Question

A fishing village once existed where now _____ the city of Mumbai. (Fill in the blank with the appropriate tense.)
A) Lies
B) Lay
C) Has lain
D) None of the above

Answer 1

Hint: The words given in the options are verbs. The given verbs are very similar as they might be different forms of the same verb or they may be two different verbs that sound, look and have a similar meaning.

Complete answer:
The city of Mumbai is presently located on the site where there used to be a fishing village. Therefore, a verb in the present tense would be suitable to fill in the blank.

Let us check the tenses of the given options.
Option A) Lies – The word ‘lies’ is the simple present form of the verb ‘to lie’, but in the third person. For e.g. My pet dog lies down whenever I scold him. Therefore, the present tense of the verb ‘to lie’ will be suitable. Hence, this option is correct.
Option B) Lay – This word is the simple present form of the verb ‘to lay’. The word lay means to put something down gently. For e.g. I’m going to lay the cards down and then you pick one of them. Though the sentence given in the question also requires a verb in the present tense and this verb is also in the present tense, it is not appropriate to use this verb for a city. Therefore, this option is incorrect.
Option C) Has lain – in this option we have a helping verb ‘has’ and the main verb ‘lain’ which is the past participle form of the verb ‘to lay’. The sentence in the question needs to be framed in the present tense. But this option would instead make a sentence in the past perfect tense. Therefore, this option is incorrect.
Option D) None of the above – This option is wrong because we have established that Options (A) and (B) are already correct.

Thus, the correct answer is Option (A) i.e, A fishing village once existed where now lies the city of Mumbai.

Note: In the present tense, we can make modifications and generate three different tenses. These are the present perfect, present continuous and the present perfect continuous tenses. For e.g.
- He has eaten his chocolate. (Perfect tense)
- He is eating his chocolate. (Continuous tense)
- He has been eating his chocolate. (Perfect continuous tense)