Select the most appropriate option to substitute the underlined word segment in the given sentence. The wedding was put on until January.

Correct — C. The word that decides this is until — "until January" names a later date the wedding has been moved to.

The phrasal verb for moving an event to a later date is put off, meaning postpone.

Read it whole: The wedding was put off until January.

put on is a real phrasal verb — you put on a play, a coat, the kettle — but it carries no sense of delay, so 'until January' has nothing to attach to.

Option (c) is the substitution that lets the time phrase do its job.

Why the others are wrong

• (a)
  put in — put in means to submit or to devote: you put in an application, or put in three hours. Neither sense can govern a date an event has been moved to.
• (b)
  put up — put up means to erect, display or accommodate — a tent, a notice, a guest. No sense of it postpones anything, and put up with, a different phrasal verb, means tolerate rather than delay.
• (d)
  put down — put down means to set something down, to suppress a revolt, or to record in writing. None of those senses works with until January.

In a phrasal verb the particle carries the meaning, not the verb. put on its own tells you almost nothing; off, up, down and in take it to four unrelated places.

That is why a whole item can be built from one verb: the options differ by a single short word, and the particle is all that is being tested.

The sentence always leaves a clue about which sense is wanted. Here it is the time phrase until January, which only a verb of postponement can license.

Key facts

• put off means postpone, as in 'The match was put off because of rain.'
• put up with is a three-word phrasal verb meaning tolerate, and it is not a sense of 'put up'.
• A phrasal verb's meaning is generally not predictable from its parts, so each combination has to be learnt as a unit.

Common traps

• Assuming the underlined segment must be meaningless. put on is ordinary English, just the wrong phrasal verb beside a date.
• Confusing put off with called off — a postponement sets a new date, a cancellation does not.
• Reaching for put up with when what the paper prints is put up.

No directly related past PYQ was found.