General English: Grammar, Vocabulary and Comprehension
General English in the NPSC Police Constable paper tests standard written English rather than literary criticism. Expect error spotting, sentence improvement, fill-in-the-blanks, synonyms and antonyms, idioms, one-word substitutions, spelling, and a short reading comprehension passage. Accuracy and elimination matter more than long explanations.
Core rules to revise
- Subject-verb agreement: a singular subject takes a singular verb; interrupters such as “along with”, “as well as” and “together with” do not change the number of the subject.
- Indefinite pronouns such as each, either, neither, everyone and nobody are singular.
- In “one of the + plural noun + relative clause”, the verb in the relative clause is usually plural: “one of the constables who were posted…”
- Articles: use “a” before consonant sounds, “an” before vowel sounds, and “the” for specific or unique nouns.
- Prepositions and tense consistency are tested through fixed expressions and time markers.
Worked example
“Each of the constables ___ trained in crowd control.” The subject is “Each”, not “constables”. “Each” is singular, so the correct verb is “has”: “Each of the constables has trained in crowd control.” The phrase “of the constables” is a prepositional modifier and does not control agreement.
Traps that cost marks
Collective nouns may take singular or plural verbs depending on whether the group acts as one unit. “Fewer” is used with countable nouns and “less” with uncountable nouns. Do not choose an idiom because it “sounds right”; learn its exact wording. In comprehension, answer from the passage, not from general knowledge, and watch for “except” and “not” in the question stem.
Exam habit
Read the whole sentence before choosing; many errors become obvious only after the full structure is visible.