Grammar Star

Some wrongly used words at a glance Our topic for this week has been drawn from words we use almost everyday. Ironically, as simple as these words may seem, some people often use them wrongly either in their daily conversation or writing. Sometimes the user may actually have the correct meaning of such words in mind, but will either use a wrong one or spell it in a way that gives it an entirely different meaning. Let's consider the following word pairs: 1. Fatal and Ghastly : Most people think that when there is a road crash leading to severe injuries and destruction of vehicles, it is fatal! The word 'fatal' is a derivative from the noun 'fate' which means 'destiny', 'an inevitable outcome', etc. Thus, an accident is described as 'fatal' when it resulted in death (or fatality). In other words, when an accident is very shocking or horrible and results in severe injuries and destruction without any death, it is not 'fatal'; it is '

In our discussion today, we shall examine the problems associated with some expressions connected to money or financial transactions.  Between hired purchase and hire purchase The fact that many verbal adjectives come in past tense makes a lot of people to overgeneralise. The question could be: if we have registered voter and hardened criminal, why won’t we have hired purchase? Unfortunately, the analogy does not stand. The correct expression is ‘hire purchase’ – defined as ‘a system by which one pays for a thing in regular installments while having the use of it’. I bought the car on hired purchase. (Wrong) I bought the car on hire purchase. (Correct) Instalmentally ? Another widely used foul expression is ‘paying instalmentally’. It is true that ‘a sum of money due as one of several equal payments for something, spread over an agreed time’, is called an instalment.  But English language frowns on turning the word into an adverb here. So, while you may have He bought it impulsively, i