Cleft Sentences

An It-cleft takes one part of a sentence, puts it right after It is / It was, and pushes the rest behind a joining word.

✔ Radhika topped the exam. (plain)
✔ It was Radhika who topped the exam. (subject stressed)
✔ It was the exam that Radhika topped. (object stressed)

[[parse: S=It | V=was | C=Radhika | CONJ=who | V=topped | O=the exam]]

Four kinds of piece can be stressed: the subject, the object, the place and the time. After the stressed piece comes that (or who for a person). What follows is a normal clause, with its own subject and verb, except when the subject itself was stressed, because then who / that takes the place of that subject.

Is or was? It is the dummy subject, and the verb be follows the time of the idea. A present or general fact takes It is; a finished event takes It was.

✔ It is my brother who lives in Pune. (present fact)
✔ It was my brother who called you yesterday. (finished event)

The dummy It is always singular, so the verb after it is is or was, whatever the stressed piece is. We shall return to this in Type 4.

This is the type that CGL 2025 tested. When the stressed piece is a place or a time, the joining word is that.

✘ It was at the summit in Vienna where the treaty was ratified.
✔ It was at the summit in Vienna that the treaty was ratified.

✘ It was in 1947 when India became independent.
✔ It was in 1947 that India became independent.

At the summit in Vienna and in 1947 already contain the place and the time. If where or when is added, the same information is given twice. The word that only joins.

The test, in two steps.
1. Delete It was and that.
2. If a full sentence remains (At the summit in Vienna the treaty was ratified), it is a cleft and that is the answer.

A different sentence that looks alike. Where a noun sits in front of where, we have a relative clause and where is correct.

✔ Vienna is the city where the treaty was signed.

> The doubt "but it is a place, so I should use where" is exactly the trap. Look at the opening It was. If it is there, think that.

After the stressed piece, the choice of joining word depends on what the piece is.

✔ It was Radhika who topped the exam.
✔ It was Radhika that topped the exam.
✔ It was the window that Ravi broke.

Both who and that are right for a person who does the action. For a thing, take that. When a person is the object of the second clause, that is the safest word (It was Radhika that I met); a formal writer may use whom.

Do not bring in which, where or when for these jobs. An It-cleft has one general joining word, that, and one extra for a person subject, who.

[[say:radhika| If both who and that are given in the options for a person, which one do I tick?]]

[[say:sir| Look at what else is in the options. If only one of the two can be right, tick it. If both are there, the question has not been framed on this point, so read the sentence again for the real error.]]

Two verbs sit in an It-cleft, and each has its own partner.

1. The verb after *It* is is / was. It is singular, because the dummy It is singular. Even when the stressed noun is plural, we do not say It are or It were.
2. The verb after *who / that* agrees with the stressed noun, because who / that stands for that noun.

✔ It is the students who are responsible for the mess.
✘ It is the students who is responsible for the mess. (students is plural, use are)
✔ It was the farmers who wanted the government to increase the support price.
✘ It were the farmers who wanted the government to increase the support price. (use It was)

[[parse: S=It | V=is | C=the students | CONJ=who | V=are | C=responsible for the mess]]

Long stressed pieces. The verb agrees with the head noun of the stressed piece, not with the noun nearest to the verb.

✔ It is the uncertainty of how the council intends to proceed that seems to have created unrest.

The head word is uncertainty (singular), so the verb is seems. Council is only part of the description.

> Two checks, every time: It was, never It were; and the verb after who / that matches the noun that was stressed.

When the stressed piece is a pronoun, two things must be right.

1. After be we use the subject form (I, he, she, we, they) in careful English, not me, him, her, us, them.
2. The verb after who agrees with that same pronoun, because who stands for it.

✘ It is me who is responsible.
✔ It is I who am responsible.
✔ It is he who has done this.
✔ It is you who have to apologise.

[[parse: S=It | V=is | C=I | CONJ=who | V=am | C=responsible]]

In everyday talk people say It's me, but the examiner works with the careful form. In a sentence-improvement question where one option says It is I who am, that option is the answer.

> Who is a mirror: it shows the person of the pronoun before it. If the pronoun is I, the verb is am; if it is you, the verb is are or have.

Some very common phrases hide an It-cleft inside them. They stress a time, a condition or a reason, so the joining word is again that.

✘ It was not until midnight when the results were declared.
✔ It was not until midnight that the results were declared.

✘ It was only after the third warning when the students left the library.
✔ It was only after the third warning that the students left the library.

✘ It is because of his honesty why everyone respects him.
✔ It is because of his honesty that everyone respects him.

✔ It is because he was ill that he missed the exam.
✔ It is for this reason that the committee has postponed the decision.

The frame is It is / was + not until / only after / only when / because (of) / for this reason + … + that. The words when and why feel natural here because the sense is about time and reason, but the sentence is a cleft and that is the only joining word.

[[say:radhika| I have also seen Not until midnight were the results declared. Is that wrong?]]

[[say:sir| No, that is correct, and it is a different pattern. There the opener is Not until, so the helping verb is inverted and there is no It. In the cleft form we keep It was not until midnight that and the second clause is in the normal order. Do not mix the two.]]

A What-cleft begins with What and puts the stressed piece after is / was.

✔ I need a long holiday. (plain)
✔ What I need is a long holiday. (What-cleft)

[[parse: S=What I need | V=is | C=a long holiday]]

What I need means the thing that I need. The whole *What*-clause is one noun clause and works as one single subject. That is why the verb after it is singular: is or was.

✔ What I need is a long holiday.
✘ What the committee failed to deliberate on were not the objectives.
✔ What the committee failed to deliberate on was not the objectives.

This was the CGL 2025 sentence. The students saw objectives in the end and chose were. But objectives is only the complement. The subject is the whole clause What the committee failed to deliberate on, and it is a single idea.

Reversed What-cleft. The stressed piece can also come first, and the *What*-clause moves to the end.

✔ A long holiday is what I need.
✔ Honest friends are what we need most.

Here the stressed piece has become the subject, so the verb now agrees with it: singular for a long holiday, plural for honest friends.

> In exams, if the *What*-clause is the subject, choose the singular verb. Some writers match the verb with a plural complement, but SSC has not given a plural verb as correct here.

SSC likes to dress a cleft in a very long sentence. The cleft frame can be perfectly correct, and the error may sit later in the sentence. So we work in two steps.

Step 1: check the frame. Is the opening It was … that or What … was? Is the joining word that, and does the verb agree?

Step 2: audit the rest. Read the remaining parts as separate small sentences. Look for the usual suspects.

✔ It was the misalignment between projected and actual data that cast doubt not only on the calculations but also on the assumptions that underlay the funding strategy.

✔ What he regretted the most was not the outcome of the negotiation, but that he had failed to communicate his intent clearly at the outset.

✔ What really counts in life is not how many toys we have collected, but how many of our talents we have used for a purpose that adds value to this world.

> When a long cleft sentence looks perfect at the frame, do not panic and do not choose No error in a hurry. Go through every verb in the later parts one by one.

An All-cleft works like a What-cleft, but All replaces What. Here all means the only thing.

✔ All I want is some peace and quiet.
✘ All I want are some peace and quiet.

All I want means the only thing I want, which is one idea, so the verb is singular: is or was.

✔ All that matters is your honesty.
✔ All she wanted was a chance to prove herself.
✔ The only thing the students demanded was a fair revaluation.

[[parse: S=All I want | V=is | C=some peace and quiet]]

Do not confuse this with all + a plural noun. In All the students were present, the word all is a determiner and the noun is plural, so the verb is plural. The difference is easy to see: in an All-cleft all has no noun after it, only a small clause (I want, that matters, she wanted).

✔ All the students were present.
✔ All I need is a good night's sleep.