Direction (1-5): In each question, the word at the top is used in five different ways, numbered to (a) to (e), Choose the option in which the usage of the word is INCORRECT or INAPPROPRIATE.
1. Put
(a) We like to put away £200 pounds every month towards our next summer holiday.
(b) We are encouraged to put forward as many ideas as possible in our staff meetings.
(d) Their dog was very ill and in pain so they sadly decided to have him put down.
(e) We are so busy at work and I am having to put it a 14-hour day.
S1. Ans. (e)
Sol. Replace ‘it’ with ‘in’.
Put in means to do work, make effort, or spend time:
Put down means suppress.
Put them up means accommodate someone temporary
Put forward means to offer an idea/ opinion.
Put away means discard or renounce.
2. Take
(a) I’d love to take part in a theatre production, but I’m just too shy.
(b) The protesters were confident and ready to take up the government.
(c) Our next performance will take place next month on the 25th.
(d) It seems to me that Nestle is just taking over all the other chocolate companies.
(e) Remember to take into account the taxes you’ll need to pay when looking at your salary.
S2. Ans. (b)
Sol. Replace ‘up’ with ‘on’.
Take on means to face or to deal with
Take part in means to participate
take place means to happen
Taking over means take control of
take into account means to remember an important point or fact that you are going to need when you do something.
3. lift
(a) The helicopters lifted down at 1030 hours.
(b) I am so tired I can’t even lift up my arms.
(c) Carefully lift out the little gear and electromagnet.
(d) Recent discoveries at the delightfully named Mistaken Point, in Newfoundland, serve to lift the veil slightly.
(e) The king did not lift a finger when his people were hungry.
S3. Ans. (a)
Sol. Replace ‘down’ with ‘off’.
Lift off means take off.
Lift up means raise, elevate
Lift out means take out or up.
Lift the veil means to uncover some private or secret things.
Lift a finger means make the slightest effort to do something especially to help someone.
4. Make
(a) The thief made off with our silver.
(b) I can’t make out the faces in this photograph.
(c) He asked the tailor to make up his dress.
(d) The story was made into a film two years ago.
(e) They made off with our television and our stereo.
S4. Ans. (c)
Sol. Replace ‘up’ with ‘over’
Make over means complete transformation
Make off means run away.
Make out means detect with the senses.
Make into means to change into something else.
Make off with means to escape with something, especially something stolen.
5. Pick
(a) Birds may pick off the flowers.
(b) I loved to pick up trash piles and collect empty bottles, tin cans with Pretty labels, and discarded magazines.
(c) Pick over the lentils carefully in case there are any stones amongst them.
(d) Let me pick apart a few of the points you make.
(e) Do not squeeze or pick at the pimples.
S5. Ans. (b)
Sol. Replace ‘up’ with ‘through’.
Pick at means to pluck or pull.
Pick apart means find fault with.
Pick over means separate or remove.
Pick through means sort through a number of items carefully.
Pick off means short or pull one by one.
Directions (6-10): In each of the following sentence there are three blank spaces. Below each sentence there are five options and each option consists of three words which can be filled up in the blanks in the sentence to make the sentence grammatically correct.
Q6. But this, it seems, is just one half of what appears to be a _____________ plan by the UK government to encourage inward immigration from predominantly white countries—also _______________, apparently, are Australia and New Zealand, but not India or China, two countries whose young and talented workforce are ______________ for global opportunities.
(a) peculiar, advantaged, overwrought
(b)comical, benefited, exuberant
(c)ludicrous, afflicted, sated
(d)bizarre, favoured , longing
(e)ridiculous, acclaimed, satiated
S6.Ans.(d)
Sol. Bizarre- very strange or unusual
Favoured- preferred or recommended
longing- having a strong desire or craving
Overwrought means in a state of nervous excitement or anxiety.
Exuberant means full of energy, excitement, and cheerfulness.
Q7. The dollar briefly touched its ___________ since 30 January at 114.17 yen, with relief that Trump set aside his _____________ campaign rhetoric over security and jobs in a meeting with the Japanese Prime Minister ______________ the weekend.
(a) climax, hard, on
(b) peak, rugged, in
(c)best, laborious, at
(d)highest, tough, over
(e)top, sturdy, during
S7.Ans.(d)
Sol. Highest-superlative degree of high
Tough- difficult and requiring determination or effort
Preposition “over” should be used.
Q8. The group behind ________________ high-profile terrorist attacks in India, including the 2001 Parliament attacks and the recent attacks on defence __________________ in Pathankot and Nagrota, has been ______________ organizing rallies and raising funds.
(a) many, camps, covertly
(b) several, establishments, openly
(c) umpteen, personnels , strictly
(d) countless, cantonment, compactly
(e) numerous, institutions, artfully
S8.Ans.(b)
Sol. Several- more than two but not many
Establishments- a business organization, public institution, or household
Openly- without concealment, deception, or prevarication, especially where these might be expected; frankly or honestly
Directions (9-13): In each of the following questions, various sentences are given and you have to choose the one which has some or any grammatical error in it. In the questions where option (e) is all are correct and all the sentences are grammatically correct choose option (e) as the correct choice.
9. (a) Hardly had we settled down for the night’s rest when we were startled by the loud noise being made outside the house.
(b) The children were inclined to be frightened by the sight of the small animal, which reminded them of the bears; but Dorothy reassured them by explaining that Eureka was a pet and could do no harm even if she wished to.
(c) Being reassured by the fact that the creatures could not crawl out of their rock-pockets, the children and the Wizard now took time to examine them more closely.
(d) It was no fun to be pulled over the sharp stones in that way; but it was better than to be bitten by the wolf.
(e) All are correct.
S9. Ans. (a)
Sol. Replace ‘by’ with ‘at’ as “startled/surprised/astonished/amazed” etc. are followed by the preposition ‘at’ and not by ‘by’. e.g. They are amazed at her beauty.
10. (a) He won't lose his mate, even if he chooses to kill her rather than give her up.
(b) Her skin began to flush until it was pink enough to look human rather than the sleep of the dead.
(c) Ordinarily when in difficulty Renu prefers keeping her counsel rather than going about here and there for advice.
(d) Maybe he'd rather listen than talk.
(e) All are correct.
S10. Ans. (c)
Sol. Use ‘to’ in place of ‘rather than’ as when two nouns or gerunds are compared using the word ‘prefer’, the preposition ‘to’ is used. e.g. She preferred playing to gossiping.
However when ‘prefer’ is used to compare two infinitives, ‘rather than’ is used instead of ‘to’. e.g. We preferred to read rather than write.
11. (a) Only 6 crore out of 29 crore persons holding permanent account number (PAN) file income tax returns at present.
(b) Only three out of a thousand are born with this rare disease.
(c) So, with a snort and a neigh and a whisk of his short tail he trotted off the roof into the air and at once began floating downward to the street.
(d) The mark of these technologies is that they are greeted with universal skepticism at first.
(e) All are correct.
S11. Ans. (e)
Sol. All the given sentences are grammatically correct.
12. (a) They have got to live a man's life, pushing all these things before them, and get on as well as they can.
(b) Swiftly they drew near to the flaming colored suns, and passed close beside them.
(c) According to the agreements reached at WTO, commitment was made by all member countries to keep import tariffs low and eliminate all non-tariff barriers which could curb imports.
(d) When I offered him to help which he needed, he persisted in refusing it, so I left him to his fate.
(e) She has refused to evacuate Malta.
S12. Ans. (d)
Sol. Remove ‘to’ before ‘help’ as ‘offer’ is a Di-Transitive verb (verb which takes two objects). So object ‘help’ will be used after ‘him’ and not the infinitive ‘to help’. e.g. I offered him a job. (Here, ‘him’ is an indirect object while ‘a job’ is a direct object.)
13. (a) Would she ever outgrow the things mama had taught her?
(b) He was not a very large man, but was well formed and had a beautiful face--calm and serene as the face of a fine portrait.
(c) She only understood the movie because she had read the book.
(d) She had offered a temporary assignment but she turned it down saying that she would accept only a permanent one.
(e) We were not able to get a hotel room because we had not booked in advance.
S13. Ans. (d)
Sol. Replace “She had offered” with “She had been offered” because the assignment was offered to ‘She’, not offered by ‘She’. Also, the first part of the sentence is in Passive Voice.
e.g. I had offered her…but she turned…down… (Active Voice)
She had been offered…but she turned…down… (Passive Voice)
Directions (14–15): Sentences given in each question, when properly sequenced form a coherent paragraph. Each sentence is labeled with a letter. Choose the most logical order of sentences amongst the five choices given to construct a paragraph.
Q14. A. In the last few years, the iconic company has changed hands several times in a desperate attempt to stay afloat.
B. A mobile handset so legendary, that even after 17 years its popularity has not eroded.
C. Sadly, a couple of years later, Nokia failed to the read market trends and started to struggle.
D. The Nokia 3310 quite literally heralded the rise of the Finnish brand and helped it to capture the global cell phone market single-handedly.
E. Be it the funny internet memes joking about the phone’s rugged build quality or the comparisons between the poor battery life offered by modern smartphones with the 3310’s week-long standby, the legend just refuses to die.
F. It’s hard to believe that more than one-and-a-half decades have passed since Nokia first introduced the original 3310.
(a)FBEDCA
(b)ABCDEF
(c)DBCAFE
(d)FADBCE
(e)FDBECA
S14. Ans. (a)
Sol. F should be the first sentence. B-E makes a combination. A should be the concluding sentence. Hence FBEDCA is the correct sequence to form a meaningful paragraph.
Q15. A. In the event, these apprehensions proved unfounded but in the charged situation of the time there was real fear that the issue could spin out of control, which brought the two countries to make a serious effort to come to agreement so as to head off risk of conflict.
B. For each of the two new countries, the Punjab, already torn and devastated, was the crucial breadbasket, source of food security and repository of hopes for the future, and neither felt it could afford to lose any part of the water supply from the elaborate modern irrigation system of the Indus that had brought prosperity to the expanses of the north Indian plains.
C. When the country was divided in 1947 no issue seemed more likely to lead to violent conflict than the sharing of the waters of the Indus and its tributaries.
D. In the seriously disturbed conditions of the time it was feared that unresolved claims on the waters could drive the two countries to war.
E. But the terms of Partition took little account of this requirement; the boundary line bequeathed by the British made an impossible tangle of the irrigation system of Punjab, with the head works often located in India while the canals were downstream in Pakistan.
F. The Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) of 1960 is an important landmark in the bilateral affairs of India and Pakistan.
(a)CDEBFA
(b)FCBEDA
(c)CBEFAD
(d)BDEAFC
(e)CFBAED
S15. Ans. (b)
Sol. F should be the first sentence. C-B makes a combination. D-A makes another combination. Hence FCBEDA is the correct sequence to form a meaningful paragraph.
