Question

In the following sentence four words and phrases are underlined. If there is any mistake with regard to grammar or usage, it is in the underlined part only. Identify the incorrect part:
He gave me a ticket so that I may visit the book fair.
A) gave me
B) so that
C) may visit
D) the

Answer 1

Hint: This is a question related to direct and indirect speech. Firstly, understand the meaning of both. Direct speech means repeating the exact words of the speaker without any variation whereas Indirect speech conveys that someone said these words without using the original words.
For example:
Direct- where is Ridhima?
Indirect- I asked where Ridhima was?

Complete answer:
According to the question, we have to deal with indirect speech. We need to find out the grammatical error in the given sentence. Furthermore, the direct speech of this sentence is: He is giving me the ticket so that I can visit the book fair. It will be helpful to find the error in indirect speech with the help of a direct one.

Let’s analyse the options:
Option (A) gave me- It is an incorrect answer. While converting the direct into indirect speech we change the tense from present to past. As a result, ‘giving me’ is replaced by ‘gave me’. Hence, there is not any grammatical error in this.

Option (B) so that- It is an incorrect answer. ‘So that’ is a connector that is used to join the two clauses together to form a complete sentence. Here, it is joining two clauses, he received a ticket and another is he is able to visit the book fair now. Therefore, there is not an error.

Option (C) I may- It is the correct answer. There are numerous errors. Firstly, we cannot use the word ‘may’ here because it is used to ask permission for something but according to the question, he already has a ticket so that he is able to visit the book fair. Therefore, he doesn’t need any permission to visit.
Secondly, according to the verb tense consistency, the verb throughout the clause should be the same. Previously, ‘gave’ was used which is a past tense hence, we cannot use may in this place.
The right word instead of May is ‘could’. Because ‘could’ is used to specify the ability to do something. Additionally, it is also satisfying verb tense consistency.

Option(D) the- It is an incorrect answer. It is used prior to the specific noun that doesn't matter singular or plural. Here, the is used before book fair which is a singular noun. Hence, there is no grammatical error.

Therefore the correct answer is option ‘C’.

Note: There are some rules for changing direct into indirect speech.
- Remove all commas or quotation marks.
- Close the sentence with a full stop.
- Replace present tense into past tense.