SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 10 September 2024, Shift 2 · English Comprehension · Question 5 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 given word. Risible

(a)Curious
(b)Giddy
(c)Serious
(d)Droll

Answer

Why

Correct — C. Risible means laughable, that is, deserving or provoking laughter. It comes from Latin ridere, 'to laugh', the root behind ridiculous and deride.

Its opposite is the register that forbids laughter, and that is serious — option (c).

The pairing to hold on to is laughable against serious, not funny against sad.

Why the others are wrong

(a)
Curious — Curious means inquisitive, or else strange. Neither sense sits on the laughter scale that risible belongs to.
(b)
Giddy — Giddy means dizzy, or frivolously excitable. Excitability sits closer to risible's own side than opposite to it.
(d)
Droll — Droll means amusing in an odd, dry way, so it is a near synonym of risible and the reverse of what the question asks for.

Concept

An antonym question first asks what axis the word sits on. Risible sits on the seriousness axis, so only a word on that same axis can be its opposite.

The Latin root settles the sense when the word is unfamiliar. Ridere, 'to laugh', gives ridiculous, derision and risible alike, and everything in that family is about provoking laughter.

Once the axis is fixed, curious and giddy drop out as off-axis and droll drops out as same-side. Serious is the only word left facing the other way.

Key facts

Risible means laughable or provoking laughter.
It comes from Latin ridere, to laugh, the root of ridiculous and deride.
Droll is a synonym of risible rather than an antonym.

Study next

The Latin root ridere and its English family: ridiculous, derision, risibleAntonyms that turn on register rather than on plain oppositesAdjectives of humour and their shades: droll, comic, hilarious, risible

Common traps

Picking droll because it looks like the odd word out among the four.
Reading risible as 'risky' or 'rising' from the shape of the word.

SSC gives the vocabulary word bare here and hides it in a sentence elsewhere in the same shift, as English Q.13 and Q.16 do with their blanks. The bare frame offers no context, so the root is the only handle you have.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.