In the following question, out of the four alternatives, select the alternative which will improve the bracketed part of the sentence. In case no improvement is needed, select 'no improvement'. The sun hid behind a cloud and it seemed like a light (have been switched) off.?

Option 1 : had been switched

The correct answer is '1'

• The subject of the sentence is 'the sun' and the verb used is 'hid' that is past tense. 'behind' is a preposition and after a preposition, we need a prepositional object so 'a cloud' is a prepositional object.
• 'and' is coordinate conjunction that is going to take a parallelism rule. hence, 'seemed' is correct. The first action in this clause 'switching off the light' hence this action is going to be written in the past perfect tense.

So the correct sentence is- The sun hid behind a cloud and it seemed like a light had been switched off.