question_answer 1)

The city folk who drove through the countryside hardly paid any heed to the roadside stand or the people who ran it If at all they did, it was to complain. Which lines bring this out? What was their complaint about?    

Answer:

The poem presents the lives of poor underprivileged people. They wait in vain for the cash flow that sustained the life of the rich people in the city. The rich zoomed across, callously, in their luxurious vehicles. They did not pay any attention to the roadside stand or the people who owned it. If at all they thought of the stand, it was to complain. They were critical because the pathetic stand had marred the beauty of the land. This is made clear in lines 9 to 16 of the poem. Out of the teeming thousands barely one stopped to inquire about the prices of the farm products. Another just used the empty space to reverse the car and yet another to enquire about the direction to his destination. One paused and asked or a gallon of gas, and was angry as the stand did not provide that.