Lessons from IBPS PO 2011 (English Section)

Dear Aspirants,

  

Since IBPS PO – III is almost at hand, we wish to ensure that no aspect of your study goes incomplete for this crucial examination. In this article , we try to help you solve “Complete the Paragraph” type of questions. This type of questions appeared in September 2011, however, there is no guarantee that these will not appear again. This formed part of the “English Section” of the Examination and left many aspirants puzzled.

Since this is a relatively uncharted area and not much literature is available on the same, we have picked out the questions from the previous paper of September 2011 and discussed the same. So go through the below article carefully and try to understand the basic underlying concepts and the “Trick” to solve these questions

Directions—: In each of the following questions a short passage is given with one of the lines in the passage missing and represented by a blank. Select the best out of the five answer choices given, to make the passage complete and coherent ( coherent means logically complete and sound).

1. Women's rights around the world are an important indicator to understand global well-being. A major global women's rights treaty was ratified by the majority of the world's nations a few decades ago, ............................................................  .These range from the cultural, political to the economic. For example, women often work more than men, yet  are paid less; gender discrimination affects girls and women throughout their lifetime; and women and girls are often the ones that suffer the most poverty. Many may think that women's rights are only an issue in countries where religion is law. Or even worse, some may think this is no longer an issue at all. But reading the report about the United Nation's Women's Treaty and how an increasing number of countries are lodging reservations will show otherwise. Gender equality furthers the cause of child survival and development for all of society, so the importance of women's rights and gender equality should not be underestimated.

(A) This treaty tackled and solved a number of issues related to women.

(B) Why is it then, that moment still face a number of problems on the domestic front?

(C) Thus, the woman today is ten times more empowered as compared to a woman say about a decade age.

(D) Women's activists across nations have implored the respective governments to take this seriously.

(E) Yet, despite many successes in empowering women, numerous issues still exist in all areas of life.

  Overview of the question.

In this question you have been given a short paragraph, with one line deleted in between, like a Cloze test in which one word has been deleted in between. You have to choose from the appropriate answer choices which line fits best in to the paragraph in the blank space.

How to Solve  ?

1. DON’T WASTE PRECIOUS TIME READING THE WHOLE PARAGRAPH.

2. READ THE LINES IMMEDIATELY BEFORE AND AFTER THE BLANK ONLY.

(A major global women's rights treaty was ratified by the majority of the world's nations a few decades ago, ............................................................ . These range from the cultural, political to the economic.)

3. FOCUS ON THE FIRST FEW WORDS AFTER THE BLANK: The first words after the blank are (1) “these ” (2) range (3) from (4) the (5) cultural.  Try to identify crucial words which give hints on how to solve these questions. Such words are called “KEYWORDS”. You have to identify such Keywords in order to solve the questions.

The first question which should come to your mind is that what is the word “these” referring to.

• “These” is a pronoun.
• “These” is plural.
• “These” has to refer to something in the previous line which is plural in nature.
•   This previous line is the blank line which you have to insert

4. NOW GO STRAIGHT TO THE ANSWER CHOICES AND ELIMINATE WRONG CHOICES

(A) This treaty tackled and solved a number of issues related to women . (Shortlisted for the correct answer As  “these” can refer to “issues”).

(B) Why is it then, that women still face a number of problems on the domestic front? (Shortlisted for the correct answer as “these” can refer to “problems”)

(C) Thus, the woman today is ten times more empowered as compared to a woman say about a decade age. ( Eliminated as there is no plural word in this line to which “these” can refer to )

(D) Women's activists across nations have implored the respective governments to take this seriously.  (Eliminated as there is no plural word in this line to which “these” can refer to)

(E) Yet, despite many successes in empowering women, numerous issues still exist in all areas of life (Shortlisted for the correct answer As  “these” can refer to “issues”).

5. WORK WITH SHORTLISTED OPTIONS

Now we have 3 shortlisted options , lets try to fit in these three options into the paragraph

1. (A) This treaty tackled and solved a number of issues related to women. These range from the cultural, political to the economic.(This answer choice  is Eliminated , as a treaty - which means an understanding- cannot by itself  tackle and solve any problem, a treaty is like an international conference , where some common understanding and roadmaps are discussed , hence a treaty cannot solve problems, it can only provide guidelines on how to solve a particular issue. )

2. (B) Why is it then, that women still face a number of problems on the domestic front? These range from the cultural, political to the economic. (Eliminated as this talks about problems on the “domestic”- i.e. household front, whereas the subsequent line talks about some problems ranging from cultural, political and economic.  )

3. (E) Yet, despite many successes in empowering women, numerous issues still exist in all areas of life. These range from the cultural, political to the economic ( This is the correct answer, as “all areas  of life” refer to cultural, political and economic issues in the subsequent sentence

 Hence, clearly we can see that option (E) is the right Answer, although it is tempting to mark option (A), but you should be extra careful while solving these problems.

Here are some other questions from IBPS PO 2011, 

Click Here to download "Complete the Paragraph" Questions and Solutions 

All The best !!

Team Bankersadda.