Let us first look at basic relationships which often figure in the questions. If you are conversant with the given items in the table below, half of your battle is already won. It is not required to mug-up these names, but instead make a clear picture in your mind as you go through each one of them. This will go a long way in retaining the details of these given shortcut tricks for solving Blood relations problems for logical and analytical reasoning. Read the following thoroughly before moving on:
| Husband of Mother or Mother’s husband | Father |
| Wife of father or Father’s Wife | Mother |
| Father or Mother’s Son | Brother |
| Father or Mother’s Daughter | Sister |
| Father or Mother’s Brother | Uncle |
| Father or Mother’s Sister | Aunt |
| Father’s or Mother’s Father | Grandfather |
| Father of Father or Mother | Grandfather |
| Father of Grandfather or Grandmother | Great Grandfather |
| Mother of Father or Mother | Grandmother |
| Father or Mother’s Mother | Grandmother |
| Mother of Grandfather or Grandmother | Great Grandmother |
| Husband’s sister or Wife’s Sister | Sister-in-law |
| Son’s Wife | Daughter-in-law |
| Brother’s or Sister’s Son | Nephew |
| Brother’s or sister’s Daughter | Niece |
| Aunt’s or Uncle’s Son or Daughter | Cousin |
| Sister’s Husband | Brother-in-Law |
| Brother’s Wife | Sister-in-law |
| Grandfather’s or Grandmother’s Son | Father or Uncle |
| Uncle’s Wife | Aunt |
| Daughter’s Husband | Son-in-Law |
If you are able to comprehend the given information quickly in exams, then just pocket-solving of the question will lead you to the answer. Generally, this method allows for quick solution of the blood relation questions.
Profile I – Single Person Based Blood Relations Questions
If the question asks about Single person blood relation, then follow the following steps for solving the question.
Step 1: Simplify the given blood relations as much as you can. For example, Father’s Son would be me,etc.
Step 2: Break the given sentence at “is/as/was” to reach the answer quickly.
Step 3: Check the answer by going backward in the given sentence.
Let us take an example, Questions says – Pointing to a photograph, a lady tells Pramila, “I am the only daughter of the lady and her son is your maternal uncle.” How is the speaker related to Pramila’s father?
Solution – Now, ‘only daughter of the lady’ – refers to speaker’s mother (which is not important for our question, so leave it there)
Speaker’s mother’s son = speaker’s brother = pramila’s uncle = speaker is pramila’s mother = speaker is related to pramila’s father as Wife.
Profile II – Mixed Blood Relations Questions
There is another type of profile based on which various questions are asked in different competitive exams for testing the analytical skills of candidates. If the approach is right, one can solve this type of questions accurately, thereby securing crucial marks. The questions on blood relations sometimes have Chain Blood Relations Problems which are also referred to as Mixed Blood Relations Problems.
In these problems, there are more than one persons mentioned. The mutual blood relations type of problems can be solved with the help of diagrams and family trees. Sometimes, when there are quite many characters in the problem, one should use symbols to mark the details to avoid confusion.
Generally the following symbols are used:
- ‘+’ denoting Male candidate
- ‘-‘ denoting Female candidate
- ‘<=>’ denotes Couple
- ‘——-‘ denotes Same generation i.e.brother –brother (or) sister-sister (or) sister – brother
- ‘_______’ denotes Different generations i.e. father-son (or) mother-son (or) father-daughter (or) Mother – daughter
The following blood relations form part of different generations of a family tree diagram.
- First generation : Grand father, Grand mother
- Second generation : Father, Mother, Uncle, Aunt.
- Third generation : Self, Sister, Brother, Brother in law,Sister in law
- Fourth generation : Son, Daughter, Nephew, Niece.
Let us give an example to help you understand the process.
Question – Anil and Bimal are brothers and Chandani and Damini are sisters. Anil’s son is Damini’s brother. How is Bimal related to Chandani?
Solution:- The individuals in the given blood relations problem can be denoted by using just the first letter of the name to further simplify. The blood relations tree of this question would look like this;
Now, you can see yourself that here, A and B have been denoted with ‘+’ while C and D are denoted with a ‘-‘ symbol with them. This process even when used for depicting larger trees would keep it simple. Since the question says that Anil and Bimal are brothers, hence belong to same generation, which is shown by the ‘- – – -‘ symbol. Similarly Chandani and Damini are also shown with the dotted line symbol to show their similar generation.
With the help of the above diagram it becomes clear that Bimal is UNCLE of Chandani. Hence, the answer to the question How is Bimal related to Chandani? is – He is Chandani’s uncle.
Now you can solve and practice Blood relations based questions from any good book. These tips and tricks can be revisited if you have any problem in understanding the strategy to approach a blood relations based question.
