SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 10 September 2024, Shift 2 · English Comprehension · Question 1 of 100

Text as printed on a candidate's response sheet for this shift; answer per SSC's tentative key as marked on that sheet. Solution last reviewed 6 September 2026.

Where this paper and its answers come from

SSC does not publish CGL question papers or a public answer key. The questions and options here are reproduced as printed on a candidate's own response sheet for this shift — the Commission's text, unchanged. Each answer is SSC's tentative key as marked on that sheet; SSC allowed challenges to it and never publishes a final key. The solutions are written by UnlockIAS.

Select the most appropriate ANTONYM of the underlined word. Their sporting achievements at the highest level are being utterly ignored.

(a)Minimally
(b)Correctly
(c)Totally
(d)Extremely

Answer

Why

Correct — A. The underlined word is utterly, a degree adverb meaning 'completely, to the fullest extent'.

An antonym has to reverse the degree, not the manner. The opposite of 'to the fullest extent' is 'to the smallest extent', which is minimally — option (a).

Read it back: achievements that are minimally ignored are barely being ignored at all.

Why the others are wrong

(b)
Correctly — Correctly answers a different question. It describes the manner of ignoring, and 'correctly ignored' is not the reverse of 'utterly ignored'.
(c)
Totally — Totally is a synonym of utterly, not its opposite. This is the planted trap, because the eye grabs the word that matches the sense of the sentence.
(d)
Extremely — Extremely also intensifies. It pushes the degree up, exactly where utterly already sits, so it cannot be the antonym.

Concept

SSC's antonym items are usually decided by the axis a word sits on, before any dictionary knowledge is needed.

'Utterly' is a degree adverb: it says how much, on a scale running from none to all. Its antonym must sit at the far end of that same scale.

That one test removes 'correctly', which measures manner rather than degree, and it exposes 'totally' and 'extremely' as points near utterly's own end. Only minimally occupies the opposite end.

The response sheet does not carry the underlining, but all four options are degree adverbs, which fixes 'utterly' as the tested word.

Key facts

Utterly means completely or absolutely, and it modifies the extent of an action.
Minimally means to the least possible degree, the far end of the same scale.
In an antonym item, the option that best fits the sentence is usually the synonym trap.

Study next

Degree adverbs and the scale they share: minimally, partly, largely, utterlyAntonym items where the tested word sits inside a sentence rather than standing aloneTelling manner adverbs from degree adverbs before choosing

Common traps

Choosing totally because it fits the sentence, when the instruction asks for the reverse.
Reading 'ignored' as the tested word and hunting for an opposite of ignore.

SSC runs antonyms in two frames. The word can stand bare, as in this shift's English Q.5 (Risible), or sit inside a sentence, as here and in Q.13 and Q.16 of the same shift. The sentence frame is what lets SSC plant a synonym that fits the sentence but not the instruction.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.