SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 17 September 2024, Shift 1 · English Comprehension · Question 11 of 98

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.

Select the most appropriate synonym of the given word. Bully

(a)Oxen
(b)Coddle
(c)Plough
(d)Oppressor

Answer

Why

Correct — D. The stem gives Bully as a noun — a person who habitually intimidates or hurts someone weaker — so the synonym has to be a noun for that kind of person.

Oppressor is exactly that: one who uses power to treat others harshly or unjustly.

Same part of speech, same relation of the stronger to the weaker, which makes option (d) the match.

Why the others are wrong

(a)
Oxen — Oxen, the plural of ox, is pulled in by the 'bull' sitting inside bully. The two words share letters and nothing else.
(b)
Coddle — Coddle means to treat someone with excessive care or indulgence — the opposite of bullying, and a verb where the stem gives a noun.
(c)
Plough — Plough is a farm implement, or the act of turning soil with one. Another cattle association rather than a sense of bully.

Concept

Synonym items are decided on two axes: sense and part of speech.

'Bully' works both ways — as a verb it means to intimidate, as a noun it names the person who does the intimidating. The options settle which reading is wanted, because one of them is a person-noun and the rest are not.

The three wrong options cluster around farm and cattle words, which is the paper testing whether you read bully as a word or as a string of letters.

'Bully' has unrelated senses in 'bully for you', meaning well done, and in 'bully beef', a name for tinned corned beef. Neither is on offer here; the option list forces the intimidation sense.

Key facts

A bully is a person who habitually intimidates or hurts weaker people.
An oppressor is one who subjects others to harsh or unjust treatment through power.
To coddle someone is to treat them with excessive care or indulgence.
Oxen is the plural of ox.

Study next

Person-nouns built with -or and -er: oppressor, tormentor, aggressorSynonym items where the options differ in part of speechLook-alike traps: words that share letters but no root

Common traps

Seeing 'bull' inside 'bully' and reaching for a cattle word.
Picking coddle because it also describes how one person treats another, in the opposite direction.

Synonyms come either as a bare word, as here, or set inside a sentence with the target word underlined.

English Q.3 of this paper asks the bare-word form for Labour, and on 9 Sep 2024, 09:00, English Q.17 the sentence form asks for a synonym of 'harass', keyed to intimidate.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.