CAT 2025 Slot 3 · VARC · Question 14

CAT 2025 Slot 3 previous year question on Para Jumbles, with the answer and a step-by-step solution.

Para JumblesVerbal AbilityType in the answer (TITA)Hard

The four sentences (labelled 1, 2, 3, and 4) given below, when properly sequenced, would yield a coherent paragraph. Decide on the proper sequencing of the order of the sentences and key in the sequence of the four numbers as your answer.

  1. The effigy of a candidate establishes a personal link between him and the voters; the candidate does not only offer a programme for judgement, he suggests a physical climate, a set of daily choices expressed in a morphology, a way of dressing, a posture.
  2. Some candidates for Parliament adorn their electoral prospectus with a portrait; this presupposes that photography has a power to convert which must be analysed.
  3. Inasmuch as photography is an ellipse of language and a condensation of an 'ineffable' social whole, it constitutes an anti-intellectual weapon and tends to spirit away 'politics' (that is to say a body of problems and solutions) to the advantage of a 'manner of being', a socio-moral status.
  4. Photography tends to restore the paternalistic nature of elections, whose elitist essence has been disrupted by proportional representation and the rule of parties (the Right seems to use it more than the Left).
Answer & solution

Answer: 2143

Sentence 2 is the only one that sets up a subject for analysis: candidates put portraits on their electoral prospectus, which 'presupposes that photography has a power to convert which must be analysed'. A sentence announcing what must be analysed opens the paragraph.

Sentence 1 follows directly, and the link is verbal. 2 mentions the 'electoral prospectus'; 1 says the candidate 'does not only offer a programme for judgement' but also suggests a physical climate, a way of dressing, a posture. The programme is the prospectus, and 1 begins the analysis 2 called for.

Sentence 4 widens from the individual candidate to the electoral system: photography restores the paternalistic nature of elections, whose elitist essence proportional representation and party rule had disrupted. Having established that the photograph conveys a personal presence, the next step is what that does to politics.

Sentence 3 closes with the verdict. 'Inasmuch as photography is an ellipse of language', it is an anti-intellectual weapon that spirits away politics – a body of problems and solutions – in favour of 'a manner of being, a socio-moral status'. That phrase sums up the personal presence of 1 and the paternalism of 4, which is what a conclusion should do.

The sequence is 2143.

Shortcut: a sentence that names something as needing analysis is an opener, and a sentence beginning 'Inasmuch as' and ending in an abstract verdict is a closer. Fixing the first and last positions leaves only two sentences to order, and there the repeated word – programme against prospectus – decides.

Hence, the answer is 2143.

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