SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 24 September 2024, Shift 1 · Quantitative Aptitude · Question 9 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.

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.

The given table shows the expenditure (in crore ₹) of three companies A, B and C and the percentage profit of these companies in different years. Given that: Income = Expenditure + Expenditure × (Profit % ⁄ 100) Years → Company A Expenditure | Company A Profit | Company B Expenditure | Company B Profit | Company C Expenditure | Company C Profit 2002 — 24 | 50% | 20 | 40% | 40 | 45% 2003 — 30 | 45% | 15 | 25% | 50 | 55% 2004 — 36 | 40% | 25 | 35% | 60 | 65% 2005 — 40 | 60% | 35 | 48% | 80 | 75% What is the difference (in crore ₹) between the profits of Company A and Company B in the year 2005?

(a)10.4
(b)8.3
(c)12.5
(d)7.2

Answer

Why

Correct — D. The table gives expenditure in crore ₹ and profit as a per cent of that expenditure, so profit = expenditure × profit% ÷ 100.

Company A, 2005: expenditure 40, profit 60%
= 40 × 60/100 = ₹24 crore

Company B, 2005: expenditure 35, profit 48%
= 35 × 48/100 = ₹16.8 crore

Difference = 24 − 16.8 = ₹7.2 crore → option (d)

Why the others are wrong

(a)
10.4 — 10.4 would need Company B's profit to be ₹13.6 crore, which is 38.9% of its ₹35 crore expenditure. The 2005 row states 48%.
(b)
8.3 — 8.3 would need B's profit at ₹15.7 crore. 48% of ₹35 crore is ₹16.8 crore, and 24 − 16.8 lands exactly on 7.2.
(c)
12.5 — 12.5 cannot come out of the profit amounts, which are ₹24 crore and ₹16.8 crore. The 60% and the 48% sit on different bases, ₹40 crore and ₹35 crore, so the 12-point gap between the rates is not the rupee gap.

Concept

The table is deliberately mixed: expenditure is an amount in crore ₹, profit is a rate. A profit percentage is worth nothing until you attach it to its own expenditure.

The stem defines income = expenditure + expenditure × profit%/100, which is the same as saying profit amount = expenditure × profit% ÷ 100.

That is why a higher rate need not mean a higher amount. Company C's 75% in 2005 rides on ₹80 crore and is worth ₹60 crore, while A's 60% rides on only ₹40 crore.

Read the year before you read the columns. The 2004 row — A at 36 and 40%, B at 25 and 35% — gives ₹14.4 crore against ₹8.75 crore, a completely different gap.

Key facts

Profit amount = expenditure × profit% ÷ 100, from the income relation printed above the table.
In 2005 Company A's profit is 40 × 60% = ₹24 crore and Company B's is 35 × 48% = ₹16.8 crore.
The difference is ₹7.2 crore, which is not the same thing as the 12-point gap between 60% and 48%.

Study next

Income from the same table, since income = expenditure + profit amountThe ratio of two companies' incomes in a stated yearThe year in which a company's profit amount peaks, which need not be the year its profit rate peaks

Common traps

Subtracting the two profit rates (60 − 48 = 12) and reporting the gap in crore
Subtracting the two expenditures (40 − 35 = 5) instead of the two profit amounts

Read the definition printed above the table before the table itself: here it is what turns a profit rate into a rupee amount.

Tables of plain amounts appear at 25 Sep 2024, 12:30, Quant Q.25 (a person's income per year) and 18 Sep 2024, 09:00, Quant Q.1 (a company's expenditure per year), where the question wants an average and no rate has to be converted.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

Topic: Histogram, Frequency polygon, Bar diagram & Pie chart — all 103 SSC CGL questions on it, every solved shift.

The given table shows the expenditure (in crore ₹) of three companies A, B and C and the percentage profit of these companies in different years. Given that: Income = Expenditure + Expenditure × (Profit % ⁄ 100) Years → Company A Expenditure | Company A Profit | Company B Expenditure | Company B Profit | Company C Expenditure | Company C Profit 2002 — 24 | 50% | 20 | 40% | 40 | 45% 2003 — 30 | 45% | 15 | 25% | 50 | 55% 2004 — 36 | 40% | 25 | 35% | 60 | 65% 2005 — 40 | 60% | 35 | 48% | 80 | 75% What is the difference (in crore ₹) between the profits of Company A and Company B in the year 2005?

(a)10.4
(b)8.3
(c)12.5
(d)7.2