English Language: Comprehension and Grammar Accuracy
English Language in IDBI JAM tests comprehension and correctness under time pressure. The usual question types are reading comprehension, cloze test, error detection, sentence improvement, para jumbles, fillers, and synonym, antonym or idiom items.
Core rules
- Reading comprehension: read once for the argument, then answer. Most items are direct retrieval or simple inference. Reject options with absolute words such as "always" or "never" unless the passage states them.
- Subject-verb agreement: the verb agrees with the head noun. "One of the + plural noun" takes a singular verb; "each", "every", "either" and "neither" are singular.
- Parallelism: items in a list share grammatical form, e.g. "to plan, to execute and to review", never "to plan, executing and review".
- Cloze and fillers: predict the word from context before reading the options, and check collocation ("make a decision", not "do a decision").
Worked example
Choose the correct form: "One of the branches ___ renovation." Options: need / needs.
The subject is "one", not "branches", so the singular verb "needs" is correct. A second check: "Neither the manager nor the clerks ___ available" takes "were", because with neither-nor the verb agrees with the nearer subject.
Traps
Picking an option because it sounds formal or long; missing tense sequence in reported speech, where a past reporting verb usually pushes the reported verb back one step; and spending ten minutes on a single RC set while cloze and error-spotting marks go unclaimed.