adi_800 wrote:This reply is taken from Bob's notes..

Pronouns do not necessarily refer to the nearest eligible noun. If that were true, there would be no such thing as ambiguous pronoun reference. The real reason that "it" is not ambiguous in choice A is that the participle "enabling" refers to the Supreme Court, and so the object "it" of the participle refers to the object of the Supreme Court's award, the CIA.

I think
enabling is referring to powers not to supreme court

ing without comma always modifies noun / noun phase just before it.

FightWithGMAT wrote:

adi_800 wrote:This reply is taken from Bob's notes..

Pronouns do not necessarily refer to the nearest eligible noun. If that were true, there would be no such thing as ambiguous pronoun reference. The real reason that "it" is not ambiguous in choice A is that the participle "enabling" refers to the Supreme Court, and so the object "it" of the participle refers to the object of the Supreme Court's award, the CIA.

I think
enabling is referring to powers not to supreme court

ing without comma always modifies noun / noun phase just before it.

Agree. enabling can't refer SC. it is correctly modifying powers.
If 'enabling' change to 'making' A may be wrong either but, we can't imagine a situation that A gives power enabling somthing to B but A has a power.

I am also confused on the usage of this particular pronoun "it" in the sentence....................can someone shed some light please........

varundaga05 wrote:Hi

Can someone tell the issue with the option B.

I am not clear why we have discarded B.

How it in option A is pointing to CIA and it in option B is confusing

Please help

First to understand why A is correct and B is wrong we need to appreciate the way test makers made a subtle change in B to make a large difference.

'It' in A is not ambiguous because enabling modifies powers. Who possess these powers?-It is the CIA. So it has a clear antecedent.

Whereas, it in B does not have a clear antecedent because the sentence now uses 'for'.If we ask the question 'Who is trying to withhold blah blah blah...?' we will realize that logically it can stand for both, CIA and the supreme court

By a vote of 9 to 0, the supreme court awarded the CIA broad discretionary powers enabling it to withhold from the public the identities of "its" sources of intelligence information.

a. enabling it to withhold from the public
b. for it to withhold from the public
c. for withholding disclosure to the public of
d. that enable them to withhold from public disclosure
e. that they can withhold public disclosure of
===============================================================

In Question "its" is refering to CIA, so use of it in answer is not restricted.
Here it is wright.
"Awarded for" seems as if CIA has done something and they are awarded for it.
But to say CIA is awarded for CIA (it) is wrong. CIA is awarded for its loyalty or intelligence is correct. So "awarded for it" is wrong as "it" here refers to CIA.

So, the best answer here IMO is A.