(a) Such information was useful for them in governing Indian society, with its large variety of communities and castes.
(b) As outsiders, the British knew little about life inside Indian households. The new novels in Indian languages often had descriptions of domestic life.
(c) They showed how people dressed, their forms of religious worship, their beliefs and practices etc.
(d) Indians used the novel as a powerful medium to criticise what they considered defects in their society and to suggest remedies.
(e) Writers like Viresalingam used the novel mainly to propagate their ideas about society among a wider readership.
(f) Novels also helped in establishing a relationship with the past. Many of them told thrilling stories of adventures and intrigues set in the past.
