How To Approach CAT Grammar - iQuanta

1. Subject-Verb Agreement
2. Pronouns
3. Articles
4. Tenses
5. Punctuation
6. Modifiers
7. Parallel Construction
8. Redundancy
9. Clarity of meaning
10. Idiomatic errors.

To some extent, we can come up with a strategy to tackle CAT Grammar question. The steps to be taken are given below. In Subsequent articles we shall tackle the Grammar questions as per these rules:

1. 1. Develop the habit of spotting the subject and the verb in the given sentence: The Subject and the Verb are building blocks of any sentence. By quickly picking the Subject and the Verb, the student can grasp the key elements of the sentence and relate them with one another. The Subject and the Verb must match in number and person. Once this has been done, the student should look for other errors.
   2. Where there are long and complex sentences, there one often comes across pronouns. The Pronouns test is as follows: First, the pronoun must point at one and only noun or noun phrase; second, the number of the pronoun must be equal to the number of the noun or the noun phrase. If the pronoun points at more than one noun or noun phrase, the student must try to logically relate them, and if confusion still persists, then there is a blatant case of pronoun ambiguity.
   3. Article usage has been frequently tested in past CAT papers. Though there isn’t any set of rules that define the Dos and don’ts of Article usage, the student must keep in mind some basic concepts on article usage to avoid making silly mistakes.
   4. The concept of tenses is often tested in most Verbal Aptitude tests. To successfully pass this test, the candidate must keep an eye on the ‘verb’ of the sentence, and on the time frame in which the action takes place. The time frame in which action takes place may not always be explicitly stated by the verb, at times the hints are given in the nouns and the adverbs of time. For example:  He comes to my place every day. Here the phrase ‘every day’ demands the verb to be in simple present tense. The student must look for such hints and ensure that there is verb-tense agreement.
   5. So far, the only punctuations that have been tested in CAT are: comma, semi colon and apostrophe. Though there are many more punctuations, they are not so relevant from Verbal Aptitude point of view.
   6. Modifiers are quite frequently tested in GMAT Sentence Correction, but not so much in CAT. Getting the modifiers correct means placing the right description at the right place. That description could be an adverb, an adjective, a prepositional phrase, a subordinate clause etc. If there is any comical meaning coming out from the sentence, then there is a definite modifier error.
   7. Though we haven’t seen many CAT questions testing the concept of Parallel construction, the concept is very important as far perspicuity concerned. In short, parallel construction means similar ideas must be in similar form. For example: I like to paint, to sing and to dance is parallel while I like painting, singing and to dance is unparallel.
   8. Once all the above stages have been tested, we are left with the test of redundancy. Many CAT questions in the past have tested it.  For example: He hypothetically assumed that the college starts at 10 am. Here, ‘hypothetically’ and ‘assumed’ mean the same thing. This is, therefore, a case of redundancy.
   9. If, even after following the above 8 steps, one is not able to spot any error, then the sentence is quite likely to be correct; but one last thing must be kept in mind, and that is ‘idiomatic errors’. In Idiomatic usages, the prepositions play a very important role. Most of the students don’t have an eye trained enough to spot such errors, but regular reading can help overcome this problem.

Let’s take an example: Rohan refused to plead guilty for the crime and had to stand trial.

The above sentence has a grammatical error. The correct idiom is: to plead guilty to something. So, instead of ‘for’, we must have the preposition ‘to’

Rohan refused to plead guilty to the crime and had to stand trial.

10. The last step towards spotting grammatical error is: clarity of meaning. Once the above grammatical rules have been tested, one must look for the intended meaning and whether the sentence expresses that meaning or not.

The variety of errors in Grammar could be innumerable. If one is not able to spot the error in two minutes, then instead of unnecessarily grappling with the question, one must leave it.

- Brijesh Pandey,
CAT VA, 100%ler,
4 years experience in teaching