CAPF AC 2023 Q1: General Mental Ability – Logical Reasoning & Puzzles

CAPF AC 2023, Paper I (General Ability and Intelligence) · General Mental Ability

1. (a) Daughter
2. (b) Mother's sister
3. (c) Cousin
4. (d) Sister

Answer: (d) Sister

Explanation

Blood relation puzzle

Given: pointing towards a photograph Mr. Ajit said, She is my father's wife's son's only sister; find her relation with Mr. Ajit.

How to think: read the chain one link at a time, starting from Ajit.

So the woman in the photograph is Ajit's sister.

Answer: (d) Sister.

Why each option is right or wrong

• (a) Incorrect. A daughter would be one generation below Ajit; the chain stays in his own generation.
• (b) Incorrect. Mother's sister would need the words mother's sister, not mother's son's sister.
• (c) Incorrect. A cousin is the child of an uncle or aunt, not of Ajit's own mother.
• (d) CORRECT. Father's wife is the mother, her son is Ajit, and his only sister is Ajit's sister.

Key point

Blood relations: resolve the chain step by step from the speaker. Father's wife = mother. Mother's son = self or brother. Brother's sister = own sister. The word only removes any doubt about which sister.

Remember

Father's wife's son's sister = my sister.

Common mistakes

• Reading the chain from the end instead of starting with the speaker.
• Taking father's wife's son as a half-brother and making the puzzle harder than it is.
• Jumping a generation and answering daughter or aunt.

Exam tip

Educated guess: count the generations. Father goes up one, son comes down one, sister stays level. Net change is zero, so she is in Ajit's own generation: a sister.

Sources

• R. S. Aggarwal, A Modern Approach to Verbal and Non-Verbal Reasoning — Blood Relations
• NCERT Class VI Mathematics — Knowing Our Numbers and logical reasoning exercises

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