Question

Fill in the blanks using the correct form of the verb:
The guests _______________ yet.
a. Are not arriving
b. Do not arrive
c. Did not arrive
d. Have not arrived

Answer 1

Hint: The word “yet” means “till now”. Also, there is the word “not” in the given options. So, something which has “not yet” happened, is being talked about in the sentence. It is a negative sentence.

Complete answer:
We are going to try to arrive at the correct answer by getting a detailed explanation of every given option.
- Option a: “are not arriving” is the present continuous tense. For example, “My Flipkart delivery is arriving in ten minutes.” So, this form of the verb “arrive” is not appropriate with the tense of the sentence in the question.
- Option b: “do not arrive” is simple present tense. For example, “At school, I usually do not arrive before 7:45 am. So you can come to my classroom after that.” Again, this form of the verb is incorrect in the given sentence.
- Option c: “did not arrive” is simple past tense. For example, “Harry did not arrive at the meeting on time.” This option is wrong.
- Option d: “have not arrived” is present perfect tense. For example, “They have not done any progress on the bridge construction yet.” So the present perfect tense, followed by the past participle of the verb is used in such cases. So this is the right answer.

> Thus, option (d) is correct.

Note: One can also just sense the tense used in the sentence and check which option is in the required tense. For example, in the given question, only option (d) is in the present perfect tense. So this is the correct option.