arvind910619 wrote:
I got this question wrong , can some please elaborate why we have to use singular verb belongs in C and what is wrong with B.
Thanks
RMD007 wrote:
Expert, please clear the doubt..
No more than one third of area's inhabitant's should use singular or plural verb.
anshulmishra08@gmail.com wrote:
One third of the area's inhabitants in singular. Kindly explain why?
adityapareshshah wrote:
Here the verb belong/belongs refers to the subject 'Inhabitants', which is plural. Hence IMO, the correct verb to be used is 'belong' and hence the correct answer is Option B.
Option C is definitely wrong. For a quantity word, such as a fraction or a percentage, the associated noun determines whether it is singular or plural. For example:
One-third of the pizza IS eaten.... correct (Pizza singular, so the fraction word "one-third" is singular)
One-third of the pizza slices ARE eaten....correct (Pizza slices plural, so the fraction word "one-third" is plural)
AjiteshArun wrote:
himanshumalhotra1990 wrote:
The answer should be B in my opinion. As per my understanding, whenever the subject lies in the 'of' kind of prepositional phrases that express quantity of some kind - some of the
stones (stones is the subject), most of the
students (students is the subject even though it is a part of prepositional phrase because together the phrase describes quantity), two of the five medals (medals is the subject) - the subject is the noun of the prepositional phrase. This concept is present in the
e-GMAT course. Please let me know if the understanding is wrong.
I've seen others also mention it, but that "concept" is probably just an oversimplification. For example, in
two of the five medals, it is not correct to say that
medals will decide the verb just because it is the object of the preposition. Consider
one of the five medals. Clearly we can't say
one of the five medals are.
However this rule applies for quantity words such as fractions / percentages, but not for actual numbers. For example:
One of the five pizzas IS eaten.... correct
Two of the five pizzas ARE eaten.... correct
Number of Pizzas eaten = one/two - one/two are numbers, not fractions / percentages - hence the rule of associated noun does not apply here.
Dear
AjiteshArun, hope you would agree with my view.