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GATE 2018 EC GA Q.1: solution and answer

GATE 2018 · ECGA Q.1 · 1 mark · MCQ

"By giving him the last ______ of the cake, you will ensure lasting ______ in our house today."

The words that best fill the blanks in the above sentence are

  1. (A)

    peas, piece

  2. (B)

    piece, peace

  3. (C)

    peace, piece

  4. (D)

    peace, peas

See the question in the paper
GATE 2018 EC GA question 1Tap to open full size

Answer and solution

ANSWER

(B) piece, peace. The first blank needs a portion of the cake (piece), and the second needs lasting harmony in the house (peace).

Official answer: BSource: Official answer key, GATE 2018 EC (IIT Guwahati)

  1. Every option is built from homophones. piece, peace and peas sound almost the same but mean different things, so choose each word by its meaning in the sentence.

  2. piece (noun) is a portion or part of something, as in "a piece of cake". peace (noun) is calm and harmony, the absence of quarrels. peas (plural noun) are the small green seeds of a vegetable.

  3. First blank: "the last ______ of the cake" needs a portion of the cake, so the word is piece. "The last peace of the cake" and "the last peas of the cake" make no sense. Only option (B) begins with piece, so (A), (C) and (D) are ruled out.

  4. Second blank, as a check: "ensure lasting ______ in our house" needs a state of harmony that can last, so the word is peace. "Lasting peace" is a standard collocation, while "lasting piece in our house" means nothing here. Option (B) has peace second, so it passes this check as well.

  5. The pair is piece, peace, which is option (B). The completed sentence reads: "By giving him the last piece of the cake, you will ensure lasting peace in our house today."

KEY IDEA

Homophones: words that sound alike (piece / peace / peas) are told apart only by meaning. Fill each blank from its context: a "piece" of cake, and lasting "peace" in a house. Checking the first blank on its own already leaves only one option.

WATCH OUT FOR

Choosing (C), "peace, piece", by swapping the two homophones: the words look and sound alike, so a hurried reader matches them to the wrong blanks. Also picking (A) or (D) because "peas" sounds right when read aloud; peas is a vegetable and fits neither blank.

From the GATE 2018 EC paper. Every question of this paper · Download the full paper · All 32 Grammar & vocabulary questions, with notes

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