SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 12 September 2024, Shift 3 · English Comprehension · Question 10 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.

Identify the INCORRECTLY spelt word in the following sentence. You need to be concious enough to listen to the question.

(a)concious
(b)enough
(c)question
(d)listen

Answer

Why

Correct — A. The sentence prints concious. The word is spelt conscious, with an s after the -n- and before the -cious ending.

The root gives it away: conscious, conscience and science all carry the Latin sci- cluster from scire, to know. Say the word as con-sci-ous and the dropped letter becomes audible, which is the fastest check in the exam hall → option (a).

Why the others are wrong

(b)
enough — enough is spelt correctly as printed. The -ough spelling pronounced with an /f/ sound is standard English, as in rough and tough.
(c)
question — question is spelt correctly. The -stion ending is regular, the same shape as suggestion and digestion, and needs no extra letter.
(d)
listen — listen is spelt correctly. Its t is silent but written, exactly as in fasten and castle, and a silent letter is not a misspelling.

Concept

A spelling item is decided by one letter, not by how the whole word looks. The planted word is almost always one whose pronunciation hides a letter: here the sc of conscious is heard as a single /sh/, so writers leave the s out.

Test the root rather than the sound. If you can name a relative that keeps the cluster — conscience, science, scientific — then the cluster stays in this word too. The three correctly spelt options are ordinary words, put there to make you doubt letters you write right every day.

Only the spelling is being tested, so read each option as a word standing on its own. The grammar of the sentence around it is not in question.

Key facts

Conscious is spelt c-o-n-s-c-i-o-u-s and means aware or awake.
The same sci- cluster runs through conscience, science and scientific, all from Latin scire, to know.
Conscious (aware) and conscience (the moral sense) are different words, and both keep the sci.

Study next

Silent-letter spellings: listen, fasten, whistle, castleWords built on Latin scire: conscious, conscience, omniscientThe -cious and -tious adjective endings: gracious, ambitious, cautious

Common traps

Reading the sentence for sense instead of checking each option letter by letter
Assuming the word with a silent letter must be the misspelt one

The spelling item comes in two shapes and this paper carries both: buried in a sentence, as here, and as a bare four-word list at English Q.6 (also 12 Sep 2024, 16:00), where Countemptible stands in for contemptible.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.