Puzzles for job hunters part-1

1. Three friends divided some bullets equally. After all of them shot 4 bullets the total
number of bullets remaining is equal to the bullets each had after division. Find the
original number divided.
2. Find sum of digits of D.
Let
A= 19991999
B = sum of digits of A
C = sum of digits of B
D = sum of digits of C
(HINT : A = B = C = D (mod 9))
3. There is a 50m long army platoon marching ahead. The last person in the platoon wants to
give a letter to the first person leading the platoon. So while the platoon is marching he runs
ahead, reaches the first person and hands over the letter to him and without stopping he runs and
comes back to his original position.
In the mean time the whole platoon has moved ahead by 50m.
The question is how much distance did the last person cover in that time. Assuming that he ran
the whole distance with uniform speed.
Submitted

4. If you take a marker & start from a corner on a cube, what is the maximum number of
edges you can trace across if you never trace across the same edge twice, never remove
the marker from the cube, & never trace anywhere on the cube, except for the corners &
edges?
5. One of Mr. Bajaj, his wife, their son and Mr. Bajaj's mother is an Engineer and another
is a Doctor.

If the Doctor is a male, then the Engineer is a male.

If the Engineer is younger than the Doctor, then the Engineer and the Doctor are not
blood relatives.
If the Engineer is a female, then she and the Doctor are blood relatives.

Can you tell who is the Doctor and the Engineer?

6. Three men - Sam, Cam and Laurie - are married to Carrie, Billy and Tina, but not
necessarily in the same order.
Sam's wife and Billy's Husband play Carrie and Tina's husband at bridge. No wife

partners her husband and Cam does not play bridge.

Who is married to Cam?
7. There are 3

persons X, Y and Z. On some day, X lent tractors to Y and Z as many as

they had. After a month Y gave as many tractors to X and Z as many as they have. After
a month Z did the same thing. At the end of this transaction each one of them had 24.
Find the tractors each originally had?
8. A certain street has 1000 buildings. A sign-maker is contracted to number the houses
from 1 to 1000. How many zeroes will he need?
9. There are 9 coins. Out of which one is odd one i.e weight is less or more. How many
iterations of weighing are required to find odd coin?
10. In a sports contest there were m medals awarded on n successive days (n > 1).
1. On the first day 1 medal and 1/7 of the remaining m - 1 medals were awarded.
2. On the second day 2 medals and 1/7 of the now remaining medals was awarded; and so
on.

3. On the nth and last day, the remaining n medals were awarded.
How many days did the contest last, and how many medals were awarded altogether?

11. A number of 9 digits has the following properties:

The number comprising the leftmost two digits is divisible by 2, that comprising the
leftmost three digits is divisible by 3, the leftmost four by 4, the leftmost five by 5, and so
on for the nine digits of the number i.e. the number formed from the first n digits is
divisible by n, 2<=n<=9.
Each digit in the number is different i.e. no digits are repeated.
The digit 0 does not occur in the number i.e. it is comprised only of the digits 1-9 in some
order.

Find the number.

12. 1/3

rd of the contents of a container evaporated on the 1st day. 3/4th of the remaining
contents of the container evaporated on the second day.
What part of the contents of the container is left at the end of the second day?
13. Vipul was studying for his examinations and the lights went off. It was around 1:00
AM. He lighted two uniform candles of equal length but one thicker than the other. The
thick candle is supposed to last six hours and the thin one two hours less. When he finally
went to sleep, the thick candle was twice as long as the thin one.
For how long did Vipul study in candle light?

14. If you started a business in which you earned Rs.1 on the first day, Rs.3 on the second
day, Rs.5 on the third day, Rs.7 on the fourth day, & so on.
How much would you have earned with this business after 50 years (assuming there are
exactly 365 days in every year)?
15. A worker earns a 5% raise. A year later, the worker receives a 2.5% cut in pay, & now his
salary is Rs. 22702.68
What was his salary to begin with?
16. At

6'o a clock ticks 6 times. The time between first and last ticks is 30 seconds. How
long does it tick at 12'o.
17. 500 men are arranged in an array of 10 rows and 50 columns according to their heights.
Tallest among each row of all are asked to come out. And the shortest among them is A.
Similarly after resuming them to their original positions, the shortest among each column are
asked to come out. And the tallest among them is B.
Now who is taller A or B ?

18. In Mr. Mehta's family, there are one grandfather, one grandmother, two fathers, two mothers,
one father-in-law, one mother-in-law, four children, three grandchildren, one brother, two sisters,
two sons, two daughters and one daughter-in-law.
How many members are there in Mr. Mehta's family? Give minimal possible answer.
19. When Alexander the Great attacked the forces of Porus, an Indian soldier was captured by
the Greeks. He had displayed such bravery in battle, however, that the enemy offered to let him
choose how he wanted to be killed. They told him, "If you tell a lie, you will put to the sword, and if
you tell the truth you will be hanged."
The soldier could make only one statement. He made that statement and went free. What did he
say?

20. A person wanted to withdraw X rupees and Y paise from the bank. But cashier made a
mistake and gave him Y rupees and X paise. Neither the person nor the cashier noticed that.
After spending 20 paise, the person counts the money. And to his surprise, he has double the
amount he wanted to withdraw.
Find X and Y. (1 Rupee = 100 Paise)

21. The game of Tic-Tac-Toe is being played between two players. Only the last mark to be
placed in the game as shown.
Who will win the game, O or X? Can you tell which was the sixth mark and at which position? Do
explain your answer.
At the Party:

1. There were 9 men and children.

2. There were 2 more women than children.
3. The number of different man-woman couples possible was 24. Note that if there were 7
men and 5 women, then there would have been 35 man-woman couples possible.

4.
5.
6.

Also, of the three groups - men, women and children - at the party:
There were 4 of one group.
There were 6 of one group.
There were 8 of one group.

Exactly one of the above 6 statements is false.

Can you tell which one is false? Also, how many men, women and children are there at the party
Assume that both the players are intelligent enough.

22. The 7th mark must be placed in square 5 which is the win situation for both X and O. Hence,
the 6th mark must be placed in a line already containing two of the opponents marks. There are
two such possibilities - the 6th mark would have been either O in square 7 or X in square 9.
As we know both the players are intelligent enough, the 6th mark could not be O in square 7.
Instead, he would have placed O in square 5 and would have won.
Hence, the sixth mark must be X placed in square 9. And the seventh mark will be O. Thus O will
win the game.

23. There is a shortage of tubelights, bulbs and fans in a village - Kharghar. It is found that

All houses do not have either tubelight or bulb or fan.

exactly 19% of houses do not have just one of these.

atleast 67% of houses do not have tubelights.
atleast 83% of houses do not have bulbs.
atleast 73% of houses do not have fans.

What percentage of houses do not have tubelight, bulb and fan?

24. Mr. Subramaniam rents a private car for Andheri-Colaba-Andheri trip. It costs him Rs. 300
everyday.
One day the car driver informed Mr. Subramaniam that there were two students from Bandra who
wished to go from Bandra to Colaba and back to Bandra. Bandra is halfway between Andheri and
Colaba. Mr. Subramaniam asked the driver to let the students travel with him.
On the first day when they came, Mr. Subramaniam said, "If you tell me the mathematically
correct price you should pay individually for your portion of the trip, I will let you travel for free."
How much should the individual student pay for their journey?
25. Substitute digits for the letters to make the following Division true
OUT

-------------

STEM|DEMISE

|DMOC

-------------

TUIS

STEM

----------

ZZZE

ZUMM

--------

IST

Note that the leftmost letter can't be zero in any word. Also, there must be a one-to-one mapping
between digits and letters. e.g. if you substitute 3 for the letter M, no other letter can be 3 and all
other M in the puzzle must be
27. At what time after 4.00 p.m. is the minutes hand of a clock exactly aligned with the hour
hand?
28. A soldier looses his way in a thick jungle. At random he walks from his camp but
mathematically in an interesting fashion.
First he walks one mile East then half mile to North. Then 1/4 mile to West, then 1/8 mile to South
and so on making a loop.
Finally how far he is from his camp and in which direction?
29. Raj has a jewel chest containing Rings, Pins and Ear-rings. The chest contains 26 pieces. Raj
has 2 1/2 times as many rings as pins, and the number of pairs of earrings is 4 less than the
number of rings.
How many earrings does Raj have?
30. How many ways are there of arranging the sixteen black or white pieces of a standard
international chess set on the first two rows of the board?
Given that each pawn is identical and each rook, knight and bishop is identical to its pair.
Submitted

31. A person with some money spends 1/3 for cloths, 1/5 of the remaining for food and 1/4 of the
remaining for travel. He is left with Rs 100/How much did he have with him in the begining?

32. Grass in lawn grows equally thick and in a uniform rate. It takes 24 days for 70 cows and 60
days for 30 cows to eat the whole of the grass.
How many cows are needed to eat the grass in 96 days?

33. There is a safe with a 5 digit number as the key. The 4th digit is 4 greater than the second
digit, while the 3rd digit is 3 less than the 2nd digit. The 1st digit is thrice the last digit. There are 3
pairs whose sum is 11.
Find the number.
34. Four friends - Arjan, Bhuvan, Guran and Lakha were comparing the number of sheep that
they owned.
It was found that Guran had ten more sheep than Lakha.
If Arjan gave one-third to Bhuvan, and Bhuvan gave a quarter of what he then held to Guran, who
then passed on a fifth of his holding to Lakha, they would all have an equal number of sheep.
How many sheep did each of them possess? Give the minimal possible answer
35. Consider a number 235, where last digit is the sum of first two digits i.e. 2 + 3 = 5.
How many such 3-digit numbers are there?
36. Find the smallest number such that if its rightmost digit is placed at its left end, the new
number so formed is precisely 50% larger than the original number.
37. Two identical pack of cards A and B are shuffled throughly. One card is picked from A and
shuffled with B. The top card from pack A is turned up. If this is the Queen of Hearts, what are the
chances that the top card in B will be the King of Hearts?
38. There are 3 ants at 3 corners of a triangle, they randomly start moving towards another
corner.
What is the probability that they don't collide?
39. Find

all sets of consecutive integers that add up to 1000.

40. There is a 4-character code, with 2 of them being letters and the other 2 being numbers.
How many maximum attempts would be necessary to find the correct code? Note that the code is
case-sensitive.
41. How many possible combinations are there in a 3x3x3 rubics cube?
In other words, if you wanted to solve the rubics cube by trying different combinations, how many
might it take you (worst case senerio)?
How many for a 4x4x4 cube?
Submitted

42. Substitute digits for the letters to make the following relation true.
N E V E R

L E A V E

M E

-----------------

A L O N E

Note that the leftmost letter can't be zero in any word. Also, there must be a one-to-one mapping
between digits and letters. e.g. if you substitute 3 for the letter M, no other letter can be 3 and all
other M in the puzzle must be 3.

43. One of the four people - Mr. Clinton, his wife Monika, their son Mandy and their daughter
Cindy - is a singer and another is a dancer. Mr. Clinton is older than his wife and Mady is older
than his sister.

1. If the singer and the dancer are the same sex, then the dancer is older than the singer.
2. If neither the singer nor the dancer is the parent of the other, then the singer is older than
3.
4.
5.

the dancer.
If the singer is a man, then the singer and the dancer are the same age.
If the singer and the dancer are of opposite sex then the man is older than the woman.
If the dancer is a woman, then the dancer is older than the singer.

Whose occupation do you know? And what is his/her occupation?