IPMAT Indore 2023 · Verbal Ability · Question 11

The error: a question tag that fails to reverse polarity.

An English question tag takes the opposite polarity to its main clause:

positive statement → negative tag: “It has changed, hasn’t it?”

negative statement → positive tag: “It hasn’t changed, has it?”

The subtlety here. The statement is “nothing much has changed.” Although the verb carries no not, the word nothing is a negative word, so the clause counts as negative. A negative clause therefore requires a positive tag:

nothing much has changed, has it?

Why the others fail:

(b) is changed, isn’t it? — wrong tense (is changed is passive and wrong here), and the tag still fails to match.

(c) has changed, hasn’t it? — repeats the original error: a negative statement with a negative tag.

(d) would it? — the auxiliary must match the main clause’s auxiliary (has), not switch to would.

Answer: Option 1

Shortcut. Two rules settle every tag question:

Reverse the polarity. Positive takes negative, negative takes positive.

Reuse the same auxiliary. has → has, will → will, can → can.

The trap here is the hidden negative. Words like nothing, nobody, never, hardly, scarcely, seldom, few make a clause negative without using not, so they take a positive tag:

Nobody called, did they? · He hardly ever writes, does he?

Spot the negative word and the answer follows in one step.