Report: The King: How will the new policy benefit college students? Minister 2: The policy will provide for an interdisciplinary education that has flexible study plans.
The King asked Minister 2 how the new education policy would benefit college students. Minister 2 told the king that the new education policy would provide for an interdisciplinary education that had flexible study plans.
Marking Scheme
- 11 mark for correctly reporting the King's question with 'would benefit' and assertive word order.
- 21 mark for correctly reporting Minister 2's statement with 'would provide' and 'that had'.
Hint
Shift all verbs one tense back: 'will' becomes 'would' and 'has' becomes 'had'. Change question word order to statement word order.
Quick Oral Answer
The King asked Minister 2 how the new policy would benefit college students. Minister 2 told the King that the policy would provide for an interdisciplinary education that had flexible study plans. I changed 'will' to 'would' and 'has' to 'had'.
Analysis & Explanation
This reported speech question tests two key transformations: converting a Wh-question and a declarative statement from direct to indirect speech. For the King's question, the reporting verb 'asked' triggers backshift: 'will' becomes 'would', and the question format changes from interrogative to assertive word order ('how the new policy would benefit' instead of 'how will the new policy benefit'). Note that no question mark is used in the reported version. For Minister 2's reply, the reporting verb 'told' again triggers backshift: 'will provide' becomes 'would provide' and 'has' becomes 'had'. The conjunction 'that' introduces the reported clause. Students must remember three simultaneous changes in reported speech: tense backshift, pronoun changes (though not needed here since proper nouns are used), and word order changes for questions. A critical exam tip is to never mix direct and indirect speech in the same sentence. Each sentence must be fully converted. The marking scheme awards 1 mark per correctly reported sentence, so partial attempts on both sentences can still earn marks. Common traps include forgetting to change 'has' to 'had' in the subordinate clause 'that has flexible study plans' because students focus only on the main verb and overlook verbs in dependent clauses.
Common Mistakes
- 1Keeping 'will' unchanged instead of shifting it to 'would', because students forget that past-tense reporting verbs (asked, told) require mandatory backshift of all future tenses.
- 2Retaining the interrogative word order in the reported question, writing 'how will the policy' instead of the correct assertive order 'how the policy would', and adding a question mark at the end.
- 3Changing only the main clause verb ('will provide' to 'would provide') but forgetting to change 'has' to 'had' in the subordinate clause 'that has flexible study plans', since backshift applies to ALL verbs in the reported sentence.
Interesting Facts
Reported speech (also called indirect speech) follows different rules in different languages. In Japanese, there is no tense backshift at all, while in Hindi, only the verb form changes without strict backshift rules like English.
The concept of reported speech was first formally described by the Roman grammarian Priscian in the 5th century CE in his work 'Institutiones Grammaticae', which remained the standard Latin grammar textbook for over 1,000 years.
CBSE has included reported speech in every Class 10 English board exam since 2010 without exception, making it one of the most consistently tested grammar topics with an average weightage of 2-3 marks per paper.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why does 'will' change to 'would' in reported speech?
When the reporting verb is in the past tense (asked, told, said), all tenses shift one step back. 'Will' (simple future) shifts to 'would' (conditional/past future). This is called backshift and applies to all tenses in indirect speech.
Do we always need to change pronouns in reported speech?
Yes, pronouns change based on the perspective of the reporter. First person pronouns of the speaker change to third person, and second person pronouns change to match the listener. However, in this question, no pronoun changes are needed since proper nouns are used.
How do I handle questions in reported speech?
Wh-questions retain the question word (how, what, why) but change to statement word order (subject before verb). So 'How will the policy benefit?' becomes 'how the policy would benefit' without a question mark at the end.