ERROR FINDING — PRACTICE SET-1 — SOLVED 

1. Manslaughter is / where a person / is killed unlawfully. / NE

2. Modern youth pay attention / to seeing films / than reading books. / NE

3. Leisure should be utilized / not in idling with the time saved but in engaging in / some useful and pleasurable activity. / NE

4. I / have been studying / since four hours. / NE

5. Not a word does he know / of any language / but his own. / NE

6. I should / have preferred / to go by myself. / NE

7. I had to / pay twenty rupees less / for that pen. / NE

8. Choose only / such friends / that you can trust. / NE

9. The food / tastes / deliciously. / NE

10. It’s high time / you reach / a decision. / NE

11. My dog, along with her seven puppies, / have chewed all of the stuffing / out of the sofa cushions. / NE

12. Each boy and each girl / were present / in the playground. / NE

13. When we visited his office / we found that / he was sipping coffee with some of his colleagues. / NE

14. Copy / it / word by word. / NE

15. Since I have returned / from the USA, / they haven’t met me. / NE

16. She told him respectfully that / that was the only way / to be happy and rich. / NE

17. Although they listen to me / but their actions / prove otherwise. / NE

18. You do not know / of him / leaving the town. / NE

19. Abusing his wife is / worse than any sin / a man can commit in all his life. / NE

20. Computers give us / an easier access / to information. / NE

21. We have received / a great deal / of complaints. / NE

22. None of / the twins / offered tea to me. / NE

23. The reporter / was unable / to illicit information from the police. / NE

24. These all / mangoes / are ripe. / NE

25. The news / I have received / is not good. / NE

ANSWER KEY

1. B	2. C	3. B	4. C	5. C	6. D	7. D	8. C	9. C	10. B
11. B	12. B	13. D	14. C	15. D	16. B	17. B	18. B	19. B	20. B
21. B	22. A	23. C	24. A	25. B

SOLUTION WITH EXPLANATION

1. Replace ‘where’ with ‘when in part ‘B’. The noun manslaughter (the name of a crime)’ is not the name of a place. So the word ‘where’ can’t be used.

2. Replace ‘than’ by ‘rather than’ in part ‘C’. Here it’s no comparison. RATHER THAN = instead of; used especially when you prefer one thing to another; e.g.

I think I’d like to stay at home this evening rather than go out.

3. Replace ‘idling with’ by ‘idling away’ in part ‘B’.

4. Replace SINCE by FOR in part ‘C’ as it’s not a point of time, rather it’s a period of time in the sentence.

5. Insert the preposition OF after BUT in part ‘C’. The word OF is a must to insert here, otherwise it’d mean ‘his own language’. OF ONE’S OWN = belonging to oneself alone; e.g.

At last I’ve got a place of my own.

6. No error. BY MYSELF = alone

7. No error. Though with countable nouns (here RUPEES), fewer is used; but when we talk about a ‘distance’ or ‘sum of money’ we use LESS, not FEWER. e.g.

Geeta said the beach was TWENTY MILES away, but I thought it was LESS than that.

8. Replace ‘that’ by ‘as’ in part ’C’. We use AS after ‘such + noun’; not WHO, WHOM, WHICH or THAT; e.g.

a) He is not such a good man as I expected.
b) Yours is not such a serious problem as mine. (not WHICH/WHOM)

9. Replace ‘deliciously’ by ‘delicious’ in part ‘C’. DELICIOUS is an adjective whereas DELICIOUSLY an adverb. The verb taste here is a LINKING VERB like BE; which means ‘to have a particular flavour’. In other words we can say when the verb is a linking verb it should be an adjective after it rather than an adverb. Therefore the word DELICIOUS is correct there.

NOTE: Linking Verb: Linking verbs do not express an action. Like their name suggests, they simply link the subject of the sentence to the predicate. Some main verbs are called linking verbs (or copular verbs). These verbs are not followed by objects. Instead, they are followed by expressions which give extra information about the subject. Some of the Linking Verbs:

BE (is, am, was, etc.)	Appear	Become	Feel	Get	Look
Remain	Seem	Smell	Sound	Taste

i) The cat was friendly.
ii) This shirt feels good.
iii) Ruchi will be 20 in August.
iv) To people who don’t know him he probably appears rather unfriendly.
v) He’s a teacher.
vi) He remained outside while his mother went into the hospital.

10. Replace ‘reach’ by ‘reached’ in part ‘B’.

Explanation: CLICK HERE TO OPEN

11. Replace ‘have’ by ‘has’ in option ‘B’. Words joined to another word or set of words by With, As well as, Along with, etc. are called parenthetical (word or group of words giving extra information). As such they are not part of the true subject. The verb, therefore, also does not get affected by a parenthetical.

Use of HER in part ‘A’ is correct as a dog can be male or female.

12. Replace ‘were’ by ‘was’ in part ‘B’. If words like ‘Each’, ‘Every’, ‘Many a’ or ‘No’ comes before the subject, the verb is singular.

14. Replace ‘word by word’ by ‘word for word’ in part ‘C’. WORD BY WORD is a system according to which words are arranged in a sequence; means alphabetically. But when something has to be copied, either orally or otherwise, we use WORD FOR WORD.

15. No error

16. Replace ‘that’ by ‘it’ in part ‘B’. THAT as a pronoun has no place in indirect speech. If you will see THAT in part ‘B’ is a pronoun. THIS and THAT usually become IT, and THESE usually become THEY/THEM when used as pronouns: e.g.

HE said, “We will discuss THIS tomorrow.” = He said that they would discuss IT the next day. OR He said that they would discuss THE MATTER the next day. (THIS is a pronoun here.)

17. Remove BUT from part ‘B’ as with the use of ALTHOUGH we can’t add the other clause with BUT or YET etc.

18. Replace ‘him’ by ‘his’ in part ‘B’. OF is a preposition, and it should be followed by an object. ‘Him leaving the town’ if taken as an object, we must replace HIM (pronoun) by HIS (adjective) as TOWN is already an object.

19. Insert ‘other’ between ‘any and sin’ and SIN in part ‘B’ or replace the whole part ‘B’ by THE WORST SIN. There are countless sins to say; means here there are more than two things for the comparison. This, when, is the case comparison can be made in two ways; either by the comparative degree or by the superlative degree. When we do it by the comparative degree we use ‘Comparative degree + than any other + noun’; if by the superlative we use ‘the + superlative degree + noun’.

So the above sentence can be written: Abusing his wife is worse than any other sin a man can commit in all his life. OR Abusing his wife is the worst sin a man can commit in all his life.

20. Replace ‘easier’ by ‘easy’ in part ‘B’. EASIER is the comparative degree of EASY; and the comparative degree is used in comparison. Here there is no comparison.

21. Replace ‘a great deal’’ by ‘a lot or lots’ in part ‘B’. If object of the verb (here COMPLAINTS) is a countable noun we use A LOT OF or LOTS OF, if uncountable we can use either A GREAT DEAL OF or A LOT OF or LOTS OF, means it’s optional.

22. Replace ‘none’ by ‘neither’ in part ‘A’. TWIN means TWO, and for two NEITHER is used; not NONE.

23. Replace ‘illicit’ by ‘elicit’ in part ‘C’ as we need an infinitive (first form of a verb) here. ELICIT is a verb and ILLICIT an adjective. Therefore ELICIT will replace ILLICIT to make it correct.

24. Replace ‘these all’ by ‘all of these or all these’’ in part ‘A’. The word ALL here can be used as an ADJECTIVE or a PRONOUN or an ADVERB. ALL as a pronoun can be followed by ‘of + the/this/these/that/those/possessive adjectives + nouns’. The word OF here is often omitted. So ‘all these’ and ‘all of these’ both are equally correct.

25. Replace ‘have received’ by ‘received’ in part ‘B’ as perfect tense is not making a sense here.

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