Question

Fill in the blank with an appropriate verb.
Either Hari or I ___ at mistake today.
a) Am
b) Is
c) Are
d) Were

Answer 1

Hint: The subject-verb agreement must accord in number. Either both the subject and verb should be singular or both should be plural in number.

Complete answer:
 As given in the hint, we need to maintain the subject-verb agreement relationship in the above-given sentence.
Example- She has a few boxes. Here, we have used the third person singular verb, ‘has’ with the third person singular pronoun, ‘she’ to form subject-verb agreement.
In the given question- The use of ‘either/or’ indicates the presence of two subjects or nouns. Since both the nouns are given in the singular form; the verb shall also be used in the singular form. Hence, the correct answer is; Either Hari or I am at mistake today.
Now, let’s examine the given options-
Option (a)- ‘Am’ is the correct option because ‘am’ is a first-person singular verb that is used with a first-person singular pronoun, ‘I’.
Option (b)- ‘Is’ is an incorrect option because ‘is’ is a second-person singular verb that is used with second-person singular pronouns.
Option (c)- ‘Are’ is an incorrect option because ‘are’ is a second-person plural verb that is used with second-person plural pronouns.
Option (d)- ‘Were’ is an incorrect option because ‘were’ is a third-person plural verb that is used with third-person plural pronouns. The correct answer is Option ‘a’.
Hence option (a) is correct.

Note:
 If two singular subjects have been joined with the help of either/or, the verb we use is also singular in form. Also, keep in mind that the verb depends on the subject and not on the object.