Strategy to Crack Verbal Section of TISSNET

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The Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai offers a range of Masters’ programs at various campuses. M.A in Human Resource Management & Labour Relations is of prime interest to management aspirants. TISS conducts a National Entrance Test called TISSNET. The TISSNET has 3 sections, namely, General Knowledge, Mathematics & Logical Reasoning, and English Proficiency.

The English Proficiency section of the TISSNET tests candidates in Verbal Ability. This section has 30 questions of moderate to tough difficulty level. The questions are a mix of Reading Comprehension and English Usage.

There were a total of 10 RC questions, based on two passages. One was themed around Aviation sector, while the other talked about Chinese wrestling. Except for a few tricky questions, RC portion was easy to manage and understand.

Most of the questions in this segment featured in form of Fill-in-the-Blanks, based on grammar or vocabulary. There were also few questions on Parajumbles, critical reasoning, and error-spotting. The parajumbles were considered time-consuming and a little complex.

In TISSNET 2021, the level of difficulty of Reading Comprehension was easy to moderate. There were 2 RC passages, with 5 questions each. All these questions were moderate in nature. While one passage dealt with OTT Platforms, the other was themed around 'The role of coffee in the Age of Enlightenment'. Although most RC questions were direct and data-based, some were based on critical reasoning.

Non-RC part took the major portion in the Verbal section of TISSNET 2021. Of the total 20 Non-RC questions, there were 7 questions on Fill-in-the-Blanks, 5 from Error-Spotting and Spelling Corrections, 4 from Synonyms and Antonyms, 2 from Critical Reasoning, and 2 from Para-formation. The overall level of difficulty of the questions was easy to moderate.

Out of the total time of 100 minutes, you should spend 25-30 minutes to solve this section in TISSNET. Since there is no negative marking, you should target an attempt of 26-28 questions. Also, to score well, you should increase your reading speed and concentration over long time periods. For this, you must read editorial/ opinion sections of reputed national dailies like The Hindu. Practicing a number of Mock Tests will also help in this regard.

You must maintain an accuracy level of 70-80 percent in the paper. This requires practicing a lot of usage-based questions like sentence completion, analogy based questions, which are commonly seen in the TISSNET Verbal section. Further, you must focus on building your vocabulary as a number of questions based on synonyms, antonyms, word meanings, etc. are commonly asked.