SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 23 September 2024, Shift 3 · General Intelligence and Reasoning · Question 20 of 100

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.

Select the combination of letters that when sequentially placed in the blanks of the given series will logically complete the series. ME_ICM_DIC_GDI_MHD_C

(a)DEMAI
(b)DFMCI
(c)DCFMI
(d)DFMBI

Answer

Why

Correct — B. Rule: the series runs in blocks of five, M _ D I C, and the second letter of each block climbs E, F, G, H.

Cut ME_ICM_DIC_GDI_MHD_C into fives:

M E _ I C → MEDIC
M _ D I C → MFDIC
_ G D I _ → MGDIC
M H D _ C → MHDIC

Reading the blanks in the order they appear gives D, F, M, C, I — DFMCI, which is option (b).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
DEMAI — DEMAI puts E in the second blank, repeating MEDIC when the block should have moved on to MFDIC. Its A also leaves the third block ending MGDIA.
(c)
DCFMI — DCFMI puts C in the second blank, so block two reads MCDIC. It then opens block three with F, where every block begins with M.
(d)
DFMBI — DFMBI is right for the first three blanks and then puts B in the fourth, so block three closes MGDIB. Every block ends on C.

Concept

A blank-filling letter series is solved by finding the block length before anything else.

Count the letters. There are 20, with blanks at the 3rd, 7th, 11th, 15th and 19th places, so blocks of five give four blocks and one blank each — except the third block, which happens to take two.

Every block then reads M ? D I C, and only the second letter moves. Three of the five letters never change, which is what makes the block visible once the string is cut.

Read the blanks back in the order they appear in the string, not block by block.

Key facts

The completed series reads MEDIC MFDIC MGDIC MHDIC.
The string holds 20 letters, so blocks of five give four blocks.
Only the second letter of each block changes, running E, F, G and H.
The blanks fall at the 3rd, 7th, 11th, 15th and 19th positions.

Study next

Letter series whose block length is four or six rather than fiveSeries in which two letters of the block advance at different ratesAlphabet-position arithmetic, converting letters to 1-26 before hunting the step

Common traps

Testing options on the first blank alone, when every option here begins with D
Cutting the string into blocks of four because the answer is five letters long
Reading the blanks in block order instead of the order they appear in the string

Here the string is printed unspaced with a blank at every fourth position, and the letters fill the blanks from left to right. A blank-filling letter series is also set at Reasoning Q.1 here, and at 09 Sep 2024, 16:00, Reasoning Q.14.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

Topic: Semantic Series — all 61 SSC CGL questions on it, every solved shift.