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SSC Stenographer 2022 PYQ — Question 26

SSC Stenographer - 17 Nov 2022 - Shift 2 • English • Q26

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The following sentence has been split into four segments. Identify the segment that contains a grammatical error.

He told his friends / that he is gone/ to visit his parents / in the evening.

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Correct answer: B

Explanation

The correct answer is option 2 i.e. that he is gone.

  • The error in this sentence lies in the verb tense.

  • The use of "is gone" is in the present tense, but the sentence is narrating an action that occurred in the past.

  • In reported speech, when the reporting verb is in the past tense ("told" in this case), the verb tense in the reported speech should shift back in time.

  • "had gone" indicates that the action of visiting his parents took place before the time of reporting, which is the correct sequence of tenses for reported speech in this context. 

So, the corrected sentence is: "He told his friends that he had gone to visit his parents in the evening."