After this incident I went to Nainital, and returned after nearly a month. I had _____ (21) taken _____ (22) my clothes when I saw Gangu standing _____ (23) a new baby. He was _____ (24) with joy. Even Nanda _____ (25) not have _____ (26) such joy _____ (27) getting Krishna. His face had the same _____ (28) that _____ (29) on the face of a _____ (30) man after a full meal. not have _____ such joy
- (a)experimented
- (b)shown
- (c)felt
- (d)heard
Correct — C, felt. Joy is an emotion a person experiences inside, and 'feel' is the verb English uses to take an emotion as its object, so the clause reads 'Even Nanda could not have felt such joy at getting Krishna.' The blank sits between the auxiliary 'have' and the object 'such joy', which means it needs a past participle that a feeling can follow.
- (a)experimented — To experiment is to carry out a trial or a test, and the verb never takes an emotion as its object; the word the sentence seems to invite is 'experienced', which is not among the choices.
- (b)shown — This would move the sentence to the outward display of joy, but the writer gives that job to the next sentence about Gangu's face, and the comparison with Nanda is about how much joy was felt.
- (d)heard — Joy is not something a person hears; 'heard' needs a sound or a piece of news as its object.
The blank stands between an auxiliary and an abstract noun of emotion, so the answer must be a past participle that can take that emotion as its object.
Nanda is the cowherd chief of Gokul in whose home Krishna was brought up, so 'Even Nanda could not have felt such joy at getting Krishna' is the strongest comparison the writer can reach for when describing a father's delight in a newborn. Reading the two sentences together settles the choice, because the inner feeling belongs in this sentence and the outward glow belongs to the one that follows.
- 'Feel' takes emotions as its object — feel joy, feel shame, feel relief.
- 'Experience' and 'experiment' share a root but not a meaning, and only the first can take 'joy'.
- The passage keeps what Gangu felt separate from what his face showed, which is why an inner verb is wanted here.
- Picking a word that merely sounds close to the one the sentence wants.
Asked as a cloze blank where the surrounding clause fixes which verb can take the noun that follows it.
I feel ________ for those who are cruel to their children.
- (a) sympathy
- (b) contempt
- (c) admiration
- (d) craving
Answer(b) contempt
Same skill — the blank is filled by reading the rest of the sentence and taking the only word whose meaning fits. There the cruelty described rules out sympathy and admiration; here the clause about an inner emotion rules out every verb except 'felt'.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Choose the word that best fills the blank — She could not ____ the slightest fear as the storm broke over the village.
- (a)experiment
- (b)feel
- (c)listen
- (d)watch
Answer(b) feel — fear is an emotion, and 'feel' is the verb that takes an emotion as its object.
- practice — not a real PYQ
Choose the word that best fills the blank — After the long walk the children ____ a deep contentment.
- (a)heard
- (b)experimented
- (c)felt
- (d)listened
Answer(c) felt — contentment is an inner state, so it follows 'felt'.