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IDIOMS & PHRASES FOR NDA AFCAT CDS AND EXAM PRACTICE
QUESTIONS AND CORRECT ANSWERS LATEST UPDATE!!
2026-27
Idioms and Phrases for CDS AFCAT NDA
• Beat back (to compel to retire) : The firemen were beaten back by angry flames and the building was reduced to ashes.
• Boil down to (to amount to) : His entire argument boiled down to this that he would not join the movement unless he saw some
monetary gain in it.
• Cast aside (to reject, to throw aside) : Men will cast aside truth and honesty for immediate gains.
• Cry down (to deprecate) : Some of the Western powers did their best to cry down India’s success in the war.
• To cut off with a shilling (to give someone a mere trifle in the will) : The father was so angry with the son over his marriage
that he cut him off with a shilling.
• Egg on (to urge on) : Who egged you on to fight a professional boxer and get your nose knocked off?
• Gloss over (explain away) : Even if you are an important person your faults cannot be glossed over.
• To laugh in one’s sleeves (to be secretly amused) : While I was solemnly reading my research paper to the audience, my friends
were laughing in their sleeves for they knew what it was worth.
• Play off (to set one party against another for one’s own advantage) : It best serves the interests of the super powers to play off
one poor nation against another.
• Pull one through (to recover, to help one recover) : Armed with the latest medicines, the doctor will pull him through.
• Cost a slur upon (by word or act to cast a slight reproach on someone) : Many a man casts a slur on his own good name with
some mean act.
• To catch a Tartar (to encounter a strong adversary) : When Hitler marched in to Russia he little knew that he would catch a
Tartar in the tough people of that country.
• To come off with flying colours (to come out of a conflict with brilliant success) : The 1971 election outcome was uncertain
but finally the congress came off with flying colours.
• To come off second best (to be defeated in every contest) : Be it an election or a tambola, I have always come off the second
best.
• To cut the Gordian knot (to remove a difficulty by bold or unusual measures) : The Parliament threw out the Bill for Abolition
of Privy Purses. The Government cut the Gordian knot by abolishing the privy purses through an ordinance.
• To fall to one’s lot (to become one’s fate) : It fell to the lot of Mujib and his colleagues to reconstruct the shattered economy of
their nation.
• To get into hot water (to get into difficulty) : The businessman got into hot water with the Income-tax authorities for concealing
his income from ancestral property.
• To give someone the slip (to dodge someone who is looking for you) : The police had nearly got the dacoits when the latter
gave them the slip in the Chambal ravines.
• To go on a fool’s errand (to go on an expedition which leads to a foolish end) : Many people earlier believed that going to the
moon was like going on a fool’s errand
• To go to the wall (to get the worst in a competition) : In the struggle of life, the weakest goes to the wall.
• To go to rack and ruin, to go to the dogs (to be ruined) : If a big war comes, our economy will go to the dogs.
,shop.ssbcrack.com
• To have one’s hands full (to be very busy) : Pakistan could hardly expect active help from the U.S.A. as her hands were already
full with Vietnam, Laos and West Asia problems.
• To have a bone to pick with one (to have a difference with a person which has not yet been fully expressed) : The extreme
leftists have a bone to pick with the police and if ever they come to power there may be unpleasantness between the two.
• To have the whip hand of (to have mastery over) : After the split in the party Mrs. Gandhi has the whip hand of the Congress.
• To have too many irons in the fire (to have so much work in hand that some part of it is left undone or is done very badly) : Let
the Government not go in for nationalisation so fast. If they have too many irons in the fire they are bound to fare badly.
• To have the tree or right ring (To be genuine) : Nixon’s pronouncements on world peace do not have the right ring.
• To have two strings to one’s bow (to have an alternative means of achieving one’s purpose) : A wife always has two strings to
her bow if coaxing fails to achieve the desired end; tears succeed.
• To have an axe to grind (have personal interests to serve) : Bigger nations supply arms to the smaller ones primarily because
they (the bigger nations) have their own axe to grind
• To keep the wolf from the door (to keep away extreme poverty and hunger) : Lakhs in India have to struggle everyday to keep
the wolf from the door.
• To make short work of (to bring to sudden end) : The locusts made short work of the ripe standing corn.
• To make amends for (to compensate for damage) : By his kindness today he has made amends pr his past insolence.
• To make common cause with (to unite, to co-operate with) : During the last elections the princes made a common cause with
the rightist parties. Both went down.
• To make a virtue of necessity (to do a very disagreeable thing as though from duty but really because you must do it) : When a
minister knows that he is going to be booted out of the cabinet he makes a virtue of necessity and resigns on health grounds.
• To make much ado about nothing (make a great fuss about a trifle) : Demonstrations and protests over the change in the timing
of news bulletins over AIR was making much ado about nothing.
• To make a cat’s paw or a tool of someone (to use someone as a means of attaining your object) : The super-powers have made
a cat’s paw of the smaller nations of Asia in their game of power politics.
• To play into the hands of someone (to act as to be of advantage to another) : By raising the slogan ‘Indira Hatao’ the opposition
played into her hands and Mrs. Gandhi won the elections hands down (easily).
• To play second fiddle’ (to take a subordinate part) : With Mrs. Gandhi as the undisputed leader of the Congress and the nation,
everyone else is content to play second fiddle to her.
• To put the cart before the horse (to begin at the wrong end to do a thing) : Preparing the blue print of a project without the
provision of funds is like putting the cart before the horse.
• To put one’s shoulder to the wheel (to make great efforts ourselves) : No amount of foreign aid will pull us out of the economic
morass; we have to put our own shoulders to the wheel.
• To set store by (to value highly) : India, surely sets much store by the Indo Soviet Treaty of Friendship.
• To set the Thames on fire (to do something extraordinary) : He is a steady worker but never likely to set the Thames on fire.
• To set one’s house in order (to arrange one’s affairs) : Let Pakistan set her own house in order before talking of the welfare of
the Kashmiris.
• To take into one’s head (to occur to someone) : The Manager look it into his head that by shutting off the electricity for a few
hours daily he could save on refrigeration costs.
• To take the bull by the horns (to grapple with a problem courageously instead of avoiding it) : There is no short cut to prosperity.
We have to take the bull by the horns and make people work like slaves.
• To take a leap in the dark (to do a hazardous thing without any idea of what it may result in) : You took a leap in the dark in
going into partnership with that man.
• To throw cold water upon (to discourage something) : The doctor threw cold water upon my plans for a world tour by declaring
that I could never stand the strain of it.
• To throw up the sponge (to give up a contest) : Faced with stiff competition from big companies, many a small company will
throw up the sponge.
• To turn over a new leaf (to change one’s course of action completely) : After a long career of crime the convict suddenly turned
over a new leaf and became a model citizen.
•
,shop.ssbcrack.com
•
• To turn tail (to retreat ignominiously) : The enemy turned tail in the face of heavy onslaughts on its key positions.
• To turn the tables (to reverse someone’s success or superiority) : Pakistan started war with a blitz on our positions but the
superior tactics of our Armed Forces soon turned the tables on them.
• To cook or doctor an account (to tamper with or falsify the account) : From the balance sheet presented to the shareholders,
the company seemed to be flourishing, but it afterwards turned out that the Secretary had cooked the accounts.
• To bear the brunt of (to endure the main force or shock of) : The infantry has to bear the brunt of a battle.
• To beard the lion in his den (to oppose someone, in his stronghold) : The Indian Army broke through strong Pakistani
fortifications in the Shakargarh area and bearded the lion in his own den.
• To bid fair to (to give fair prospect of) : His health is so good that he bids fair to live till he is sixty.
• To blow one’s own trumpet (to parade one’s own good deeds) : Modesty does not pay. Only if you blow your own trumpet, you
can succeed.
• To blunt the edge of (to make something less effective) : Time blunts the edge of grief.
• To build castles in the air (to indulge in reveries or visionary schemes) : There is nothing wrong if you build castles in the air;
now put foundations under them.
• To burn the candle at both ends (to use too much energy) : Our resources are limited. Let us use them judiciously and not burn
the candle at both ends.
• To buy a pig in a poke (to purchase a thing without previously examining it) : Buying shares in a new Company started by
unknown entrepreneurs is like buying a pig in a poke.
• To cross or pass the Rubicon (to take a decisive step forward) : The Government will have to think of many things before
nationalising the textile industry for once they cross the Rubicon there will be no going back.
• To cry over spilt milk (to nurse unnecessary regrets) : We have failed to build up a sizeable total against England’s meagre first
innings total. It is no use crying over spilt milk now.
• To err on the safe side (to choose a course which may in fact be inaccurate, but which will keep you safe from risk or harm) :
In going in for mixed economy rather than wholesale nationalisation the Government were erring on the safe side.
To flog a dead horse (waste one’s energies) : We are flogging a dead horse if we are trying to make Sanskrit the national language
of India.
To feather one’s nest (to provide for oneself through dishonest means) : Many tax collectors make a point of feathering their
own nests well while they have opportunity.
• To Eat one’s heart out (to brood over one’s sorrows or disappointments) : Don’t eat your heart out over failure in this
competition.
• To eat humble pie (to have to humiliate oneself) : Since none came to his support he had to eat humble pie and give in to their
demands.
• To eat one’s words (to retract one’s assertions under compulsion) : It is hard for a haughty man to have to eat his words.
• To throw down the gauntlet, to take up the gauntlet (to offer or give a challenge, to accept a challenge) : It is not for a small
country to throw down the gauntlet to the right and the left.
• To run the gauntlet (to undergo severe criticism or ill treatment) : Most trend-setting books have to run the gauntlet of the
literary critics.
• To burn one’s fingers (to get oneself into unexpected trouble) : They were happily placed in the woollen industry. But they
went in for cosmetics and burnt their fingers.
• To force one’s hands (to compel one to do something unwillingly or earlier than he wished to do it) : The Government wanted
to do all that they could to meet the workers’ demands. But the violence by the strikers forced their hands to declare a lockout.
• To haul over the coals (to scold a man, reprove him) : If your bad habits become known, you will get hauled over the coals
and richly deserve it.
•
IDIOMS & PHRASES FOR NDA AFCAT CDS AND EXAM PRACTICE
QUESTIONS AND CORRECT ANSWERS LATEST UPDATE!!
2026-27
Idioms and Phrases for CDS AFCAT NDA
• Beat back (to compel to retire) : The firemen were beaten back by angry flames and the building was reduced to ashes.
• Boil down to (to amount to) : His entire argument boiled down to this that he would not join the movement unless he saw some
monetary gain in it.
• Cast aside (to reject, to throw aside) : Men will cast aside truth and honesty for immediate gains.
• Cry down (to deprecate) : Some of the Western powers did their best to cry down India’s success in the war.
• To cut off with a shilling (to give someone a mere trifle in the will) : The father was so angry with the son over his marriage
that he cut him off with a shilling.
• Egg on (to urge on) : Who egged you on to fight a professional boxer and get your nose knocked off?
• Gloss over (explain away) : Even if you are an important person your faults cannot be glossed over.
• To laugh in one’s sleeves (to be secretly amused) : While I was solemnly reading my research paper to the audience, my friends
were laughing in their sleeves for they knew what it was worth.
• Play off (to set one party against another for one’s own advantage) : It best serves the interests of the super powers to play off
one poor nation against another.
• Pull one through (to recover, to help one recover) : Armed with the latest medicines, the doctor will pull him through.
• Cost a slur upon (by word or act to cast a slight reproach on someone) : Many a man casts a slur on his own good name with
some mean act.
• To catch a Tartar (to encounter a strong adversary) : When Hitler marched in to Russia he little knew that he would catch a
Tartar in the tough people of that country.
• To come off with flying colours (to come out of a conflict with brilliant success) : The 1971 election outcome was uncertain
but finally the congress came off with flying colours.
• To come off second best (to be defeated in every contest) : Be it an election or a tambola, I have always come off the second
best.
• To cut the Gordian knot (to remove a difficulty by bold or unusual measures) : The Parliament threw out the Bill for Abolition
of Privy Purses. The Government cut the Gordian knot by abolishing the privy purses through an ordinance.
• To fall to one’s lot (to become one’s fate) : It fell to the lot of Mujib and his colleagues to reconstruct the shattered economy of
their nation.
• To get into hot water (to get into difficulty) : The businessman got into hot water with the Income-tax authorities for concealing
his income from ancestral property.
• To give someone the slip (to dodge someone who is looking for you) : The police had nearly got the dacoits when the latter
gave them the slip in the Chambal ravines.
• To go on a fool’s errand (to go on an expedition which leads to a foolish end) : Many people earlier believed that going to the
moon was like going on a fool’s errand
• To go to the wall (to get the worst in a competition) : In the struggle of life, the weakest goes to the wall.
• To go to rack and ruin, to go to the dogs (to be ruined) : If a big war comes, our economy will go to the dogs.
,shop.ssbcrack.com
• To have one’s hands full (to be very busy) : Pakistan could hardly expect active help from the U.S.A. as her hands were already
full with Vietnam, Laos and West Asia problems.
• To have a bone to pick with one (to have a difference with a person which has not yet been fully expressed) : The extreme
leftists have a bone to pick with the police and if ever they come to power there may be unpleasantness between the two.
• To have the whip hand of (to have mastery over) : After the split in the party Mrs. Gandhi has the whip hand of the Congress.
• To have too many irons in the fire (to have so much work in hand that some part of it is left undone or is done very badly) : Let
the Government not go in for nationalisation so fast. If they have too many irons in the fire they are bound to fare badly.
• To have the tree or right ring (To be genuine) : Nixon’s pronouncements on world peace do not have the right ring.
• To have two strings to one’s bow (to have an alternative means of achieving one’s purpose) : A wife always has two strings to
her bow if coaxing fails to achieve the desired end; tears succeed.
• To have an axe to grind (have personal interests to serve) : Bigger nations supply arms to the smaller ones primarily because
they (the bigger nations) have their own axe to grind
• To keep the wolf from the door (to keep away extreme poverty and hunger) : Lakhs in India have to struggle everyday to keep
the wolf from the door.
• To make short work of (to bring to sudden end) : The locusts made short work of the ripe standing corn.
• To make amends for (to compensate for damage) : By his kindness today he has made amends pr his past insolence.
• To make common cause with (to unite, to co-operate with) : During the last elections the princes made a common cause with
the rightist parties. Both went down.
• To make a virtue of necessity (to do a very disagreeable thing as though from duty but really because you must do it) : When a
minister knows that he is going to be booted out of the cabinet he makes a virtue of necessity and resigns on health grounds.
• To make much ado about nothing (make a great fuss about a trifle) : Demonstrations and protests over the change in the timing
of news bulletins over AIR was making much ado about nothing.
• To make a cat’s paw or a tool of someone (to use someone as a means of attaining your object) : The super-powers have made
a cat’s paw of the smaller nations of Asia in their game of power politics.
• To play into the hands of someone (to act as to be of advantage to another) : By raising the slogan ‘Indira Hatao’ the opposition
played into her hands and Mrs. Gandhi won the elections hands down (easily).
• To play second fiddle’ (to take a subordinate part) : With Mrs. Gandhi as the undisputed leader of the Congress and the nation,
everyone else is content to play second fiddle to her.
• To put the cart before the horse (to begin at the wrong end to do a thing) : Preparing the blue print of a project without the
provision of funds is like putting the cart before the horse.
• To put one’s shoulder to the wheel (to make great efforts ourselves) : No amount of foreign aid will pull us out of the economic
morass; we have to put our own shoulders to the wheel.
• To set store by (to value highly) : India, surely sets much store by the Indo Soviet Treaty of Friendship.
• To set the Thames on fire (to do something extraordinary) : He is a steady worker but never likely to set the Thames on fire.
• To set one’s house in order (to arrange one’s affairs) : Let Pakistan set her own house in order before talking of the welfare of
the Kashmiris.
• To take into one’s head (to occur to someone) : The Manager look it into his head that by shutting off the electricity for a few
hours daily he could save on refrigeration costs.
• To take the bull by the horns (to grapple with a problem courageously instead of avoiding it) : There is no short cut to prosperity.
We have to take the bull by the horns and make people work like slaves.
• To take a leap in the dark (to do a hazardous thing without any idea of what it may result in) : You took a leap in the dark in
going into partnership with that man.
• To throw cold water upon (to discourage something) : The doctor threw cold water upon my plans for a world tour by declaring
that I could never stand the strain of it.
• To throw up the sponge (to give up a contest) : Faced with stiff competition from big companies, many a small company will
throw up the sponge.
• To turn over a new leaf (to change one’s course of action completely) : After a long career of crime the convict suddenly turned
over a new leaf and became a model citizen.
•
,shop.ssbcrack.com
•
• To turn tail (to retreat ignominiously) : The enemy turned tail in the face of heavy onslaughts on its key positions.
• To turn the tables (to reverse someone’s success or superiority) : Pakistan started war with a blitz on our positions but the
superior tactics of our Armed Forces soon turned the tables on them.
• To cook or doctor an account (to tamper with or falsify the account) : From the balance sheet presented to the shareholders,
the company seemed to be flourishing, but it afterwards turned out that the Secretary had cooked the accounts.
• To bear the brunt of (to endure the main force or shock of) : The infantry has to bear the brunt of a battle.
• To beard the lion in his den (to oppose someone, in his stronghold) : The Indian Army broke through strong Pakistani
fortifications in the Shakargarh area and bearded the lion in his own den.
• To bid fair to (to give fair prospect of) : His health is so good that he bids fair to live till he is sixty.
• To blow one’s own trumpet (to parade one’s own good deeds) : Modesty does not pay. Only if you blow your own trumpet, you
can succeed.
• To blunt the edge of (to make something less effective) : Time blunts the edge of grief.
• To build castles in the air (to indulge in reveries or visionary schemes) : There is nothing wrong if you build castles in the air;
now put foundations under them.
• To burn the candle at both ends (to use too much energy) : Our resources are limited. Let us use them judiciously and not burn
the candle at both ends.
• To buy a pig in a poke (to purchase a thing without previously examining it) : Buying shares in a new Company started by
unknown entrepreneurs is like buying a pig in a poke.
• To cross or pass the Rubicon (to take a decisive step forward) : The Government will have to think of many things before
nationalising the textile industry for once they cross the Rubicon there will be no going back.
• To cry over spilt milk (to nurse unnecessary regrets) : We have failed to build up a sizeable total against England’s meagre first
innings total. It is no use crying over spilt milk now.
• To err on the safe side (to choose a course which may in fact be inaccurate, but which will keep you safe from risk or harm) :
In going in for mixed economy rather than wholesale nationalisation the Government were erring on the safe side.
To flog a dead horse (waste one’s energies) : We are flogging a dead horse if we are trying to make Sanskrit the national language
of India.
To feather one’s nest (to provide for oneself through dishonest means) : Many tax collectors make a point of feathering their
own nests well while they have opportunity.
• To Eat one’s heart out (to brood over one’s sorrows or disappointments) : Don’t eat your heart out over failure in this
competition.
• To eat humble pie (to have to humiliate oneself) : Since none came to his support he had to eat humble pie and give in to their
demands.
• To eat one’s words (to retract one’s assertions under compulsion) : It is hard for a haughty man to have to eat his words.
• To throw down the gauntlet, to take up the gauntlet (to offer or give a challenge, to accept a challenge) : It is not for a small
country to throw down the gauntlet to the right and the left.
• To run the gauntlet (to undergo severe criticism or ill treatment) : Most trend-setting books have to run the gauntlet of the
literary critics.
• To burn one’s fingers (to get oneself into unexpected trouble) : They were happily placed in the woollen industry. But they
went in for cosmetics and burnt their fingers.
• To force one’s hands (to compel one to do something unwillingly or earlier than he wished to do it) : The Government wanted
to do all that they could to meet the workers’ demands. But the violence by the strikers forced their hands to declare a lockout.
• To haul over the coals (to scold a man, reprove him) : If your bad habits become known, you will get hauled over the coals
and richly deserve it.
•
