SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 26 September 2024, Shift 3 · General Intelligence and Reasoning · Question 13 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 option that represents the letters that, when sequentially placed from left to right in the blanks below, will complete the letter series. _ V D W Y _ D W Y V _ W Y _ D _

(a)YVDVW
(b)YWDVW
(c)YVYVW
(d)YVDVY

Answer

Why

Correct — A. Rule: the block Y V D W repeats, four letters at a time.

Break the sixteen slots into groups of four:
_ V D W | Y _ D W | Y V _ W | Y _ D _

Every group has to read Y V D W, so the first group needs Y, the second needs V, the third needs D, and the fourth needs V and then W.

Taking the blanks left to right in the order they appear gives YVDVW, option (a).

Why the others are wrong

(b)
YWDVW — YWDVW puts W in the second blank. That blank is the second slot of the group Y _ D W, and the second letter of the block is V.
(c)
YVYVW — YVYVW puts Y in the third blank. That blank is the third slot of the group Y V _ W, and the third letter of the block is D.
(d)
YVDVY — YVDVY ends in Y. The last blank is the fourth slot of the final group Y _ D _, and the fourth letter of the block is W.

Concept

A blanked letter series is a period-finding problem. Count the slots — sixteen here — and look for the shortest block that agrees with every filled position.

Read the longest unbroken run first. Slots 2 to 5 read V D W Y and slots 7 to 10 read D W Y V: the same four letters, started at a different point. That is the signal for a four-letter block.

Once the block is fixed the filling is mechanical. Cut the slots into consecutive groups of four and copy the block into each. Every letter already printed should agree, and if one does not, the block is wrong.

The blanks are answered left to right in the order they appear in the string, not in the order the letters take inside the block. That is where a correct reading still loses the mark.

Key facts

The repeating block is Y V D W.
Sixteen slots hold four complete copies of a four-letter block.
The blanks fall at slots 1, 6, 11, 14 and 16.
Reading those five slots in order gives Y, V, D, V, W.

Study next

Blanked series with a five-letter or six-letter repeating blockSeries where the block itself shifts by one letter with each cycleNumber series built on a repeating cycle of digits rather than letters

Common traps

Assuming the period is five because there are five blanks
Starting the block at the first printed letter, V, instead of testing where each group begins
Writing the answer letters in block order rather than in the order the blanks appear

SSC prints a string with blanks scattered through it and four candidate fills, and the work is finding the period.

The same frame appears at 11 Sep 2024, 16:00, Reasoning Q.3 (R F _ G T R _ V G _ R F V _ T _ F V G T) and at 13 Sep 2024, 09:00, Reasoning Q.14.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.