Cherapunji receives more rainfalls than any other site of the world

There is a mistake in the question its testing consistency "yet the agriculture is so fertile and"

Here's the question


Cherapunji receives more rainfalls than any other site of the world, yet the agriculture is so fertile and the water reservoirs are efficient, so that the water does not overflow the land; otherwise, the level of surface water would rise unexpectedly and flood most of the state’s renowned towns.


(A) are efficient, so that the water does not overflow on the land; otherwise,

(B) are so efficient that the water does not overflow the land; were it to do so,

(C) so efficient that the water does not overflow on the land, or else

(D ) efficient, so that the water does not overflow on the land, or

(D) efficient so that the water does not only overflow the land; if it did

keyword "AND" only B is parallel and consistent

(A) Unidiomatic. It should be Overflow the land
(B) Correct usage of idiom. Correct usage of subjuctive mood - were it do so.
(C) Unidiomatic. It should be Overflow the land
(D) Unidiomatic. It should be Overflow the land
(E) Verb 'are' is missing. Incorrect usage of hypothetical situation, 'if it did'

Hence B.

This was a tough one.

D and E are clearly out, because they are missing the preposition or a verb at the start...making the sentence awkward.

Among A, B and C, I eliminated A because of use of otherwise and C because of use of 'or else' (makes it wordy). B fits best among the given choices.

i thought of parallelism after reading the sentence;hence i choose C. yes d and e are clearly out because of awkwardness or weirdness. I am not sure about the idiomatic usage that is referred above. Can somebody elaborate more on this ?

Thanks,
Vikram

@warrior123 - How Subjunctive mood is playing here. Can you please elaborate more on this?
I see the "were...would..." Subjunctive combination in B but not able to correlate.
Cheers!
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@Capricorn369: Here is my honest explanation based on my understanding. I'm not an expert though.

If we observe the original sentence closely, the ',' after efficient has changed the meaning of the sentence. It implies that the agricultre is so fertile and the water reservoirs are so efficient, and as a result, the water does not overflow the land. Hence the usage of 'Otherwise' modifies the previous sentence implying that -" If water does not overflow the land, it would result in unexpected rise of surface water level and floods. In other words, it implies that there are two outcomes (both good & bad) because of the efficient water reservoirs and fertile agriculture. Hence this is incorrect.

The actual intention was to convey a hypothetical situation that, if at all water does overflow then there would be unexpected rise in water level and floods.Hence the subjunctive /hypothetical mood in option (b) correctly conveys the message. Also, please observe that there is no ',' after 'efficient'.

Hope this helps.

In option B "were it to do so" here what "it" refers to, any idea?

I think it refers back to the water.

(B) are so efficient that the water does not overflow the land; were it to do so,

"were it to do so" is a dead give-away. That would be the right answer.

The basic split is between the options with verb and the options without the verb on the right arm of contrast "Yet"

C, D and E are missing the verb so they are out.

Between A and B -- A has the wrong construction of So X that Y, for this reason A is out.

B is the right answer.

What does "It" refers to in answer choice B. Please explain.

Pronoun 'it' should refer to the subject of the clause preceding it. 'it' should refer to 'the water'

Hi expert,

However, I selected the right choice because of the first part of the sentence, and I know that the usage of subjunctive mood is correct in this case. Can you please rephrase the sentence "Were it to do so" by replacing "so" and "it" by what these terms refer to? I tried but failed.
Please help !

"It" refers to "water"; "do so" refers to " overflow the land".

"... were the water to overflow the land..."

However the above is not really a good construction - better would be:
"....IF the water overflowed the land..." OR "....If it did so...."

Note that in GMAT the if-then relation is generally not depicted in the following way, though such usage is often found in other sources:
Were I to go out, I would take an umbrella.

Better:
IF I were to go out, I would take an umbrella.

Even better:
If I went out, I would take an umbrella.

''yet the agriculture is so fertile and the water reservoirs''
in the above parts, ''the agriculture'' and ''the water'' are 2 different subjects. This part is quoted from NON-UNDERLINED part not from the underlined part. So, this part is 100% legit. in this part, the TAG ''AND'' indicates to use a new verb after 'reservoirs', because ''the agriculture'' and ''the water'' gives 2 separate ideas. So, C,D and E are out, because they don't carry any verb after ''reservoirs''
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Hi Expert,
I've a curiosity about the red part. In the red part, it has been written that ''Cherapunji receives more rainfalls than any other site of the world''. I can simply write the above part as below.
x receives more rainfalls than y.
Is it:
--->(1) x receives more rainfalls than x receives y?
or, ---> (2) x receives more rainfalls than WHAT y receives?
Definitely the original sentence indicates the second one. right?
So, I think, there must have a verb for any other site of the world. The correct sentence must be like below.
''Cherapunji receives more rainfalls than DOES any other site of the world''.
What's your opinion honorable expert?
Thank you...
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The pronoun 'it' directly indicates 'water' in the option B. This is the issue of common sense understanding. Thank you...
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The correct sentence:
Cherapunji receives more rainfalls than any other site of the world, yet the agriculture is so fertile and the water reservoirs are so efficient that the water does not overflow the land; were it to do so, the level of surface water would rise unexpectedly and flood most of the state’s renowned towns.

If we replace red part by ''If it did so'' or ''IF the water overflowed the land'' , then the sentence would be flawed by wrong use of semi-colon, sayantanc2k. Isn't it brother?

Cherapunji receives more rainfalls than any other site of the world, yet the agriculture is so fertile and the water reservoirs are so efficient that the water does not overflow the land; IF the water overflowed the land, the level of surface water would rise unexpectedly and flood most of the state’s renowned towns.

Thank you brother...
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May i get a cordial response expert, please?
Thank you...


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"Cherapunji receives more rainfalls than (Cheranpunji receives) any other sites."... this sentence does not make sense. The only possible meaningful construction is:
"Cherapunji receives more rainfalls than any other sites (receive rainfalls)."
Hence omission is alright.

However in the following case omission would not be allowed:
I like chocolates more than Madhu.
Both the following constructions make sense:
I like chocolates more than (I like) Madhu.
I like chocolates more than Madhu (likes chocolates).
Hence in this case omission makes the sentence ambiguous.