In the following passage, some words have been deleted. Read the passage carefully and select the most appropriate option to fill in each blank. Now, we have Mr. X as the President of India. It has come as a surprise (1)______ Scheduled Tribes who are (2)______ the most marginalised groups of the country. The Adivasis of India have been (3)______ socially, economically and culturally. Despite various efforts taken by the Government of India, they are still under (4)______ and suffering. Therefore, the (5)______ a leader from a marginalised community or group does not indicate that now the entire community will be uplifted. However, this kind of move may bring certain changes in the status of the Adivasis.
Select the most appropriate option to fill in blank no.1
- (a)at
- (b)off
- (c)in
- (d)to
Answer
Why
Correct — D. The frame in the passage is come as a surprise, and that phrase marks the person who is surprised with to.
It has come as a surprise to Scheduled Tribes — the same shape as it came as a shock to the family, or it came as a relief to us.
The preposition is fixed by the collocation rather than chosen for meaning, which is why option (d) is the fit.
Why the others are wrong
- (a)at — at attaches to the adjective, not to this noun phrase: you are surprised at something, and that something is the cause. The blank is followed by the people who feel the surprise, not by its cause.
- (b)off — off marks separation or removal — take off, off the shelf. There is no English phrase come as a surprise off anybody.
- (c)in — in would give a manner adverbial, as in she looked up in surprise. That describes how a person reacts, and cannot introduce the people the news reached.
Concept
A cloze blank offering four bare prepositions is almost never a meaning test. It is a collocation test — which preposition the neighbouring word happens to demand.
Here the neighbour is the noun surprise inside come as a surprise, and that frame takes to plus a person.
The same root takes different prepositions in other frames: surprised at or by the news, a surprise for her birthday, to everyone's surprise.
The passage names the experiencer straight after the blank — Scheduled Tribes — and that is the clue. Find the word on each side of a preposition blank before you open the options.
Key facts
- Come as a surprise takes to before the person who is surprised.
- Surprised at or surprised by introduces the cause of the surprise.
- In surprise is an adverbial of manner, as in he stared in surprise.
Study next
Common traps
- Choosing at from the familiar phrase surprised at, without checking which word the blank actually follows.
- Testing the options by ear alone, when more than one of them makes a readable string.
- Treating a preposition blank as a meaning question and hunting for the best sense.
When a cloze set opens on a preposition blank, the word that governs it sits right beside the gap.
The first blank is keyed the same way at 10 Sep 2024, 09:00, English Q.21 (unveiled at a conference), 24 Sep 2024, 12:30, English Q.21 (performed according to), and 09 Sep 2024, 12:30, English Q.21 (from the beginning of the eighteenth century).
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