SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 19 September 2024, Shift 3 · General Intelligence and Reasoning · Question 2 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.

In a certain code language, ‘CYCLE’ is coded as ‘242241522’ and ‘FINAL’ is coded as ‘2118132615’. How will ‘MUSIC’ be coded in that language?

(a)14681824
(b)1421191824
(c)146191824
(d)146192184

Answer

Why

Correct — A.

Rule: replace each letter by 27 minus its alphabet position, then write the values one after another.

CYCLE: C(3)→24, Y(25)→2, C(3)→24, L(12)→15, E(5)→22, giving 24 2 24 15 22 = 242241522.
FINAL: F(6)→21, I(9)→18, N(14)→13, A(1)→26, L(12)→15, giving 21 18 13 26 15 = 2118132615.

MUSIC: M(13)→14, U(21)→6, S(19)→8, I(9)→18, C(3)→24.

Strung together that is 14 6 8 18 24 = 14681824, which is option (a).

Why the others are wrong

(b)
1421191824 — 1421191824 reads 14-21-19-18-24. U and S have been given their forward positions 21 and 19 instead of the reverse values 6 and 8.
(c)
146191824 — 146191824 reads 14-6-19-18-24. Only S slips here: it is written as 19, its forward position, where the reverse value is 8.
(d)
146192184 — 146192184 keeps M=14 and U=6, then breaks. After S the digits 2184 cannot be split into values for I and C that are either their forward or their reverse positions.

Concept

Reverse-alphabet coding replaces a letter by the one an equal distance from the other end of the alphabet. In numbers, position p becomes 27 minus p, because A(1) pairs with Z(26) and every such pair sums to 27.

The giveaway is a code whose digits run against the letters. C is the third letter but is coded 24, so the count is coming from the back.

Learn four anchor pairs — A and Z, B and Y, C and X, M and N — and every other value is a short step from one of them.

The values are concatenated with no separator, so a single-digit value such as 6 or 8 shortens the string. That is why the wrong options differ in length as well as in content.

Key facts

Reverse position equals 27 minus the forward position, since A pairs with Z.
In this code CYCLE gives 24-2-24-15-22, printed without separators as 242241522.
MUSIC gives 14-6-8-18-24, printed as 14681824.
The repeated C in CYCLE takes the same value 24 both times, which confirms the mapping is letter-based.

Study next

Reverse-alphabet coding whose answer is a letter string rather than a digit stringCodes that double or shift the position before writing it, so the pair sums no longer holdCoding of words with repeated letters, where the same letter must always take the same code

Common traps

Reading the code as forward positions because 14 for M sits close to M's own position of 13.
Splitting the digit string in the wrong places once single-digit values appear.

Two coded words are given and a third is wanted, so the rule has to survive both checks before you use it. Alphabet-position arithmetic also drives Reasoning Q.7 and Q.21 in this shift.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.