SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 19 September 2024, Shift 3 · English Comprehension · Question 16 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 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 option to substitute the underlined segment in the given sentence. After reflecting on the matter regarding his boss’s selfish attitude, Raju decided to force himself to perform an unpleasant action in a difficult situation in order to resolve the matter.

(a)dodge the bullet
(b)ignore the bullet
(c)bite the bullet
(d)shoot the bullet

Answer

Why

Correct — C. The underlined stretch is not a sentence but a definition spelt out in full: force himself to perform an unpleasant action in a difficult situation.

Bite the bullet means precisely that — to make yourself go through with something painful or unpleasant because there is no way round it.

Read for direction and the set thins out at once: Raju goes through with the unpleasant act, so the idiom must move towards it, not away. Option (c) is the one that does.

Why the others are wrong

(a)
dodge the bullet — Dodge the bullet is the reverse movement — narrowly escaping something bad. The sentence has Raju submitting to the unpleasant task, not getting clear of it.
(b)
ignore the bullet — Ignore the bullet is not an established English idiom, and its plain sense points at looking away, which is the opposite of forcing yourself to act.
(d)
shoot the bullet — Shoot the bullet is not a fixed idiom either. Read literally it is aimed at attacking something, and it carries nothing of enduring an unpleasant duty.

Concept

An idiom-substitution item hands you the meaning in full and asks for the phrase. Read the definition for its direction before you read any option.

Here the direction is towards the unpleasant thing: force himself to perform. Any option that means avoid, escape or overlook is wrong on direction alone, whatever else it means.

The bullet phrases are chosen to exploit that. Bite it and you endure; dodge it and you escape.

Two of the four options are not English idioms at all. Bite the bullet and dodge the bullet are the fixed phrases here, so the real choice is between them, and it turns on direction.

Key facts

Bite the bullet means to force yourself to endure something painful or unpleasant.
Dodge the bullet means to narrowly avoid a danger or a difficulty.
Ignore the bullet and shoot the bullet are not established English idioms.

Study next

Idioms of endurance: bite the bullet, grin and bear it, face the musicIdioms of escape: dodge the bullet, off the hook, a close shaveDeciding an idiom item by direction of meaning before vocabulary

Common traps

Taking dodge the bullet because it is the phrase heard most often
Treating any bullet phrase as an idiom once bite the bullet comes to mind
Answering from the first half of the sentence, about the boss, rather than from the underlined definition

SSC sets the same idiom in different formats across shifts: it is defined outright on 10 Sep 2024, 12:30, English Q.20, and set as a fill-in-the-blank on 26 Sep 2024, 12:30, English Q.6. Substitution of an underlined segment also appears in this paper at English Q.12.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.