SSC CGL 2025 PYQs

Concept: Uphold = to support or confirm (a law, decision, value).

1. Its opposite is to cancel or do away with formally.
2. Abrogate = to repeal, annul, abolish (e.g. a law or treaty).
3. Support, Maintain, Defend are synonyms of uphold, not antonyms.

Trick: When three options mean the same as the given word, the odd one is the antonym.

Answer: (C) Abrogate

Concept: 'Chew the cud' = to think about something slowly and carefully.

1. The phrase comes from cows and buffaloes that bring food back up and chew it again at leisure.
2. In the sentence, the writer was reflecting carefully before his next novel.
3. So the meaning is 'pondering deeply' – not eating or aimless daydreaming.

Yaad rakhein: Similar idioms: 'mull over', 'turn over in one's mind' – both mean to think carefully.

Answer: (C) Pondering deeply

Concept: Learn the exact spelling of borrowed French words.

1. Correct: P-E-R-S-I-F-L-A-G-E – persiflage, meaning light mocking talk or banter.
2. Errors: 'phledge' (B), 'Pur-' (C), 'Perci-' (D).

Trick: Split it: PERSI + FLAGE (like 'camouflage') – both halves are French-style endings.

Answer: (A) Persiflage

Concept: Noun formed by adding '-ity' to the adjective 'caustic'.

1. caustic (burning; sharply sarcastic) + ity = causticity.
2. (B) changes 'au' to 'o', (C) adds an extra 'i', (D) uses 's' in place of 'c' before -ity.

Trick: Write the base word first, then add the suffix: CAUSTIC + ITY – nothing in the base changes.

Answer: (A) Causticity

Concept: Pick the word for a person who pushes for change.

1. Reformer = one who works to change and improve society, laws or systems.
2. Conservative = opposes change; Idealist = guided by ideals; Dogmatist = sticks rigidly to fixed beliefs.

Yaad rakhein: Raja Ram Mohan Roy is called the 'Father of the Indian Renaissance' – a classic social reformer.

Answer: (C) Reformer

Concept: Antediluvian = 'ante' (before) + 'diluvium' (flood) → before Noah's Flood.

1. So it describes something extremely old or hopelessly old-fashioned.
2. Obsolete = no longer in use (need not be ancient); Primitive = early/undeveloped; Tale = a story.

Trick: 'Biblical times' in the clue points straight to the Flood – ante + diluvian.

Answer: (C) Antediluvian

Concept: Direct → indirect: said to → told; present continuous → past continuous; today → that day.

1. Reporting verb: said to her friend → told her friend that.
2. 'I am feeling' → 'she was feeling'.
3. 'today' → 'that day'.
4. (A) keeps 'is', (B) has 'said her friend', (D) drops the listener and keeps 'today'.

Trick: Check three things quickly – 'told', past tense, 'that day'. Only (C) has all three.

Answer: (C) She told her friend that she was feeling tired that day.

Concept: With a past reporting verb, shift tenses back and change first-person pronouns.

1. will judge → would judge; expect → expected.
2. our → their; we → they (the historian speaks for a group).
3. (B) keeps will/our/we; (C) and (D) change the meaning (drop 'than we expect', alter subject).

Trick: First eliminate options still having 'will' – then pick the one that keeps the full meaning.

Answer: (A) The historian said that future generations would judge their actions more harshly than they expected.

Concept: 'So controversial that …' needs a word showing a negative first reaction.

1. Disregarded = ignored, not given attention – fits a controversial idea.
2. Appreciated, acclaimed, endorsed are all positive reactions and clash with 'controversial'.
3. 'Initially' hints that acceptance may have come later.

Trick: Three positive options and one negative – the cause-effect clue picks the odd one.

Answer: (A) disregarded

Concept: The verb after 'that/which/who' agrees with the noun the pronoun refers to.

1. 'that' refers to 'advanced instruments' (plural), not 'facility'.
2. So 'that allows' must be 'that allow'.
3. Correct: … advanced instruments that allow scientists to conduct …

Trick: Ask 'what allows?' – the instruments do, and 'instruments' is plural.

Answer: (C) (3)

Concept: Present continuous passive = is/are being + V3.

1. Active: They are repairing the old bridge.
2. Object 'the old bridge' (singular) → 'is being repaired'.
3. Passive: The old bridge is being repaired after the monsoon. (Agent 'by them' is dropped.)

Trick: Continuous active ('-ing') always gives 'being' in passive – only (C) has 'being'.

Answer: (C) The old bridge is being repaired after the monsoon.

Concept: Correlatives like 'not only … but also' need parallel forms on both sides.

1. Part (1) has inversion 'did the committee reject' – the base verb 'reject' follows 'did'.
2. Part (2) uses past 'criticized', which does not match; it should read 'but also criticize' (or 'but it also criticized').
3. So the error is in part (2).

Trick: Match the two verbs after 'not only' and 'but also' – they must look alike in form.

Answer: (B) (2)

Concept: A homonym is spelt the same but carries a different meaning in another context.

1. Given sentence: simony = buying or selling church posts or spiritual favours.
2. (A), (B), (D) use the word in exactly this church-related sense.
3. Only (C) puts it in an alchemist's equations – a different, unrelated sense, so it is the homonym usage.

Trick: Three options share the same context (church, indulgences, religious bodies); pick the one from a totally different field.

Answer: (C) The alchemist could not interpret the simony in his equations.

Concept: Passive 'has/have been + V3' becomes active 'has/have + V3'; tense does not change.

1. Agent 'the director' becomes the subject.
2. 'has been postponed' → 'has postponed'.
3. Active: The director has postponed the meeting until further notice.

Trick: Voice change never changes tense – keep 'has' and you are left with only (C).

Answer: (C) The director has postponed the meeting until further notice.

Concept: 'Keen' takes 'on' before an activity, and a preposition is followed by a gerund (-ing).

1. 'keen to learn of swimming' is wrong – 'learn of' means 'hear about'.
2. Correct pattern: keen on + V-ing → 'keen on learning'.
3. One learns 'to swim' (a skill), so: He is keen on learning to swim.

Yaad rakhein: Other 'adjective + on' pairs: intent on, bent on, dependent on, insistent on.

Answer: (D) on learning to swim

Concept: Radiant = sending out bright light; glowing.

1. Luminous = giving off light, shining – same meaning.
2. Dull, Dim, Opaque all suggest lack of light – opposite direction.

Trick: Three options mean 'dark/no light'; the lone 'bright' word is the synonym.

Answer: (A) Luminous

Concept: Scanty = too little; meagre.

1. Exiguous = very small in amount, scanty – a close synonym.
2. Huge, Excessive, Abundant all mean 'a lot' – antonyms.

Trick: If you don't know a hard word, eliminate: the three easy words are all 'plenty', so the unfamiliar one must be the synonym.

Answer: (A) Exiguous

Concept: Factual question – find the sentence about 'early AI research'.

1. Passage: early research in the mid-20th century concentrated on 'symbolic reasoning and expert systems'.
2. Deep learning, image recognition and NLP are described as later breakthroughs.

Trick: Scan for the keyword 'Early' in the passage – the answer sits in that same sentence.

Answer: (B) Symbolic reasoning and expert systems

Concept: Look for the 'turning point' named in the passage.

1. The passage says the real inflection point came with machine learning, especially deep learning using brain-inspired neural networks.
2. This led to breakthroughs in image recognition, language processing and autonomous systems.
3. Quantum computing, robotics and internet speed are not mentioned as the cause.

Trick: 'Inflection point' = turning point; the phrase right after it is the answer.

Answer: (C) Machine learning, especially deep learning

Concept: Definition-type question – the passage explains the term itself.

1. The 'black box' problem: the way complex AI models reach decisions is opaque (hidden, not clear).
2. This makes it hard to hold anyone accountable.
3. Hardware design, proprietary software or secret government use are not what the term means here.

Yaad rakhein: The field that tries to solve this is called Explainable AI (XAI).

Answer: (B) The difficulty in understanding how complex AI models make decisions