The author is currently a faculty for Verbal in CPLC, Mumbai. Prior to CPLC, he was a faculty for Verbal in Career Launcher India Limited for several years. Both these institutes train candidates appearing for competitive exams like the CAT, CET, GMAT, GRE etc. The author is Masters in English literature from the University of Mumbai and has a Diploma in management. Apart from corporate experience of more than a decade, he has spent about the same time in teaching in the mainstream (India and abroad) and the parallel education. Over the years the author has trained tens of thousands of students appearing for competitive examinations. The inspiration for this book came from this experience. Grammar and Usage were perceived to be an unstructured area of the test; students felt it was not possible to prepare adequately in this area; there wasn't any single source from which they could learn the principles of grammar. This book is an effort to create such a source. Also, a bigger book might meet the same fate as any other grammar book – end up intimidating the students. Too many rules and technical vocabulary may help them become grammarians – which is missing the point again! Hence the book has tried to avoid both the pitfalls. The idea behind this book was to explain the principles that will help them answer questions in the examination, well as well as contribute to their overall proficiency.