Fill in the blank with the correct article:
Nearly ______ thousand people gathered at the school ground to watch the Republic Day parade.
Answer & explanation
Correct answer: option 2
The correct answer is Option (2) → a
Complete sentence: Nearly a thousand people gathered at the school ground to watch the Republic Day parade. “A thousand” is the same as “one thousand”, and “thousand” begins with a consonant sound.
| Option | When to use | Example |
|---|---|---|
| (1) an | before a word that begins with a vowel sound | Papa gave me an eight-page notebook. |
| (2) a (answer) | before number words such as hundred, thousand and dozen, “a” means one | The book has a hundred pages. |
| (3) the | a particular group that both people already know; these people are not known from before | The two hundred chairs we hired came late. |
| (4) No article | plural or uncountable nouns used in a general sense; “thousand” cannot stand alone as a number and needs “a” or a number word such as “one” or “two” before it | Thousands of people came to the mela. |