Read each sentence to find out whether there is any grammatical or idiomatic…
2021
Read each sentence to find out whether there is any grammatical or idiomatic error in it. The error, if any, will be in one part of the sentence. The number of that part is the answer. If there is 'No error', the answer is 'e'. (Ignore errors of punctuation, if any.)
It had (A)/ stopped raining (B)/ when I (C)/ had left the office. (D)
- A.
A
- B.
B
- C.
C
- D.
D
- E.
No error
Attempted by 5 students.
Show answer & explanation
Correct answer: D
Concept
When a sentence describes two completed past actions in a clear before-and-after sequence, the EARLIER action takes the past perfect tense (had + past participle) and the LATER action — the reference point introduced by a time word such as "when" — takes the simple past tense. Two past-perfect verbs cannot both sit in such a sequence, because the past perfect exists only to show which of two past events happened first.
Application
Identify the two past events: the rain stopping, and the speaker leaving the office.
Decide the order: the rain had already stopped at the moment the speaker left, so "stopped raining" is the earlier event and correctly carries the past perfect "had stopped".
The clause "when I ... the office" is the reference point that fixes the later moment, so it must be in the simple past: "when I left the office."
The written form uses the past perfect again — "had left the office" — which wrongly puts both events in the past perfect and removes the before/after contrast. This is the grammatical error.
Cross-check
Read the corrected sentence: "It had stopped raining when I left the office." The past perfect "had stopped" now clearly precedes the simple-past "left", giving a clean sequence. The error therefore lies in the part "had left the office".