SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 11 September 2024, Shift 2 · English Comprehension · Question 19 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 synonym of the given word. Jovial

(a)Profane
(b)Solemnity
(c)Miserable
(d)Cheerful

Answer

Why

Correct — D. Jovial means merry and good-humoured — the mood of someone who laughs easily in company. Cheerful is its plain equivalent, so option (d) is the match.

The word carries its own clue. It comes from Jove, the Roman god Jupiter; people born under Jupiter's influence were held in old astrology to be genial and light-hearted.

A synonym item wants the same part of speech and the same direction of feeling, and cheerful is the one adjective here that is positive in tone.

Why the others are wrong

(a)
Profane — Profane means irreverent towards what is sacred, or simply secular rather than religious. It describes disrespect, not mood, so it is nowhere near jovial.
(b)
Solemnity — Solemnity is a noun — the state of being grave and serious. It fails twice: wrong word class for an adjective, and opposite in sense.
(c)
Miserable — Miserable means wretchedly unhappy, so it is the antonym rather than the synonym. SSC plants the opposite in the option set to catch a reader who matches the topic but not the direction.

Concept

A synonym item asks for the closest word in the same part of speech and the same direction of feeling.

Jovial belongs to a family of adjectives for good humour: cheerful, jolly, merry, genial, convivial. They describe an outward, sociable brightness rather than quiet contentment.

Two habits solve most of these. Check the word class first, because an abstract noun among adjectives is almost always dead weight. Then check direction: if the question word is positive, discard every negative option before comparing shades of meaning.

Three of the four options can be eliminated without knowing what jovial means — one is a noun, and two are negative in tone. That is worth practising, because it is what saves time on a word you have never met.

Key facts

Jovial means cheerful and good-humoured, especially in company.
It derives from Jove, the Roman name for Jupiter.
Jolly, genial, merry and convivial sit in the same family of adjectives.
The noun form is joviality.

Study next

Adjective families for mood: jovial, genial, morose, sullen, dourWords from Roman gods: jovial from Jove, martial from Mars, mercurial from MercuryNoun-among-adjectives traps in synonym questions

Common traps

Picking Miserable because it is the emotional word that comes to mind, when direction matters as much as topic.
Not noticing that Solemnity is a noun while the question word is an adjective.

SSC gives the synonym word either bare, as here, or underlined inside a sentence — this shift does both, at English Q1 (Merit) and English Q4 (consort). Jovial itself turns up as a wrong option on 9 Sep 2024, 09:00, English Q1, where the word to match is Fatal.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.