CBSE Class 10 Answered

The said caricature depicts the political conditions in Europe. To be precise, it puts its finger on the farcical political scenario after the downfall of Napoleon and the emergence of the conservative, autocratic regimes in Europe. The conservative states established after the Treaty of Vienna in 1815 did not tolerate criticism or dissent of any sort and sought to curb the activities that questioned the legitimacy of autocracy. Most of these new states imposed draconian censorship laws on the media – newspapers, books, plays, songs, all were censored and any sort of promulgation of the ideas of the French Revolution was banished.

The caricature shows that the so called club of thinkers is prohibited from using its right to speech. The notice on its walls also reads that if at all anyone succumbs to the temptation to speak; muzzles will distributed among the members in order to suppress it.  It is a satirical take on the then existing political conditions wherein independent thinking of all sorts was completely banished from the public sphere in the name of protecting the traditional institutions and practices.