SSC CGL 2025 Tier-I · 16 September 2025, Shift 3 · English Comprehension · Question 2 of 75

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 most appropriate antonym of the given word. Pulchritude

(a)Grace
(b)Ugliness
(c)Charm
(d)Beauty

Answer

Why

Correct — B. Pulchritude is a formal, literary word for physical beauty. It comes from Latin pulcher, 'beautiful'.

The item asks for the antonym, so you need the word for the absence of beauty. Ugliness is exactly that → option (b).

Grace, Charm and Beauty all sit on the same side as pulchritude, which is why they fail here.

Why the others are wrong

(a)
Grace — Grace is elegance of movement or manner. It is a quality of beauty, so it stands beside pulchritude, not opposite it.
(c)
Charm — Charm is the power of pleasing or attracting people. Like pulchritude it names something attractive, so it cannot be the opposite.
(d)
Beauty — Beauty is the plain English synonym of pulchritude. It would be the key if the item asked for a synonym, and it catches anyone who reads the word as meaning ugliness.

Concept

An antonym item has two steps: pin down the word's sense, then find its opposite. Pulchritude means beauty, especially of a person's appearance.

Three options, Grace, Charm and Beauty, share that sense. Ugliness reverses it.

Dictionaries label pulchritude literary or formal, so you may never have heard it spoken. Its Latin root pulcher is the reliable way in, and its adjective is pulchritudinous.

Key facts

Pulchritude means physical beauty.
It comes from Latin pulchritudo, from pulcher, 'beautiful'.
Its adjective is pulchritudinous, meaning beautiful.
Grace, charm and beauty are on its side of the scale, and ugliness is its antonym.

Study next

Latin -tude nouns for qualities, such as turpitude, lassitude and fortitudeLiterary words for beauty, such as comeliness and pulchritudinous

Common traps

Guessing from the harsh sound of the word that pulchritude means ugliness, then picking Beauty as its opposite
Missing the word antonym in the stem and picking Beauty, the synonym

Here the word follows 'Select the most appropriate antonym of the given word.' and three of the options are its near-synonyms. English Q.4 of the same sitting, Incorrigible, is built the same way.

17 Sep 2025, 16:00, English Q.3 tests another Latin -tude noun as an antonym: Turpitude, keyed Morality, against Depravity, Vice and Sin.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

Topic: Antonyms — all 137 SSC CGL questions on it, every solved shift.