SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 17 September 2024, Shift 3 · English Comprehension · Question 6 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 ANTONYM of the given word. Candid

(a)Tender
(b)Dishonest
(c)Irrelevant
(d)Guileless

Answer

Why

Correct — B. Candid means frank and open — saying what you actually think, without hiding or softening it.

The axis being tested is therefore truthfulness. Reverse candid on that axis and you get someone who conceals and misleads: dishonest, option (b).

Check it by substitution. A candid answer and a dishonest answer are opposed answers, which is what an antonym pair should be.

Why the others are wrong

(a)
Tender — Tender means gentle or kind. Kindness is a different axis from frankness — a candid remark is often unkind, and that does not make tender its opposite.
(c)
Irrelevant — Irrelevant means not connected to the matter in hand. It measures relevance, not honesty, so it can never reverse candid.
(d)
Guileless — Guileless is guile, meaning cunning deceit, plus -less. It therefore means without deceit, which is a synonym of candid planted where the antonym should be.

Concept

Antonym items are decided by first naming the axis the word sits on. Candid sits on truth-telling, alongside frank, forthright and outspoken, and opposite dishonest, evasive and disingenuous.

Candid has a second, narrower use, of a photograph taken without the subject posing. That sense is not in play when the word is printed bare with a moral list of options.

The -less ending on guileless is the deliberate trap: a negative-looking suffix on a word that already means honest.

Candid turns up on the other side of this same contrast at 10 Sep 2024, 16:00, English Q.9. There candid is one of the wrong options and the key is mendacious, meaning lying, for the clue word misleading.

Key facts

Candid means frank and open, saying what one really thinks.
Guile means cunning deceit, so guileless means free of deceit and stands on the same side as candid.
Tender means gentle or kind, which is a matter of manner rather than of honesty.
Candid also describes a photograph taken of an unposed subject.

Study next

The frankness family: candid, frank, forthright, blunt, outspokenGuile, guileless and beguile, and how the root shifts meaningWords for dishonesty: mendacious, disingenuous, evasive, duplicitous

Common traps

Reading the -less of guileless as a negative suffix that must make an opposite
Treating candid as a warm, pleasant word and reaching for tender
Passing over Dishonest because it looks too plain to be the key on a list with guileless on it

The bare word with four one-word options is the frame here, as at 11 Sep 2024, 09:00, English Q.9 (Forbid, keyed Allow, with Prohibit sitting on the list as the synonym trap).

13 Sep 2024, 16:00, English Q.16 stacks that trap: Affirmative is keyed to Negative, while Accession, Sanction and Acquiescence all mean assent — the same side as the clue word.

This shift also runs antonyms inside a sentence at English Q.3 (predictable), Q.9 (abolish) and Q.12 (chronic).

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.