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GATE CS 2013 · General Aptitude

Question 59

MCQPrinted as GA Q.591 markWrong answer: −1/3Easy (estimate)

Question

Were you a bird, you ___________________ in the sky.

Choose one option
Official answer and solution
Official answer
A
From
Official GATE 2013 answer key

Solution

Apply the standard rules for inverted second conditional clauses expressing unreal or hypothetical present situations.

The sentence begins with an inverted conditional structure:

"Were you a bird"≡"If you were a bird"\text{"Were you a bird"} \equiv \text{"If you were a bird"}

This is a second conditional sentence expressing an unreal, hypothetical present condition. The standard grammatical formula for the second conditional is:

If + past subjunctive, subject + would + base verb\text{If + past subjunctive, subject + would + base verb}

Applying this rule:

"Were you a bird, you would fly in the sky."\text{"Were you a bird, you would fly in the sky."}

Therefore, option (A) "would fly" is the grammatically correct completion.

Final answer

A

The answer is the one in the official GATE answer key. The solution is this site's own explanation.

Source

Paper
GATE 2013 Computer Science and Information Technology (CS)
Question
59 of 65, printed as GA Q.59
Section
General Aptitude

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