General Aptitude: Speed, Logic and Comprehension
General Aptitude in GATE PI carries 15 marks and tests numerical ability, reasoning and verbal comprehension at a class-10 level. The difficulty is speed and precision, not syllabus depth.
Quantitative aptitude
High-yield areas are percentages, ratio and proportion, time–speed–distance, time and work, averages, permutations and probability, mensuration, and number/letter series. Convert word problems into one equation before calculating; most errors come from mis-set ratios rather than arithmetic.
Verbal ability
Expect grammar and usage, synonyms and antonyms, sentence completion, para jumbles and reading comprehension. For comprehension, the correct option must be supported by the passage itself, not by outside knowledge or by a plausible general truth.
Analytical reasoning
Practice series completion, coding–decoding, blood relations, seating arrangements, syllogisms and direction sense. Draw a compact diagram for arrangement and relation puzzles instead of holding constraints in memory.
Data interpretation
Tables, bar charts, pie charts and line graphs appear in sets. Compare ratios rather than computing absolute values, and watch units: lakh, crore, thousands, and percentage-point versus percent change.
Worked example
A price is increased by 20% and then reduced by 20%. What is the net change? Start with 100. After a 20% rise: 120. A 20% fall applies to 120, not 100: 120 × 0.8 = 96. Net change = −4, i.e. a 4% decrease. Successive percentage changes multiply as (1 + a)(1 + b) and are never additive.
Traps that cost marks
- Adding successive percentage changes instead of multiplying factors.
- Answering exactly when the question says at least (or vice versa) in probability.
- Choosing a comprehension option that is true in general but absent from the passage.
- Ignoring the 1/3 negative marking: random guessing on GA destroys the score that careful elimination protects.