Editing a Notice Before It Leaves the Office
A Patwari office in a Punjab tehsil must issue an English notice to 37 cultivators whose girdawari entries are disputed. The notice has to fix a hearing date, list the documents required and warn that adjournments will not be granted. A junior clerk drafts the following text and leaves it on the Patwari’s desk for signature: “All the farmers whom cultivation have been disputed are hereby informed that they should appears before the undersigned on 12th March, 2025 at 11:00 AM along with their original documents. The enquiry will be conduct in the presence of the Kanungo. No request for adjournment will not be entertained. Kindly note that the land in question is a irrigated land and the crop condition is required to be verify.” The Patwari has 20 minutes before the dispatch clerk leaves. He cannot change the hearing date or the list of documents, but he can correct the language and add one sentence explaining the consequence of non-appearance.
1. Identify five grammatical or usage errors in the draft and state the rule that each correction applies.
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Five clear errors, with rules:
- “farmers whom cultivation have been disputed” → “farmers whose cultivation has been disputed.” The farmers possess the cultivation, so the relative pronoun is possessive whose, not object whom. The subject is singular cultivation, so the verb is has.
- “should appears” → “should appear.” A modal verb takes the bare infinitive, not the third-person singular form.
- “will be conduct” → “will be conducted.” Passive voice is will be + past participle.
- “No request for adjournment will not be entertained” → “No request for adjournment will be entertained.” English does not normally use two negatives in one clause; no already carries the negative.
- “a irrigated land” → “irrigated land” (or “an irrigated plot”). Land is uncountable here, so it takes no indefinite article; a before a vowel sound is also wrong.
A sixth error is “required to be verify” → “required to be verified”, again passive infinitive.
2. Rewrite the notice in 60–80 words, keeping the official register and adding one sentence on the consequence of non-appearance.
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Notice: All cultivators whose girdawari entries are disputed are hereby informed that a hearing will be held before the undersigned on 12 March 2025 at 11:00 a.m. in the presence of the Kanungo. They should appear with their original documents. No request for adjournment will be entertained. The land in question is irrigated, and the crop condition must be verified. Cultivators who fail to appear will lose the opportunity to be heard on this date.
This is 75 words. It keeps the date, time, documents and adjournment warning unchanged, removes the double negative and the mixed pronouns, and adds a specific consequence rather than a vague threat.
3. Explain why “whom” is wrong in the original sentence, and what the use of “kindly” and “should” does to the register of an official notice.
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Whom is an object pronoun: it would replace the object of a verb or preposition, as in “the farmers whom the Kanungo summoned”. Here the farmers are not the object of “disputed”; their cultivation is the thing disputed. The correct link is possessive: “farmers whose cultivation has been disputed”.
On register: kindly is a politeness marker from correspondence, and should can sound like advice. An official notice that fixes a hearing and warns of consequences is better written in neutral, authoritative language: “are hereby informed”, “must appear”, “will be entertained”. Politeness is not banned, but it should not blur whether attendance is optional. The rewritten notice keeps courtesy out of the operative sentences and makes the obligation clear.