SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 25 September 2024, Shift 2 · English Comprehension · Question 21 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 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.

In the following passage, some words have been deleted. Read the passage carefully and select the most appropriate option to fill in each blank. We naturally seek the company of those whose (1) _________ are the same as our own. Fools do not like the (2) _________ of wise men, and wise men avoid fools. Serious-minded people do not find much in common with (3) _________ folk, and vice versa. Sinners feel uncomfortable with (4) _________ and do not seek their company. We can, therefore, as a rule, judge a man’s (5) _________ by the company he keeps.

Select the most appropriate option to fill in blank number 1.

(a)institutes
(b)organisations
(c)apathy
(d)tastes

Answer

Why

Correct — D. The clause is 'those whose (1) _________ are the same as our own'. The verb is are, so the blank must hold a plural noun — that alone removes apathy, which is uncountable.

Sense settles the rest. The sentence is the passage's thesis: we look for people like ourselves. What two people can share and compare is their tastes → option (d).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
institutes — Institutes are organisations or the buildings that house them. The passage compares what people are like inside — fools against wise men, sinners against saints — not which body they belong to.
(b)
organisations — Organisations gives the plural the verb needs but the wrong sense. Sharing an employer is not what makes us naturally seek someone's company in this passage.
(c)
apathy — Apathy is uncountable, so it cannot take the plural verb 'are'. It also means indifference, which nobody seeks out in company.

Concept

A cloze blank is decided twice: once by grammar, once by the argument running through the passage.

Grammar first. whose (1) ___ are fixes the number, so the filler must be plural, and an uncountable noun is gone before you weigh any meaning.

Then the argument. Sentence one states the thesis — we look for people like ourselves — and the sentences after it give pairs that prove it. The blank names the thing that is 'the same as our own'.

Both institutes and organisations survive the grammar test, so this blank cannot be settled on number alone. The theme of the passage does the rest of the work.

Key facts

Tastes, in the plural, means a person's likings and preferences.
In a relative clause, whose + noun takes its verb from that noun, so 'whose tastes are' is correct.
Apathy is an uncountable noun and cannot pair with a plural verb such as are.

Study next

Subject-verb agreement inside whose-clausesCountable and uncountable abstract nouns: taste and tastes, apathy, patienceReading the first sentence of a cloze passage as its thesis before filling any blank

Common traps

Picking whichever option sounds most formal.
Ignoring 'are' and dropping a singular abstract noun into the blank.
Answering blank 1 before reading the last sentence, which names what the passage is really measuring.

The five blanks come from one passage and are answered together, not one at a time — here English Q.21 to Q.25 all sit on this paragraph.

The same five-blank cloze runs at 9 Sep 2024, 09:00, English Q.21 to Q.25 and 26 Sep 2024, 16:00, English Q.21 to Q.25.

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. We naturally seek the company of those whose (1) _________ are the same as our own. Fools do not like the (2) _________ of wise men, and wise men avoid fools. Serious-minded people do not find much in common with (3) _________ folk, and vice versa. Sinners feel uncomfortable with (4) _________ and do not seek their company. We can, therefore, as a rule, judge a man’s (5) _________ by the company he keeps.