regrouped into artificially created valanadus, and royal officers such as the Nadu-vagai-ceyvar and the Nadu-kankani-nayagam represented royal power inside the nadu.
Conclusion. Chola local administration combined locally autonomous peasant institutions, the ur and the nadu, with a royal revenue machinery laid over them. That combination gave the state both reach and stability.
The Debate on Indian Feudalism
Question: Critically examine the debate related to Indian Feudalism.
Meaning
R. S. Sharma described Indian feudalism as a particular economic and social formation which, according to the feudalism theorists, came into being through the practice of land grants.
The feudalism thesis
- The concept was first suggested by D. D. Kosambi and elaborated by R. S. Sharma in Indian Feudalism, published in 1965, and later defended in his paper asking how feudal Indian feudalism actually was.
- The theory rests on land grants from the fourth century CE, which created a hierarchy of landed intermediaries standing between the state and the peasant.
- Grants transferred land along with peasants, artisans and fiscal and administrative rights, producing a graded officialdom of samantas, mahasamantas, ranakas and mandalikas.
- There are more than a hundred references to forced labour. Peasants were reduced to semi-serfs and many became ardhikas or share-croppers, burdened by taxation and coercion.
- The decline of long-distance trade, the paucity of coined currency, the use of cowries and visible urban decay are all linked to a self-sufficient village economy.
The critics
- Harbans Mukhia, who edited The Feudalism Debate, questioned whether feudalism was universal, while D. N. Jha criticised Sharma for leaning too heavily on the absence of trade.
- B. D. Chattopadhyaya, Ranabir Chakrabarti and John S. Deyell have demonstrated flourishing trade and currency around 1000 CE, which dissolves the trade and feudalism dichotomy.
Conclusion. However heavily contested, the Indian feudalism formulation has been the most fertile framework for reading the early medieval economy and polity, and it forced scholars to re-examine the whole period.
Developments in Science and Technology
Question: Discuss briefly the developments in science and technology in the early medieval period.
Scope
The early medieval centuries saw notable achievement in mathematics, astronomy, chemistry and medicine, alongside a vigorous two-way translation activity between India and the Arab world.
Mathematics and astronomy
- In mathematics, the Lilavati and the Bijaganita of Bhaskara II set out rules for trigonometrical functions such as sine, cosine and tangent.
- In astronomy, Govindasvamin, Sankaranarayana who served as chief astronomer at the Chera court, Aryabhata II of about 950 CE who is credited with the moon's second inequality, Sripati and Satananda were all active.
Influence on Arabic science
- Al-Fazari, assisted by Hindu pandits, translated Brahmagupta into Arabic, which profoundly influenced astronomy across the Islamic world.
- Al-Khwarizmi used the new Indian numerals to develop algebra, which later passed into Europe.
- The astrolabe, originally a Greek instrument, was brought to India by Muslim astronomers and popularised by the Arabs.
Chemistry, medicine and technology
- In chemistry, alchemy found practical application in medicine and the compound makaradhvaja is still used in indigenous practice, though Indian alchemy did not develop into a rational chemistry. Al-Biruni praised Hindu proficiency in medicine, astronomy and philosophy.
- Technology advanced through the Persian wheel, a water-lifting device used in irrigation, and the spinning wheel, which mattered greatly for cotton textile production.
Conclusion. The period combined original achievement with a remarkable exchange of scientific learning running in both directions between India and the Arab world.
The Battles of Tarain
Question: Write a short note in about 200 words on the Battles of Tarain.
Definition
The wars fought between Prithviraj Chauhan and Muizzuddin Muhammad Ghori in 1191 and 1192 CE are known as the First and Second Battles of Tarain.
- In the First Battle of Tarain in 1191 CE, Prithviraj Chauhan defeated Ghori and left him badly wounded. Ghori was carried from the field by a Khalji horseman.
- The Turkish forces returned for the Second Battle of Tarain in 1192 CE, this time with careful planning and a large cavalry force.
- Ferishta records that Prithviraj's army was the larger of the two, but Ghori's superior mobility and battlefield tactics won him the day.
- The Chauhan defeat opened the upper Ganga valley to Turkish expansion and led directly to the foundation of Turkish rule in north India.
Conclusion. Tarain is examined as a turning point rather than as a battle narrative, so the marks sit in the consequence, not in the fighting.
Those five samples are drawn from four different units of the syllabus. The nine questions still inside the file cover inscriptions, Rashtrakuta administration, the rise of the Rajputs, temple architecture, the Chola naval expedition to Srivijaya, urbanisation and the urban decay debate, the agrarian economy, bhakti and the socio-religious movements, and the second short-note set.
If you want to compare our answer style against the raw exam question first, the IGNOU Previous Year Question Paper collection lets you see how these same questions were worded by the university in earlier sessions.
How the BHIC 105 Solved Guess Paper Was Built from Past Papers
Papers from the last five years were read, and the six most recent Term-End sessions, June 2023 through December 2025, were mapped question by question into a frequency table. The December 2025 paper was the last one added, and it changed two priority ratings.
The method is deliberately unglamorous. Every question from every one of those six papers was written into a grid, one row per topic. Topics that recurred four or more times, or that appeared in the two most recent sessions, were marked HIGH. Two or three appearances gave a MEDIUM. A single appearance gave a LOW and was kept only as a backup short note.
A frequency count alone is not enough, though, because IGNOU rotates. A topic that has appeared in five consecutive papers is not automatically safer than one that vanished for four sessions and has just resurfaced. So the ratings also account for gaps that have grown long enough to be due.
Answers were then written against the IGNOU BHIC 105 course material rather than against general history reading. That matters more in this course than in most, because examiners are marking against the university's own framing of the feudalism debate and the Third Urbanization argument, not against whatever a standard textbook says.
The same method sits behind every file in our IGNOU Solved Guess Paper range, which is why the format will feel familiar if you have used one of our papers for another course.
You can check our frequency claims yourself. IGNOU publishes its past Term-End papers openly, and the December 2022 BHIC 105 paper is available on the university's own previous year question paper archive. We would rather you verified than took our word.
BHIC 105 Exam Pattern and Marking Scheme for 2026
The BHIC 105 Term-End paper is 100 marks over three hours, with eight questions split into two Sections, of which you attempt any five including at least two from each Section. All five carry equal marks.
| Element | Detail |
|---|---|
| Total marks | 100 |
| Duration | 3 hours |
| Questions set | 8, numbered Q1 to Q8 |
| Questions to attempt | Any 5 |
| Section rule | At least 2 from Section I and at least 2 from Section II |
| Marks per question | 20 |
| Answer length | About 400 words |
| Short-note questions | Q4 and Q8, attempt any 2 of 4 options, 10 plus 10 marks |
| Short-note length | About 200 words each |
| Sessions | June and December only |
The Section rule is where marks quietly disappear. A student who has revised only the political and source-based topics will find those clustered in Section I, and will then be forced to attempt a Section II question cold. Three strong answers plus two thin ones is a far more common outcome than a genuinely weak paper.
The 400-word instruction is also worth taking literally. Twenty marks divided across roughly seven substantive points means each point is worth close to three marks. Writing 800 words on four points scores less than 400 words on seven.
Complete Unit Index of BHIC 105 History of India-III
BHIC 105 is a 6-credit course built from 17 units, and the guess paper draws directly on 13 of them. The table below lists every unit with the specific topics it carries, and marks whether the guess paper touches it.
| Unit | Unit title | Key topics inside the unit | In the guess paper |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Historical Sources | Charitas, prasastis and vamsavalis; land-grant and prashasti inscriptions; Rajatarangini; Arab and Persian accounts | Yes, Q1 and Q2 |
| 2 | The Political Scenario I: Rajputs, Rise and Struggle to Power | Agnikula and solar-descent legends; Gurjara Pratiharas, Guhilas, Paramaras and Cahamanas; lineage state formation | Yes, Q4 |
| 3 | The Political Scenario II: Rashtrakutas and Palas | Rashtra, Vishaya and Bhukti divisions; rashtramahattaras; Pala kingship; the Kaivarta revolt | Yes, Q3 |
| 4 | The Political Scenario III: Cholas and Chalukyas | Ur, nadu and nattar; valanadu reorganisation under Rajaraja I; Taila II and the Chalukyas of Kalyana | Yes, Q6 and Q13 |
| 5 | Art and Architecture: North India and South India | Nagara, Dravida and Vesara orders; garbhagriha, shikhara, mandapa and gopuram; Khajuraho, Thanjavur, Konarka | Yes, Q5 and Q13 |
| 6 | Arab Conquest of Sindh, Turkish Invasions, Mahmud Ghazni and Mohd. Ghouri | The Chachnama; Dahar and Muhammad bin Qasim; Mahmud's raids on Mathura and Somnath; the two Battles of Tarain | Yes, Q13 |
| 7 | Social, Cultural and Technological Impacts of the Arab and Turkish Invasions | Transmission of Indian numerals; the astrolabe; the Persian wheel and the spinning wheel; cultural interaction | Partly, inside Q11 |
| 8 | Society, Economy, Polity and Culture: East and North-East India | Pala and Sena Bengal; Kamarupa; eastern land-grant patterns; regional cultural formation | Not covered |
| 9 | Political and Cultural Expansion in Southeast Asia | Srivijaya; Rajendra Chola's naval expedition of 1025 CE; the Sejarah Melayu record; Indic cultural transmission | Yes, Q7 |
| 10 | Agriculture, Landlords, Peasants and Tribals: The Feudalism Debate | Brahmadeya and agrahara grants; ardhikas and forced labour; R. S. Sharma's thesis; the Mukhia and Jha critiques | Yes, Q8 and Q10 |
| 11 | Castes, Gender and Professions | Changing status of Sudras; property rights of women; artisan and service groups; varna order under strain | Not covered |
| 12 | Trade, Trade Routes and Maritime Trade | Ayyavole, Manigramam and Nanadesi guilds; inland and coastal routes; the currency and coinage question | Yes, Q14 |
| 13 | Merchant Guilds and Urbanization in North India and South India | The Third Urbanization argument; mandapikas and Siyadoni; the nagaram and pattana; the urban decay debate | Yes, Q9 and Q14 |
| 14 | Developments in Religion | Nayanars and Alvars; the Shakti cult; Virashaivism and Basava; Tantric and Puranic traditions | Yes, Q12 and Q14 |
| 15 | Education, Intellectual Traditions, Interactions and Philosophy | Nalanda and Vikramashila; Shankaracharya and Advaita; Al-Biruni's observations; monastic learning | Not covered |
| 16 | Languages and Literature | Kavirajamarga; Pampa, Ponna and Ranna; Kamban's Tamil Ramayana; Apabhramsha and regional vernaculars | Yes, Q14 |
| 17 | Science, Technology and Environment | Bhaskara II's Lilavati and Bijaganita; Aryabhata II; alchemy and makaradhvaja; irrigation technology | Yes, Q11 |
The four units marked as not covered are a deliberate choice, not an oversight. Units 8, 11 and 15 have produced roughly one Term-End question each across the six sessions we tracked, and preparing them as full essays costs more revision time than the expected return justifies.
Students who want to read those units anyway can work from the official course material, and our BHIC 105 Study Material page collects the unit-wise reading alongside this paper.
BHIC 105 Important Questions Ranked by Repeat Frequency
Of the 25 topics we tracked across six sessions, eleven qualified as HIGH priority, and those eleven account for twelve of the 14 questions in the paper. The ranking below is the shortened version of the full table inside the PDF.
| Priority | What it means | Topics in this band |
|---|---|---|
| HIGH | Repeated four or more times, or appeared in the two most recent papers | Biographies and charitas; temple architecture; the feudalism debate; Chola local administration; Chola naval expeditions and Srivijaya; urbanisation and urban decay; merchant guilds; science and technology; bhakti and socio-religious movements; Arab conquest of Sindh; Tamil and Kannada literature |
| MEDIUM | Two or three appearances, worth preparing as a second line | Inscriptions as a source; rise and origin of the Rajputs; Pala polity; sculpture; ur and nadu as a short note; maritime trade; Chalukyas of Kalyana; the Battles of Tarain; agrarian economy; the Shakti cult; Virashaivism; Nayanars and Alvars |
| LOW | One appearance only, keep as a backup short note | Archaeological sources; brahmadeya and nagaram as standalone essays |
Two entries there deserve a word of caution. The agrarian economy sits at MEDIUM on raw count, because it appeared only once in the six sessions, yet it appeared in December 2025. A topic that has just been set is not usually repeated immediately, but the syllabus offers few economic questions, so it stays in the paper rather than being dropped.
The Shakti cult is the reverse case. It has appeared three times, which is a MEDIUM count, but it is a narrow topic that reads well as a short note and poorly as a 400-word essay. The file keeps it as backup rather than as a prepared answer.
Does BHIC 105 Have a Practical File or Project
No. BHIC 105 History of India-III is a wholly theory course with no practical file, no laboratory record and no project component. Its assessment is 30 per cent Tutor Marked Assignment and 70 per cent Term-End Examination, and there is nothing to submit beyond the TMA.
This gets asked often enough to be worth stating plainly, because students moving in from science or vocational streams assume every IGNOU course carries a file. In BA (Honours) History, practical files appear only where a course explicitly names a project, and BHIC 105 does not.
What takes the place of a practical file here is the question index. The 14 questions inside the paper act as your working checklist for the whole course.
The index runs as follows: biographies as a source, inscriptions as a source, Rashtrakuta administration, the rise and origin of the Rajputs, temple architecture, Chola local administration, Chola naval expeditions and Srivijaya, the feudalism debate, urbanisation and urban decay, the agrarian economy, science and technology, bhakti and the socio-religious movements, short-note set A, and short-note set B.
Tick those 14 off as you finish them and you have covered 13 of the 17 units in the syllabus without opening a fifth revision list.
How to Use the BHIC 105 Guess Paper in Your Last 15 Days
Work through the HIGH-priority questions first, one per day, writing each answer out by hand once before you move on. Reading an answer and writing it are different skills, and only one of them is examined.
- Days 1 to 6. Take the six HIGH questions from Section I. Read the answer once, close the file, and write it in 40 minutes. Compare afterwards and mark what you dropped.
- Days 7 to 11. Move to the Section II HIGH questions. These carry the debates, feudalism and urban decay in particular, so pay attention to how each answer presents both sides before judging.
- Days 12 and 13. Both short-note sets. Eight topics, 200 words each. These are the fastest marks in the paper and the easiest to leave unwritten when time runs short.
- Day 14. Read the strategy pages, then write one full mock paper, five answers in three hours, using only the questions you have prepared.
- Day 15. Revise definitions and scholar names only. Every answer needs a named historian in its opening lines, and those names are what slip first under pressure.
One habit is worth building from day one. Learn the conclusion of each answer as carefully as the body, because the final evaluative sentence is where the last two or three marks sit and it is the part most students improvise badly.
Who the BHIC 105 Guess Paper Suits and Who Should Skip It
This paper is built for a BAHIH student with two to four weeks left who has read the units at least once and now needs to decide what to write. It is a selection and structuring tool, not a substitute for the course material.
It suits you if you have attended little or no counselling, if you are repeating BHIC 105 after a back paper, or if you can write history in English but keep losing marks on structure rather than on content. It also suits working students who simply do not have the hours to prepare all 17 units evenly.
It will not suit you if you have not opened the course material at all. Fourteen prepared answers are a strong position from which to walk into the hall, but they are not a syllabus, and a question worded differently from ours will still need you to know the underlying unit.
Students taking several History papers in the same session often pick up the wider BAHIH Guess Paper set instead, since the Semester III courses are examined in the same window and preparing them together saves a week of scheduling.
How to Get the Complete BHIC 105 Guess Paper with Answers
Send a WhatsApp message to 9899436384 with the course code BHIC 105 and your session, and you will receive the price and the delivery details in reply. The file is a 17-page PDF sent after payment.
Say which session you are appearing in, June 2026 or December 2026, because the file is prepared for both but the covering notes differ. If you need more than one History course from the same semester, mention them in the same message and they can be quoted together.
Doubt support runs until your exam date. If an answer in the file is not clear, or you want to know how to adapt one of these answers to a differently worded question, send the question and you will get a reply.
The complete BHIC 105 guess paper covers 14 questions across 17 pages. Five of those questions are on this page in full. The remaining nine, along with the frequency table and the strategy pages, are in the file.
WhatsApp 9899436384 to enquire about the BHIC 105 guess paper for June 2026 or December 2026.
WhatsApp 9899436384BHIC 105 Guess Paper FAQs
The eight questions below are the ones students ask on WhatsApp before ordering the BHIC 105 paper. Each is answered directly rather than deflected to an enquiry.
What is included in the BHIC 105 Solved Guess Paper for 2026?
The BHIC 105 file is a 17-page PDF holding 14 questions with complete written answers. Twelve are 20-mark essay questions and two are short-note sets carrying four topic options each. Every question shows its block, its Section, its priority rating and the sessions in which that topic last appeared, along with a frequency table and two strategy pages.
How were the BHIC 105 important questions selected for this paper?
Papers from the last five years were read, and the six most recent Term-End sessions, June 2023 to December 2025, were mapped question by question into a frequency table. Topics repeating four or more times, or appearing in the two latest papers, were rated HIGH. Long-standing gaps that are statistically due were also included even where the raw count was lower.
Is the BHIC 105 guess paper valid for both the June 2026 and December 2026 sessions?
Yes. IGNOU conducts Term-End Examinations for BHIC 105 in June and December only, and this file is prepared against the same syllabus that both sessions use. The question selection does not change between the two sessions. Mention which one you are appearing in when you enquire, because the covering notes and the suggested revision schedule differ slightly for each of them.
Are the BHIC 105 answers written from the official IGNOU course material?
Yes. Answers were written against the IGNOU BHIC 105 units rather than from general history reading. This matters for this course, because examiners mark against the university's own framing of arguments such as the feudalism debate and the Third Urbanization thesis. An answer built from an outside textbook can be historically sound and still miss the expected framing.
Does BHIC 105 History of India-III have a practical file to submit?
No. BHIC 105 is a theory course with no practical file, no laboratory record and no project. Assessment is 30 per cent Tutor Marked Assignment and 70 per cent Term-End Examination. Students moving in from science or vocational backgrounds often assume a file is required, but nothing beyond the TMA is submitted for this course.
How many marks can the BHIC 105 guess paper realistically help me secure?
That depends on how you use it. The paper prepares 14 answers against a requirement of five, and covers 13 of the 17 units. Students who write each answer by hand at least once before the exam consistently report better outcomes than those who only read. No paper can promise a mark, and any seller who does is not being straight with you.
Can I use the BHIC 105 guess paper for my Tutor Marked Assignment as well?
Partly. Several BHIC 105 assignment questions overlap with Term-End topics, inscriptions, Chola local administration and the Arab conquest of Sindh among them. The answers can be adapted, but assignment word limits differ, running to 500, 250 and 100 words. Copying an exam answer directly into a TMA is also a poor idea, since assignments are checked for similarity.
How do I order the BHIC 105 guess paper and how quickly is it delivered?
Send a WhatsApp message to 9899436384 with the course code BHIC 105 and the session you are appearing in. You will receive the price and payment details in reply, and the PDF is shared once payment is confirmed. Delivery is usually within a few hours during working hours. Doubt support continues until your exam date.