When you use a hypothetical situation, the structure is
IF....were..., ....would...
So If bill gates were a country, he would be..........

E is the best choice as no other choice has any close resemblance to this structure
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In an article in 2013, Mic, a media company, had its tongue-in-cheek when it playfully suggested that if Bill Gates would have been a country, he would be the 37th richest country on Earth, richer than the likes of Austria, Norway, and Ukraine

A. if Bill Gates would have been a country, he would be the 37th richest country on Earth, richer than the likes of Austria, Norway, and Ukraine
B. if Bill Gates had been a country, he would be the 37th richest country on Earth, richer than the likes of Austria, Norway, and Ukraine
C. if Bill Gates was a country, he would be the 37th richest so on Earth, richer than Austria, Norway, and Ukraine alike
D. if Bill Gates was a country, he would be the 37th richest country on Earth, richer than the likes of Austria, Norway, and Ukraine
E. if Bill Gates were a country, he would be the 37th richest country on Earth, richer than the likes of Austria, Norway, and Ukraine

Consider the underlined portions in above statements and Lets look at the splits here:
1.would have been/had been/was/were :Since it refers to a past article,the tense should be past. so C/D/E are eliminated.Alsowere refers to plural nouns and since the noun is Bill gates(a singular) were is out of contention for that.Would have been is correct since it is an example of a Modal Perfect construction which is used for conditional perfect tense You can see the modal 'would' and the perfective "have + -en".

2.on earth/so on earth- so is not required and makes it wordy,eliminate C

3.alike at the end of C:Same as split 2.

So IMO,answer is A.

Ankit it is not a past article. Bill gates can never be a country, it is a hypothetical/conditional sentence ...
And hypothetical sentence have the structure..
If he were.., he would be....
WERE is not to show a plural or past event but to show a hypothetical situation, something which is not true..
I am sure you will find some article on this here, and if you don't, pl post your query.
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Please go through the following links, I am sure this will help you -

https://www.kaptest.com/study/gmat/gmat ... bjunctive/

https://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/gmat-gram ... ive-tense/
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Hello!

Here is a brief video explanation-



All the best!
Experts'Global
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