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MCQ on Direct and Indirect Speech questions with answers for all competitive exams

English MCQs

Direct and Indirect Speech MCQ Questions

Direct and Indirect Speech
Direct speech is the exact quote of the speech. They are completely identical transcripts of speech between two people.
Reported speech is the way a listener would narrate the incident in front of another person.
The verbs in the present tense will change into their corresponding past tenses in the following manner −

  1. Simple present to simple past
  2. Present progressive to past progressive
  3. Present perfect to past perfect
  4. Present perfect progressive to past perfect progressive.
  5. The word “will, shall” will be replaced by “would”.
  6. The word “can” will be replaced by “could”.
    Important: The only action words that will not change its tense are actions that are universal truth.
  1. She says “I am a bit busy today.”
    A. She said that she was a bit busy that day.
    B. She said she is busy today
    C. She says that she is a bit busy today.
    D. She is a bit busy today was said by her.

Answer: C
Solution: If the reporting speech is in present tense or future tense, then no change is required to be made in the verb of reported speech. This verb could be in any tense i.e. present, past, or future. Thus the sentence within quotes will remain as it is, and “says” will remain “says”. Hence the correct answer here is option C.
  1. They said that they took the bus every day.
    A. That they took the bus every day was said by them.
    B. They said “We take the bus.”
    C. They said “We took the bus every day.”
    D. They said, “They take the bus every day.”

Answer: D
Solution: If the reporting verb is in past tense, then reported verb will be changed as per the following criterion, i.e. present indefinite tense is changed into past indefinite tense. Hence the correct answer here is option D.
  1. He said, “She is taking medication weekly.”
    A. That she is taking weekly medication was said by him.
    B. She is taking weekly medication, he said.
    C. He said that she was taking medication weekly.
    D. He said that, weekly medication was being taken by her.

Answer: C
If the reporting verb is in past tense, then reported verb will be changed as per the following criterion, i.e. present perfect is changed into the past perfect tense. Hence the correct answer is option C.
  1. He said to me “I will not give you any money without signing a contract.”
    A. He said to me that he would not give me any money without signing a contract.
    B. He said to me that he would not give me any money without him signing a contract.
    C. He said to me that he will not give me any money without signing a contract.
    D. He said to me that he would not give me money without signing a contract.

Answer: A
The given speech is in future tense. In Future Tense, while no changes are made except “shall‟ and “will‟ are changed into would.
  1. We said, “We go for a walk every day.”
    A. They said that they had gone for a walk every day.
    B. We said that we went for a walk every day.
    C. We went for a walk every day, is what we said.
    D. They said that they went for a walk every day.

Answer: B
The speech in question indicates a regular activity. It is given in direct speech. To convert it into indirect speech, we need to change the tense into past tense. Therefore “go” will become “went”. “We” will remain “we”, as the subject remains unchanged.
  1. She says, “I eat a mango a day.”
    A. She said that she ate a mango a day.
    B. She says that she eats a mango a day.
    C. That she eats a mango a day was said by her.
    D. She said that she eats a mango a day

Answer: B
If the reporting speech is in present tense or future tense, then no change is required to be made in the verb of reported speech. This verb could be in any tense i.e. present, past, or future. Thus the sentence within quotes will remain as it is, and “says” will remain “says”.
  1. He said, “My father is playing tennis with me.”
    A. He said that his father was playing tennis with him.
    B. That his father was playing tennis with him was said by him.
    C. He said that his father is playing tennis with him.
    D. He said that tennis was being played by his father.

Answer: A
If the reporting verb is in past tense, then reported verb will be changed as per the following criterion, i.e. present perfect is changed into the past perfect tense.
So, “is” will become “was”. “Me” will change into “him”.
Note: Changes in Person of Pronouns:
1) 1st Person pronouns in reported speech are always changed according to the subject of the reporting speech.
2) 2nd Person pronouns in reported speech are always changed according to the object of the reporting speech.
3) 3rd Person pronouns in reported speech are not changed.
  1. She said, “I am going to meet her tonight.”
    A. She said that she was going to meet her that night.
    B. That she was going to meet her tonight was said by her.
    C. I am going to meet her tonight, she said.
    D. She said that she is going to meet her that night.

Answer: A
If the direct speech is in present tense, then the reported speech will be in past tense. Therefore, “am” will be converted into “was”. “Tonight” will become “that night”.
  1. He will say that his brother will take care of her.
    A. He will say, “My brother will be taking care of her.”
    B. He will say, “My brother will take care of her.”
    C. He will say, “My brother will take care her.”
    D. He will say, “Her care will be taken by my brother.”

Answer: B
The given sentence is in indirect speech. To convert it into direct speech all we do is remove the use of “that” in the sentence, and keep the part within the quotation the same as given in the reported speech.
  1. She said, “I visited the University yesterday.”
    A. She said she had visited the university the day before.
    B. She said she visited the university that day
    C. That she visited the university was said.
    D. She said that she had visited the University the previous day.

Answer: D
The direct speech is given in past tense. Therefore the indirect speech will be changed into the past tense of the former, i.e. “visited‟ will become “had visited‟.