SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 24 September 2024, Shift 1 · English Comprehension · Question 21 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 10 September 2026.

In the following passage, some words have been deleted. Read the passage carefully and select the most appropriate option to fill in each blank. The mathematician Federico Ardila-Mantilla grew up in Colombia, an (1) ______________ student but gifted in math. He was failing most of his classes at his high school in Bogotá when someone (2) _______________ him to apply to MIT. He had not heard of the school. To his surprise, he got in, and he went on scholarship. Mathematically, he did well. One of his professors, an acid-tongued theoretician known to (3) ____________ his audience to a herd of cows, routinely tucked ‘open’ math problems into homework assignments, without telling the students. These had never been solved by anyone. Ardila solved one. He went on to receive his bachelor’s and Ph.D. in math from MIT. But his academic experience was also one of isolation. Part of it had to do with his own (4) _____________. Part of it was cultural. As a Latino, he was very much in the minority in the department, and he did not feel comfortable in American mathematical spaces. No one had tried to explicitly (5) ______________ him, yet he felt alone. In math, collaborating with others opens up new kinds of learning and thinking. But in his nine years at MIT, Ardila worked with others only twice.

Select the most appropriate option to fill in blank no. 1

(a)indifferent
(b)apprehensive
(c)apologetic
(d)excellent

Answer

Why

Correct — A. Read past the blank to the connector. The passage says an blank student but gifted in math, and but demands a contrast, so blank 1 must be the opposite of gifted.

The next sentence proves it: He was failing most of his classes at his high school in Bogotá.

Indifferent has a second sense beyond unconcerned — of only middling quality, mediocre. An indifferent student is a poor one, which is the contrast but calls for. Option (a).

Why the others are wrong

(b)
apprehensive — apprehensive means anxious about what may come. Anxiety is not the opposite of gifted, and the passage reports failing grades rather than fear.
(c)
apologetic — apologetic means expressing regret. Nothing in the passage has Ardila apologising, and being sorry does not contrast with being gifted at math.
(d)
excellent — excellent points the wrong way. An excellent student but gifted in math leaves but with nothing to contrast, and it contradicts the failing grades in the next sentence.

Concept

In this deletion passage the fastest evidence is the connector, not the vocabulary. But, yet and however flip the direction. And, so and therefore continue it.

Here but sits two words after the blank and settles the direction before you have thought about any option.

The item then turns on a word with two senses. Indifferent is learnt first as showing no interest, but its other sense — neither good nor bad, mediocre — is standard, and it is the sense this sentence needs.

Key facts

Indifferent has two senses in standard use: unconcerned, and of merely average quality.
But joining two descriptions of the same person marks a contrast, so the descriptions must pull opposite ways.
Apprehensive means uneasy or fearful about something expected.

Study next

Adjectives with a common second sense, such as indifferent, mean, involved and qualifiedContrast connectors in cloze passages: but, yet, however, although, whereasThe apprehensive family, including apprehension, apprehend and comprehend

Common traps

Knowing indifferent only as not caring and rejecting it. The mediocre sense is the one the sentence needs.
Filling the blank before reading on. The sentence about failing his classes is what fixes the direction.
Treating the article an as a clue. All four options begin with a vowel sound, so an fits every one of them.

Five-blank deletion passages of the same shape also run at 18 Sep 2024, 16:00, English Q.21-Q.25 and at 23 Sep 2024, 16:00, English Q.21-Q.25.

Blank 3 of this same passage, English Q.23 of this shift, is decided by the preposition after the blank instead.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

In the following passage, some words have been deleted. Read the passage carefully and select the most appropriate option to fill in each blank. The mathematician Federico Ardila-Mantilla grew up in Colombia, an (1) ______________ student but gifted in math. He was failing most of his classes at his high school in Bogotá when someone (2) _______________ him to apply to MIT. He had not heard of the school. To his surprise, he got in, and he went on scholarship. Mathematically, he did well. One of his professors, an acid-tongued theoretician known to (3) ____________ his audience to a herd of cows, routinely tucked ‘open’ math problems into homework assignments, without telling the students. These had never been solved by anyone. Ardila solved one. He went on to receive his bachelor’s and Ph.D. in math from MIT. But his academic experience was also one of isolation. Part of it had to do with his own (4) _____________. Part of it was cultural. As a Latino, he was very much in the minority in the department, and he did not feel comfortable in American mathematical spaces. No one had tried to explicitly (5) ______________ him, yet he felt alone. In math, collaborating with others opens up new kinds of learning and thinking. But in his nine years at MIT, Ardila worked with others only twice.