NDA (II) 2016 General Ability Test · Question 44 of 150

Correct — D, NO IMPROVEMENT. The table is the thing that will receive the paint, not the thing that applies it, so the verb has to be passive; after 'to be' the passive is formed with the past participle, and 'needs to be painted' is exactly that.

• (a)paint — 'To be paint' makes 'paint' a noun standing as a complement, so the sentence would claim that the table needs to become paint.
• (b)painting — 'To be painting' is the active continuous, which would make the table the one holding the brush.
• (c)having paint — 'To be having paint' is not an English construction here; 'have' in the sense of possessing does not take the continuous form.

The passive infinitive is 'to be' followed by the past participle, and it is used when the subject undergoes the action rather than performs it.

The word 'to be' is already printed and is not part of the underlined portion, which fixes the shape of the answer before the options are read — whatever follows must be a past participle. A candidate may recall that 'the table needs painting' is also correct English, since 'need' followed by an -ing form carries a passive sense of its own; that is a different construction, and it cannot be mixed with the 'to be' that this sentence has already committed to.

• 'Need', 'want' and 'require' followed by an -ing form carry a passive meaning, as in 'the shirt needs washing'.
• The same idea can be put as 'needs to be washed', but 'needs to be washing' mixes the two patterns and is wrong.

• Assuming an underlined word must be wrong and replacing a correct participle.
• Blending 'needs painting' and 'needs to be painted' into 'needs to be painting'.

Asked as a very short sentence-improvement item where the words left outside the underline already decide what form the answer must take.

No directly related past PYQ was found.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Which option best improves the underlined part — The old gate needs to be <u>repairing</u> before the rains.

  • (a)repaired
  • (b)repair
  • (c)having repair
  • (d)No improvement

  Answer(a) repaired — after 'to be' the passive takes the past participle.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Which option best improves the underlined part — These shirts need <u>to washing</u> before Monday.

  • (a)washing
  • (b)wash
  • (c)to washed
  • (d)No improvement

  Answer(a) washing — 'need' followed by the -ing form already carries the passive sense.