SSC CGL 2025 Tier-I · 22 September 2025, Shift 1 · General Intelligence and Reasoning · Question 22 of 98

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.

We doubt SSC's key on this question.

'All dogs are cats' with 'Some cats are rats' lets the rats overlap only the cats that are not dogs, so by the standard certainty rule neither conclusion follows (option a), and SSC's own keys reject the same step at 20 Sep 2025, 09:00, Reasoning Q.8 and 16 Sep 2025, 09:00, Reasoning Q.23.

The answer below is still the option SSC's key marks, and we solve to that option.

Statements: All dogs are cats. Some cats are rats. Conclusions: I. Some rats are dogs. II. All dogs are rats.

(a)Neither I nor II follows
(b)Only Conclusion II follows
(c)Both I and II follow
(d)Only Conclusion I follows

Answer

Why

Correct — D. SSC's key accepts conclusion I and rejects conclusion II.

Dogs sit wholly inside cats, and rats overlap cats somewhere.
The key reads that overlap as reaching the dogs. Drawn that way, some rats are dogs, which is conclusion I.

All dogs are rats needs every dog inside the rats. The rats can take in some dogs and leave the rest outside, so conclusion II does not follow.

Only conclusion I → option (d).

Why the others are wrong

(a)
Neither I nor II follows — Neither rejects conclusion I, which SSC's key accepts: the key reads the rats' overlap with the cats as reaching the dogs. The note on the key records the dispute.
(b)
Only Conclusion II follows — All dogs are rats is not forced: the rats can take in some dogs and leave the rest outside. Conclusion II fails, so 'only II' fails with it.
(c)
Both I and II follow — Both needs conclusion II, and nothing puts every dog among the rats. The rats can take in some dogs and leave others out, so II fails and 'both' fails with it.

Concept

Statements of the shape All A are B and Some B are C link A and C only through B, and B is the bigger circle.

The 'some' overlap between B and C can fall inside A or entirely outside it. Both drawings are allowed, so no definite relation between A and C follows: not 'Some A are C', not its converse 'Some C are A', and not 'All A are C'.

What does follow is about B: 'Some cats are rats' converts to some rats are cats.

The key and the rule disagree on conclusion I. 'Some rats are dogs' is the converse of 'Some dogs are rats', the same claim read the other way round.

SSC's keys reject that step elsewhere. At 20 Sep 2025, 09:00, Reasoning Q.8 (All poets are writers. Some writers are critics. No critic is a fool.), 'Some poets are critics' is keyed not to follow, and so is 'Some metals are gases' at 16 Sep 2025, 09:00, Reasoning Q.23.

Key facts

'All A are B' with 'Some B are C' gives no definite conclusion between A and C.
'Some A are B' converts to 'Some B are A', so 'Some rats are dogs' and 'Some dogs are rats' stand or fall together.
'Some cats are rats' converts to 'Some rats are cats', which does follow here.

Study next

Possibility conclusions such as 'Some rats may be dogs'Conversion of All, Some and No statementsThree-statement syllogisms ending in a 'No' statement

Common traps

Converting 'All dogs are cats' into 'All cats are dogs': an All statement converts only to 'Some cats are dogs'.
Treating a conclusion that is merely possible as one that follows.

The same All + Some template is set at 20 Sep 2025, 09:00, Reasoning Q.8 and 16 Sep 2025, 09:00, Reasoning Q.23, where the A-to-C conclusion is keyed not to follow.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.

Topic: Drawing inferences — all 90 SSC CGL questions on it, every solved shift.