SSC CGL 2025 Tier-I · 13 September 2025, Shift 2 · English Comprehension · Question 2 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 13 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.

Choose the correct meaning of idiom: Has two strings to his bow

(a)He is indecisive in crucial matters.
(b)He has two romantic interests simultaneously.
(c)He has an additional skill or option to rely on.
(d)He uses deception to achieve goals.

Answer

Why

Correct — C. To have two strings to one's bow is to have a second skill, plan or resource to fall back on if the first one fails.

The image comes from archery: with a spare bowstring, the bow still works when one string snaps.

So the man in the idiom has an additional skill or option to rely on → option (c).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
He is indecisive in crucial matters. — Indecisive confuses two options to rely on with two options to agonise over. Being unable to choose is in two minds, a different idiom.
(b)
He has two romantic interests simultaneously. — Two romantic interests reads 'strings' as ties of love. The idiom is about backup resources, and seeing two partners at once is called two-timing.
(d)
He uses deception to achieve goals. — Deception has no place in the bow image. Keeping a fallback is prudent, not dishonest. Deceit of that kind is double-dealing, a different expression.

Concept

An idiom item tests a fixed figurative meaning, which you cannot build word by word from the parts.

Two strings to one's bow is a British idiom, also said as a second string to one's bow. It praises foresight: someone with a second string is not ruined when the first plan fails.

The literal words pull you toward the wrong options. Two can suggest two partners or being torn two ways, and the idiom means neither.

The paper prints the idiom as a clause, 'Has two strings to his bow'. Dictionaries list it as have two strings to one's bow, with the pronoun changing to fit the subject.

Key facts

Have two strings to one's bow means to have more than one skill, resource or plan to rely on.
It is also said as have a second string to one's bow.
Be in two minds means to be undecided.
Two-timing means being unfaithful to a partner by seeing someone else.

Study next

Backup-plan idioms, such as a fallback and don't put all your eggs in one basketIdioms of indecision, such as in two minds and sit on the fenceIdioms of deceit, such as double-dealing and two-faced

Common traps

Reading 'strings' as romantic ties and picking the two-partners option
Treating two strings as two competing choices, which is indecision, when the idiom means one plan plus a spare

Here the paper prints the idiom without a subject, 'Has two strings to his bow', and each of the four options is a sentence beginning 'He'.

The opposite situation is keyed at 12 Sep 2025, 09:00, English Q.2: Hobson's choice, 'No real choice at all'.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

Topic: Idioms and phrases — all 97 SSC CGL questions on it, every solved shift.