SSC CGL 2025 Tier-I · 15 September 2025, Shift 1 · English Comprehension · Question 13 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.

Select the sentence containing the homonym of the highlighted word: She placed a compact mirror in her purse.

(a)The team formed a compact defensive unit.
(b)He compacted the soil using a roller.
(c)They signed a compact to maintain peace.
(d)The book was written in a compact style.

Answer

Why

Correct — C. In the stem, compact means small and closely packed: a mirror made to fit into a purse.

The sentence in option (c) uses a separate word with the same spelling, the noun compact meaning a formal agreement: 'They signed a compact to maintain peace.'

Same spelling, unrelated meaning and origin: that is a homonym → option (c).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
The team formed a compact defensive unit. — A compact defensive unit is tightly packed together. That is the stem's own adjective in the same 'closely packed' sense, so it is the same word, not a homonym.
(b)
He compacted the soil using a roller. — Compacted is the verb 'to press closely together', from the same root as the stem's adjective. A related form with a related meaning is not a homonym.
(d)
The book was written in a compact style. — A compact style is concise, the 'packed tight' idea applied to writing. It is a sense of the stem's own adjective, not a separate word.

Concept

A homonym shares its spelling, and usually its sound, with another word but has an unrelated meaning.

The test is whether the meaning belongs to a separate word, not whether the setting is new. In (a), (b) and (d), 'compact' keeps the idea of packed closely together: a tight unit, pressed soil, dense prose.

The noun in (c), an agreement between parties, has no link to packing and comes from a different Latin verb.

If you read 'compact mirror' as the make-up case called a compact, the answer does not change: that noun is itself formed from the adjective, after the compacted face powder it holds.

Key facts

compact (noun) = an agreement or contract between two or more parties.
The agreement sense comes from Latin compacisci, 'to come to agreement'.
The adjective comes from Latin compingere, 'to fasten together'.
Several senses of one word, such as a compact car and a compact style, do not make a homonym.

Study next

Homonym pairs across parts of speech, such as stern (strict) and stern (the rear of a ship)Polysemy versus homonymy: one word with several senses versus two unrelated words

Common traps

Picking (b) because 'compacted' looks the most different, when it is the same packing idea used as a verb
Treating a new context as a new meaning: a compact unit and a compact style use the same adjective

The same frame is asked at 21 Sep 2025, 16:00, English Q.19, where the homonym of a 'stern warning' is keyed as 'the stern of the ship', and at 18 Sep 2025, 12:30, English Q.13, where a bishop's mitre is keyed against 'a steel mitre joint'.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

Topic: Homonyms and confusables — all 29 SSC CGL questions on it, every solved shift.