SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 26 September 2024, Shift 3 · English Comprehension · Question 12 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 INCORRECTLY spelt word.

(a)Embarrass
(b)Discipline
(c)National
(d)Convinient

Answer

Why

Correct — D. The word is spelt convenient, with an e in the middle syllable: con-ven-ient. Option (d) prints Convinient, with an i in that slot, so it is the misspelt word.

The root settles it. Convenient comes from Latin convenire, 'to come together', which also gives convene and convention — all of them carry -ven-.

The other three are spelt correctly as printed, however awkward two of them look.

Why the others are wrong

(a)
Embarrass — Embarrass is correct as printed. It takes a double r and a double s, and misspellings of it normally drop one of those pairs — nothing is dropped here.
(b)
Discipline — Discipline is correct as printed. The c after the s is not sounded (dis-ci-pline), which makes the word look wrong, but it comes from Latin discipulus and stays.
(c)
National — National is correct as printed: nation plus -al, with ti pronounced 'sh'. The mismatch between sound and spelling is the only odd thing about it.

Concept

Spelling items here turn on a single letter, so read each word syllable by syllable instead of recognising its shape.

The failure point in convenient is an unstressed vowel. The middle syllable is spoken with a weak, colourless vowel, so pronunciation gives you no evidence for i or e and the eye will accept either.

Roots settle what sound cannot. Convenient, convene and convention all carry -ven- from Latin convenire, and the same move fixes definite, which contains finite.

The question asks which word is wrong, not which word looks strange. Discipline and national both look irregular for phonetic reasons while being perfectly spelt.

Key facts

Convenient is spelt con-ven-ient, with an e in the second syllable.
Convenient, convene and convention share the Latin root convenire.
Embarrass carries a double r and a double s.
Discipline keeps the silent c of Latin discipulus after its s.

Study next

Words with a commonly mis-written unstressed vowel, such as separate, definite and privilegeDouble-letter words worth learning, such as accommodate, occurrence and millenniumThe -ent against -ant ending, as in relevant and independent

Common traps

Marking discipline wrong because its c is silent
Trusting pronunciation for a vowel that is unstressed in speech
Reading only the first half of each word before answering

SSC prints four words with no sentence and asks which one is wrong, and here the three correct words are ones that look irregular — a silent c, a double pair, a 'sh' spelt ti.

The same frame appears at 09 Sep 2024, 09:00, English Q.12, where Embarrass is again a correct option and the wrong word is Relevent, and at 12 Sep 2024, 09:00, English Q.9 (Preceed).

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.