Repairing a Draft Inquiry Report
An inquiry report on a picket incident, drafted by a junior officer, contains the following extract: "At 2140 hrs the picket at Gate 3 reported that a crowd of about two hundred had gathered. The Sub-Inspector, along with two constables, were proceeding to the spot. Neither the loudspeaker nor the barricades was in place. The crowd, which had been shouting slogans since dusk, were asked to disperse thrice before force was used. The officer's decision to wait for the Executive Magistrate, though the situation was deteriorating, was later questioned by the board." The board's chairman returns the draft, observing that it contains grammatical errors, that it leaves uncertain whether the officer was criticised for waiting or for something else, and that its use of the passive voice hides who did what. The drafting officer must revise the extract without changing any fact recorded in it.
1. Identify and correct the grammatical errors in the extract, naming the rule applied in each case.
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Error 1: 'The Sub-Inspector, along with two constables, were proceeding to the spot.' Correct: 'The Sub-Inspector, along with two constables, was proceeding to the spot.' Rule: the verb agrees with the subject, not with an intervening phrase. 'Along with two constables' is a parenthetical addition; the subject is the singular Sub-Inspector.
Error 2: 'Neither the loudspeaker nor the barricades was in place.' Correct: 'Neither the loudspeaker nor the barricades were in place.' Rule: with 'neither... nor', the verb agrees with the nearer subject. The nearer subject here is the plural 'barricades', so the plural verb is required. (Had the order been reversed - 'neither the barricades nor the loudspeaker' - 'was' would be right.)
Error 3: 'The crowd, which had been shouting slogans since dusk, were asked to disperse...' Correct: 'The crowd, which had been shouting slogans since dusk, was asked to disperse...' Rule: 'crowd' is a collective noun treated as a single body, so it takes a singular verb; the relative clause in between does not change the number of the subject.
Note what is not an error: 'had been shouting' is correctly used for an action continuing up to a past point, and 'had gathered' correctly marks the earlier of two past events.
2. The chairman says it is unclear whether the officer was criticised for waiting or for something else. Which inference is supported by the extract, and what single sentence would settle the issue without inventing facts?
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What the extract actually supports. The sentence names only one decision - to wait for the Executive Magistrate while the situation deteriorated - and records that the board questioned it. It does not say the board found the officer wrong, nor that it blamed the delay for any specific consequence. The safest reading is narrow: the board questioned the choice of waiting, and the report records that fact without recording the board's conclusion.
What the extract does not support. That the officer was 'unprepared' or that the force was 'under-resourced'. Those are inferences from the separate sentence about missing loudspeaker and barricades, and the report nowhere links the two. A reader who merges them is reading in a causal claim the writer never made.
Sentence that would settle it, consistent with the recorded facts: 'The board questioned the decision to wait, asking whether the officer had assessed that the crowd could be held back for the time the Magistrate would take to arrive.' This converts a vague criticism into a stated question, does not assert any finding, and keeps the door open for the officer's reply.
Drafting point for the officer revising the extract: an inquiry report must distinguish sharply between what was observed, what was decided and what was concluded. Mixed constructions let a reader supply a conclusion that the board never reached - which is exactly how reports generate appeals.
3. Rewrite the last sentence in the active voice so that no ambiguity remains about who questioned what, and explain what your revision gains.
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Original: 'The officer's decision to wait for the Executive Magistrate, though the situation was deteriorating, was later questioned by the board.'
Revision: 'The board later questioned the officer's decision to wait for the Executive Magistrate even though the situation was deteriorating.'
If the intended meaning is that the board put the question to the officer himself: 'The board later asked the officer why he had waited for the Executive Magistrate while the situation was deteriorating.'
What the revision gains.
- A named actor. The board is placed at the head of the sentence, so the report shows who questioned the decision rather than leaving 'was questioned' to float.
- A clear object. The object of questioning is now unambiguously 'the decision to wait', not the officer personally and not the deterioration.
- Correct treatment of 'though'. The concessive clause implies the officer acted despite a worsening situation - an evaluative slant. 'Even though' inside the board's act of questioning keeps the evaluation where it belongs: with the board, not with the narrator.
- Fewer post-modified nouns. The original stacks 'decision to wait for the Executive Magistrate, though the situation was deteriorating' between subject and verb, forcing the reader to hold three ideas in suspension; the revision releases them in sequence.
A revised extract should then be checked against the original for factual fidelity - in this case no date, time, number or act has been altered, so the chairman's objection on that count is met.