SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 13 September 2024, Shift 2 · English Comprehension · Question 8 of 99

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 10 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.

Given below are four jumbled sentences. Select the option that gives their correct logical sequence. A. When we connect this design with a wire, electricity flows. B. These metal strips were put in a sulphuric acid solution. C. He made two strips of different metals. D. Alessandro Volta discovered electric battery.

(a)CBDA
(b)DCBA
(c)BCDA
(d)ACDB

Answer

Why

Correct — B. Follow the back-references: each sentence contains a word that points to something an earlier sentence introduced.

D needs no earlier context. It names Alessandro Volta and the thing discovered, so it opens.

C begins with He, and the only person available to be He is Volta, so C follows D.

B begins with These metal strips, which are the two strips of different metals made in C.

A speaks of this design and gives the outcome, electricity flows, so it closes. D, C, B, A — option (b).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
CBDA — CBDA opens with He made two strips, leaving He with nobody to refer to, and it pushes the sentence that names Volta into third place.
(c)
BCDA — BCDA opens with These metal strips before any strips exist in the passage. These points backwards, so it cannot start the sequence.
(d)
ACDB — ACDB opens with this design before any design has been built, and it ends on B, leaving the result stranded in the middle of the passage.

Concept

Para-jumbles are solved by cohesion markers, not by knowing the story. Three markers do most of the work.

Pronouns (he, they, it) must follow the noun they replace. Demonstratives (this, these, such) must follow the thing they point back to. Connectives (thus, so, therefore) must follow what they draw on.

The opening sentence is the one with no back-pointer at all. Fix that first, and the chain usually forces the rest of the order by itself.

Two options here begin with a back-pointing word, so they can be struck out before the sequence is worked at all. That leaves a choice between DCBA and ACDB, and A cannot open for the same reason.

Key facts

A sentence opening with He, This or These cannot be the first sentence of a jumble.
The opening sentence introduces the noun that every later back-pointer refers to.
The chain in this set runs Volta, then He, then These metal strips, then this design.

Study next

Cohesion markers: pronouns, demonstratives and connectivesJumbles where two sentences both look like plausible openersSentence-part rearrangement, where the four parts are fragments rather than sentences

Common traps

Ordering by the chronology of the science instead of by the pronoun chain.
Accepting an option because its first sentence sounds like a topic sentence, without testing the second.

The pronoun chain keys these items across shifts.

At 11 Sep 2024, 12:30, English Q.2 the key is DCAB on cod liver oil, where D names the supplement and C opens This supplement. At 23 Sep 2024, 09:00, English Q.8 the key is CBAD on Saudi Arabia.

The fragment version, where the four parts are not whole sentences, runs at English Q.10 of this 13 Sep 2024, 12:30 paper.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.