SSC CGL 2025 Tier-I · 12 September 2025, Shift 3 · General Intelligence and Reasoning · Question 9 of 100

We transcribed this text from the pictures on a candidate's response sheet for this shift; the answer is the key SSC colour-marked on that sheet. Solution last reviewed 11 September 2026.

Where this paper and its answers come from

SSC does not publish CGL question papers or a public answer key. From 2025 the candidate response sheet prints every question and option as a picture, so the text here is transcribed from those pictures for this shift and checked against them independently; where the layout carries meaning, the picture is shown as well. Each answer is the key SSC colour-marked on that sheet. SSC released a tentative key for challenge and later its final one, both only to candidates behind a login, and the sheet does not say which of the two it carries. The solutions are written by UnlockIAS.

From the given options, find the word which cannot be formed using the letters of the given word: INTELLIGENCE

(a)CANCEL
(b)NEGLECT
(c)GENTLE
(d)INCITE

Answer

Why

Correct — A.
Rule: count each letter of the given word, then check every option against the counts.

INTELLIGENCE has E ×3, I ×2, N ×2, L ×2, and one each of T, G and C.

CANCEL needs an A, which INTELLIGENCE does not have, and two C's where it has one.

So CANCEL cannot be formed → option (a).

Why the others are wrong

(b)
NEGLECT — NEGLECT needs two E's, and INTELLIGENCE has three. N, G, L, C and T are all available, so it can be formed.
(c)
GENTLE — GENTLE needs two E's, with three available, and one each of G, N, T and L, all in stock, so it can be formed.
(d)
INCITE — INCITE needs two I's, and INTELLIGENCE has exactly two. N, C, T and E are available too, so it can be formed.

Concept

Word formation is bookkeeping. List how many times each letter appears in the given word, then test each option against that list.

An option fails if it needs a letter not in the word at all, or needs a letter more times than the word has it. CANCEL fails both ways: no A, and one C short.

Key facts

INTELLIGENCE has 12 letters: E ×3, I ×2, N ×2, L ×2, and one each of T, G, C.
INTELLIGENCE contains no A.
INTELLIGENCE has one C, and CANCEL needs two.

Study next

Words that can be formed using each letter only onceLetter-count checks on long source words such as ADMINISTRATION

Common traps

Checking only that each letter exists, and missing that CANCEL needs C twice
Rejecting INCITE for its two I's, when INTELLIGENCE has exactly two

21 Sep 2025, 16:00, Reasoning Q.19 turns on a missing letter too: SITUATION cannot be formed from ADMINISTRATION, which has no U.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.