SSC CGL 2025 Tier-I · 20 September 2025, Shift 1 · General Intelligence and Reasoning · Question 21 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.

A doctor mistakenly discloses patient data. What legal principle is violated?

(a)Negligence
(b)Confidentiality
(c)Defamation
(d)Right to dignity

Answer

Why

Correct — B.
Rule: name the duty that was broken, not the way it was broken.

A doctor holds patient information in trust. Disclosing it breaches the duty of confidentiality, whether the leak was deliberate or a mistake.

Mistakenly describes how it happened. The principle violated is still confidentiality, option (b).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
Negligence — Negligence describes the careless manner, which the word mistakenly hints at. The question asks which principle the disclosure breaks, and that is the patient's right to have their data kept confidential.
(c)
Defamation — Defamation is harm to someone's reputation through what is said about them. The stem describes private data getting out, not a statement attacking the patient's character.
(d)
Right to dignity — Right to dignity is a broad right that many wrongs touch. The question wants the specific principle a leak of patient data breaks, and the precise name for that is confidentiality.

Concept

Items like this test whether you can match a situation to the precise legal or ethical term. Several options sound related, and the answer is the one naming the exact duty broken.

Doctor–patient confidentiality is the duty to keep what a patient shares, and their records, private unless the patient consents or the law requires disclosure. The disclosure itself is the breach, so intent does not change which principle is violated.

The word mistakenly is the trap. Carelessness may matter to the consequences of a breach, but it does not change which duty was broken.

Key facts

Confidentiality can be breached by an accidental disclosure as well as a deliberate one.
Negligence names careless conduct, while confidentiality names the duty owed to the patient.
In India, a nine-judge bench of the Supreme Court held privacy to be a fundamental right in K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India (2017).

Study next

Doctor–patient confidentiality and its exceptionsNegligence, defamation and privacy: what each term coversThe right to privacy under Article 21

Common traps

Seizing on mistakenly and choosing negligence, which describes the manner rather than the principle.
Picking the broadest right on offer, dignity, when the question wants the specific duty.

Reasoning Q.19 in this shift, an administrative officer who sees bias in recruitment, asks the same kind of professional-ethics judgement.

A workplace-judgement item is also set at 21 Sep 2025, 16:00, Reasoning Q.14, keyed seek help or guidance.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.