Agniveer (Agnipath Scheme) General English Syllabus

General English syllabus — full chapter and topic list

Expand any chapter to see its topics and sub-topics. This is the whole examinable outline for General English in Agniveer (Agnipath Scheme), not a summary of it.

1. 1

   Grammar Fundamentals

   5 topics

   • Parts of speech
     • Nouns, pronouns and adjectives
     • Verbs, adverbs and prepositions
   • Tenses
   • Subject-verb agreement
   • Articles and determiners
   • Voice and narration
     • Active and passive voice
     • Direct and indirect speech
2. 2

   Vocabulary

   5 topics

   • Synonyms and antonyms
   • One-word substitution
   • Idioms and phrases
   • Spelling correction
   • Homophones and confusable words
3. 3

   Sentence Structure and Usage

   5 topics

   • Sentence improvement and correction
   • Spotting errors
   • Sentence rearrangement
   • Fill in the blanks
   • Phrasal verbs and prepositional usage
4. 4

   Comprehension and Composition

   3 topics

   • Reading comprehension
   • Cloze test
   • Para jumbles

General English flashcards for Agniveer (Agnipath Scheme)

20 of 49 cards from the General English deck — real questions with worked answers.

1. What are the eight parts of speech in English?

   Noun, pronoun, verb, adjective, adverb, preposition, conjunction, and interjection.

2. What is the difference between a common noun and a proper noun?

   A common noun names a general class (city, boy, river); a proper noun names a specific person, place, or thing and is capitalised (Delhi, Ravi, Ganga).

3. Name the four main types of verbs by function.

   Transitive (takes an object), intransitive (no object), auxiliary/helping verbs, and modal verbs (can, may, must, etc.).

4. List the 12 English tenses (4 aspects x 3 times).

   Present/Past/Future each in Simple, Continuous, Perfect, and Perfect Continuous forms — e.g. Simple Present, Present Continuous, Present Perfect, Present Perfect Continuous, and likewise for Past and Future.

5. Give the structure of the Present Perfect tense.

   Subject + has/have + past participle (V3). Example: She has finished the work.

6. Give the structure of the Past Perfect tense and its use.

   Subject + had + past participle (V3). It shows an action completed before another past action. Example: He had left before I arrived.

7. Give the structure of the Future Perfect Continuous tense.

   Subject + will have been + verb-ing. Example: By June, I will have been working here for five years.

8. State the basic rule of subject-verb agreement.

   A singular subject takes a singular verb and a plural subject takes a plural verb. Example: The boy runs / The boys run.

9. When two singular subjects are joined by 'or'/'nor', which verb is used?

   A singular verb, agreeing with the nearer subject. Example: Neither the teacher nor the student was present.

10. What verb form do collective nouns (team, family, jury) usually take?

    A singular verb when acting as one unit (The team is winning), but a plural verb when members act individually (The team are arguing among themselves).

11. Do 'each', 'every', 'everyone', 'somebody', 'neither', 'either' take singular or plural verbs?

    Singular. Example: Each of the boys is present; Everyone has arrived.

12. What are articles, and name the definite and indefinite articles?

    Articles are a type of determiner placed before nouns. 'The' is the definite article; 'a' and 'an' are indefinite articles.

13. When do we use 'a' versus 'an'?

    Use 'a' before a consonant sound (a book, a university) and 'an' before a vowel sound (an apple, an hour, an MLA).

14. What are determiners? Give examples of their types.

    Words placed before nouns to specify them. Types: articles (a, an, the), demonstratives (this, that), possessives (my, your), quantifiers (some, many, few), and numbers.

15. How is a sentence changed from active to passive voice?

    The object becomes the subject, the verb changes to 'be + past participle', and the original subject moves to a 'by' phrase. Example: Rama wrote a letter -> A letter was written by Rama.

16. How does passive voice form in the Present Continuous tense?

    Object + is/am/are + being + past participle. Example: She is cleaning the room -> The room is being cleaned by her.

17. In reported (indirect) speech, how do tenses generally change when the reporting verb is past?

    They shift back one step: present -> past, past -> past perfect, will -> would, can -> could, may -> might.

18. How do you change a question into indirect speech?

    Use 'asked/enquired', remove the question mark, change to statement order; for yes/no questions use 'if/whether', for wh-questions keep the wh-word. Example: He said, 'Where do you live?' -> He asked where I lived.

19. What is the difference between a synonym and an antonym?

    A synonym is a word with the same or similar meaning (happy/glad); an antonym is a word with the opposite meaning (happy/sad).

20. Give a synonym and an antonym for the word 'abundant'.

    Synonym: plentiful/ample; Antonym: scarce/insufficient.

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