Direct Indirect Speech Practice Set 1 SOLVED IN HINDI & ENGLISH (with options)

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1. He said, “Will you come to my house?” I said, “No.”

Answer: A

Explanation: Option ‘A’ (He asked me if I would go to his house and I said that I would not.). COME changes to both COME and GO. If the reporter of the speech is with the person whose speech is within inverted commas we use COME itself, if he is at some other place we convert COME into GO. The question suggests that the person reporting the speech is not with the speaker, so we’ll use GO.

To understand how YES/NO in questions are converted into the indirect speech see HERE:

Subject + Helping Verb of the given question

OR

We convert YES into ‘Answered/Replied in the Affirmative’; we convert NO into Answered/Replied in the Negative

a) He said, “Will you have time to do it?” and I said “Yes.”
= He asked if I would have time to do it and I said that I would.
= He asked if I would have time to do it and I replied/answered in the affirmative.

b) He said, “Can you swim?” and I said “NO.”
= He asked (me) if I could swim and I said I could not.
= He asked (me) if I could swim and replied/answered in the negative.

IN THE NEGATIVE = NO; and hence a right expression. IN NEGATIVE is wrong as the article THE is necessary here, hence option ‘D’ is incorrect

2. Ram will say, “I need two boys to assists me.”

Answer: D

Explanation: Option ‘D’ (Ram will say that he needs two boys to assist him.). When the reporting verb is in the present tense or in the future tense, the tense of the reported speech does not change, in such a case only pronouns are changed. Here the reporting verb WILL SAY is in the future.

3. He said to the judge, “I did not commit this crime.”

Answer: C

Explanation: Option ‘C’ (He told the judge that he had not committed the crime.). See this to know how THIS and THESE as adjectives are converted into the indirect speech: If the reporting verb is the past, in time expressions THIS becomes THAT, and THESE becomes THOSE, and if they are normal adjectives both of them are changed into the article THE; e.g.

a) He said, “She is coming this week.”
= He said that she was coming that week.

[In this sentence THIS WEEK is a time expression.]

b) He said, “I bought these pearls for my mother.”
= He said that he had bought the pearls for his mother.

[In this sentence THESE is not in a time expression, rather it’s a normal adjective.]

4. Robb said, “We shall avenge my father’s death.”

Answer: B

Explanation: Option ‘B’ (Robb said that they would avenge his father’s death.). See how SHALL is changed into Indirect Speech:

Both WILL and SHALL of the indirect speech normally become WOULD, but if the sentence is reported by the original speaker, SHALL can become either WOULD or SHOULD. Similarly SHOULD of the indirect speech normally becomes WOULD, but if the sentence is reported by the original speaker, SHOULD can either remain unchanged or can become WOULD; e.g.

“I shall be 21 tomorrow,” said Raman.
= Raman said he would be 21 the following day.
(Here SHALL can’t be changed into SHOULD as the speech is not reported by the original speaker i.e. Raman.)

I said, “I should like to see it.”
= I said I WOULD like to see it.
= I said I SHOULD like to see it.
(Here, as the speech is reported by the original speaker i.e. ‘I’, SHOULD can remain SHOULD or can be changed into WOULD also.

5. The injured old man exclaimed, “Will none of you help me?”

Answer: A

Explanation: Option ‘A’ (The injured old man exclaimed whether none of them would help him.). After the verb EXCLAIM if there is a question we use WHETHER, not IF.

6. He said, “The teacher usually does not ask any question.”

Answer: A

Explanation: Option ‘A’ (He said that the teacher usually does not ask any question.) For a universal truth or a permanent characteristic we do not change the tense in the indirect speech. This is a characteristic of a teacher that he doesn’t ask a question from his students usually.

7. The woman asked how long the letters had been coming for him.

Answer: B

Explanation: Option ‘B’ (“How long have the letters been coming for him?” asked the woman.). The question word phrase form HOW LONG  is used with the Present Perfect Continuous Tense to express events that started in the past and are still in progress in the present. Other words like this that we use with the Present Perfect Continuous Tense are FOR, SINCE and SINCE WHEN. We don’t use the simple continuous tenses for this propose, hence option ‘D’ is incorrect; e.g.

a) “How long have you been learning French?” – I’ve been learning it for two months.
b) “Since when have they been dating?” – They’ve been dating since October.

8. “You’d better leave the dog alone,” said the man.

Answer: C

Explanation: Option ‘C’ (The man warned me to leave the dog alone.). See how HAD BETTER changes into in the indirect speech:

1st/3rd PERSON + HAD BETTER remains unchanged, but 2nd PERSON + HAD BETTER either can remain unchanged or be reported by ADVISE/WARN + OBJECT + TO-INFINITIVE; e.g.

a) He said, “I’d better hurry.”
= He said that he’d better hurry. (1st PERSON + HAD BETTER, so no change)

b) The children had better go to bed early,” said Mohan.
= Mohan said that the children had better go to bed early. (3rd PERSON + HAD BETTER, so no change)

c) You’d better not drink the water,” she said.
= She said that I/WE had better not drink the water.
= She advised/warned me/us not to drink the water. (2nd PERSON + HAD BETTER, so it can be a change there or not.)

9. He said to me, “You are rich, aren’t you?”

Answer: C

Explanation: Option ‘C’ (He asked me if I was rich.). In indirect speech we do not use the question tag.

10. I said to my friend, “Good Morning! Let us go for a picnic today.”

Answer: B

11. I said to him, “How do you know this?”

Answer: D

Explanation: Option ‘D’ (I asked him how he knew it.). See this to know how THIS and THESE as pronouns are converted into the indirect speech: If the reporting verb is the past, in time expressions THIS/THAT become IT, and THESE/THOSE become THEY/THEM; e.g.

a) He showed me two bullets and said, “I found these embedded in the paneling.” b) He said, “We will discuss this tomorrow.”

= He showed me two bullets and said he had found them embedded in the paneling. = He said that they would discuss it the next day.

12. The new student asked the old one, “Do you know my name?”

Answer: A

13. Rahul said, “I will do it now or never”.

Answer: C

Explanation: Option ‘C’. NOW OR NEVER is a fixed expression, so you can’t make a change in it. NOW OR NEVER = at this time and no other; e.g.

I decided that it was now or never, and jumped.

14. My father once said to me, “If I can’t trust my people, then I don’t want to be doing this.”

Answer: B

Explanation: Option ‘B’ (My father once told me that if he couldn’t trust his people then he didn’t want to be doing that.). When IF begins an assertive sentence both THAT and IF can come together. ‘If I can’t trust my people, then I don’t want to be doing this.’ is an assertive sentence.

15. “You say,” said the judge, “that the bag you lost contained one hundred and ten pounds”. “Yes, your honour,” replied the cheat. “Then as this one contains one hundred pounds it cannot be yours.”

Answer: A

Explanation: Option ‘A’ (The judge asked the cheat if the bag he had lost contained one hundred and ten pounds. The cheat replied respectfully in the affirmative. Then the judge concluded that as that one contained one hundred pounds it could not be his.).

REPLIED THE CHEAT implies that The judge actually asked a question from the cheat, so our reporting verb should be ASKED or any other like that. CONCLUDE = to arrive at a judgement.

16. The father warned his son that he should be beware of him.

Answer: A

17. The boy pleaded that he had not stolen the book.

Answer: D

Explanation: Option ‘D’ (The boy said, “I haven’t stolen the book.”). The Present Perfect Tense becomes the Past Perfect Tense in the indirect speech; the Past Perfect Tense remains unchanged. By this explanation both the options ‘C’ and ‘D’ should be correct. But it’s not like that; option ‘C’ is incorrect as we use the Past Perfect Tense for an action completed before a certain point in the past; e.g.

I met him in Mumbai in 2001. I had seen him last six years before.

But as you see there is no reference of a past point in option ‘C’. Hence it’s incorrect.

18. From one of the windows of my flat I can see the Qutub Minar.’ said my friend.

Answer: C

Explanation: Option ‘C’ (My friend said that from one of the windows of his flat he could see the Qutub Minar.). Option ‘A’ is incorrect as the verb TELL (here TOLD) is transitive, so it should normally have an object.

19. I said to him, “Whether she will pass or not is not certain.”

Answer: A

Explanation: Option ‘A’ (I told him that whether she would pass or not was not certain.). Option ‘B’ is incorrect as use of WHETHER is necessary here as WHETHER SHE WILL PASS OR NOT IS NOT CERTAIN is not a question, rather it’s an assertive statement.

Use of THAT with WHETHER is correct as it’s a conversion of an assertive sentence, so option ‘A’ is correct. Option ‘C’ is incorrect as the verb tell (here TOLD) takes an object.

20. The teacher said, “Students, you have to attend the lecture tomorrow.”

Answer: D

Explanation: Option ‘D’ (The teacher told the students that they had to attend the lecture the next day.). You see there is a comma after STUDENTS; it means that STUDENTS have been addressed. So it will be the object of the reporting clause; we can also rewrite the sentence in the Direct Speech as THE TEACHER SAID TO THE STUDENTS, “YOU HAVE TO ATTEND THE LECTURE TOMORROW.”

21. The father said, “Well done, son. I am proud of you.”

Answer: C

Explanation: Option ‘C’ (The father told his son that he was proud of him as he had done well.).  Option ‘B’ is incorrect as it’s wrong grammatically.

22. He said to me, “I want you to read the book now.”

Answer: B

Explanation: Option ‘B’ (He said to me that he wanted me to read the book then.). Option ‘A’ is incorrect as the verb TELL (here TOLD) is a transitive verb, hence it takes an object. In indirect speech we normally use SAY or TELL + OBJECT, but SAY TO + OBJECT is also correct however is much less usual than TELL + OBJECT; e.g.

He said to me, “I just heard the news.”
= He told me that he had just heard the news.
= He said to me that he had just heard the news.

23. The mother said to the son, “Why didn’t you write to me often? I was so worried.”

Answer: D

Explanation: Option ‘D’ (The mother asked the son why he had not written to her often, and said that she had been so worried.). Option ‘A’ is incorrect as we should have changed the verb WAS to HAD BEEN. Option ‘B’ is incorrect as I WAS SO WORRIED is a statement, not the part of the question; so it needs verb other than ASKED, of course it will be SAID here.

24. “Run away, children quickly” said the teacher.

Answer: C

25. The kidnapper said to the businessman over the phone, “If you don’t pay the ransom at once, I will kill your son.”

Answer: C

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