SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 12 September 2024, Shift 3 · General Intelligence and Reasoning · Question 7 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.

In a certain code language, 'MUTUAL' is written as '12121202113', 'MARKET' is written as '2051118113', how will 'MODULE' be written in that language?

(a)1315421125
(b)5122141513
(c)5122141613
(d)14122361522

Answer

Why

Correct — B. Number the letters A=1 to Z=26, then read the word backwards and write the numbers end to end.

MUTUAL reversed is L A U T U M = 12, 1, 21, 20, 21, 13, which prints as 12121202113.
MARKET reversed is T E K R A M = 20, 5, 11, 18, 1, 13, which prints as 2051118113.

MODULE reversed is E L U D O M = 5, 12, 21, 4, 15, 13.
End to end: 5 | 12 | 21 | 4 | 15 | 13 = 5122141513 — option (b).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
1315421125 — 1315421125 reads 13, 15, 4, 21, 12, 5 — the same positions taken forwards, M O D U L E. Both worked examples reverse the word first.
(c)
5122141613 — 5122141613 differs in one place: it puts 16 where the key has 15. O is the 15th letter and P the 16th, so the string must end 15, 13.
(d)
14122361522 — 14122361522 uses reverse-alphabet values in forward order: M=14, O=12, D=23, U=6, L=15, E=22. The worked codes use ordinary positions read backwards.

Concept

Two independent decisions build this code, and both are visible in the worked examples: which number stands for a letter, and in what order the letters are read.

Here the number is the ordinary alphabet position and the order is reversed. You cannot settle the order from MUTUAL alone, because its ends look similar; MARKET decides it, since a forward reading would open 13 and the given code opens 20.

The code is a concatenation, not a list, so nothing marks where one letter ends and the next begins. A one-digit position contributes one character and a two-digit position contributes two, which is why splitting the string into fixed pairs fails.

Key facts

MUTUAL reversed is LAUTUM, whose positions 12, 1, 21, 20, 21, 13 print as 12121202113.
MARKET reversed is TEKRAM, whose positions 20, 5, 11, 18, 1, 13 print as 2051118113.
MODULE reversed is ELUDOM, whose positions 5, 12, 21, 4, 15, 13 print as 5122141513.

Study next

Alphabet-position coding, where a letter is replaced by its 1-26 numberReverse-alphabet coding, where a letter maps to 27 minus its position

Common traps

Splitting the digit string from the left in fixed pairs, which breaks the moment a one-digit position appears.
Coding the word forwards because the reversal is easy to forget once the numbers start.
Reading 15 and 16 alike under time pressure, which is the only difference between two of the options.

SSC builds number codes out of alphabet positions and varies both the direction of reading and the direction of the alphabet. On 9 Sep 2024, 16:00, Reasoning Q.25 the word SET is coded 37, which is the sum of the reverse positions 8, 22 and 7.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.