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18 PROBABILITY
Probability Results on probability
The term probability refers to the chance of happening or not (i) For any event A and B, we have :
happening of an event. P ( A  B )  P( A )  P( B )  P( A  B )
(ii) If the events are mutually exclusive and exhaustive. The
Sample space sum of the individual probabilities = 1
The set of all possible and distinct outcomes of an experiment
P (a)  P(A)  1.
is called the Sample Space of that experiment and is denoted by
S. Each element of the sample space is called a sample point. So , P ( A)  1  P (a )
n(s) denotes the number of elements of S.
(iii) Range of probability is 0  P ( E )  1
Exhaustive cases
Ex.1 Find the probability of getting at least one head when two
All possible out comes of an event are known as exhaustive coins are tossed.
cases.  S = [HH, TH, HT, TT]  n(S) = 4
E = {HH, TH, HT}  n[E] = 3
Favorable cases
P(E) = ¾
The number of outcomes which result in the happening of a
desired event are called favorable cases. Ex.2 Find the probability of getting a multiple of 2 in the
Thus in a single throw of a dice the no. of favorable cases of throw of a die.
getting an odd no. are three i.e. 1, 3 and 5.  S = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6}
 n(S) = 6
Mutually exclusive events Let A be the event that the die shows a multiple of 2.
Two or more events are said to be mutually exclusive if the A = {2, 4, 6}
happening of any one of them excludes the happening of all  n(A) = 3
other in a single experiment. Thus in the throw of a single dice n( A) 3 1
the event 5 and 6 are mutually exclusive . P ( A)   
n( S ) 6 2
Equally likely events
Ex.3 Find the probability that the birthday of a child is on a
Two or more events are said to be equally likely if the chance Saturday or Sunday.
of their happening is equal. In the throw of an unbiased coin  n(a) = 2; n(S) = 7 then p(a) = 2/7
the coming up of head or tail is equally likely.
Ex.4 A bag contains 7 red, 5 blue, 4 white and 4 black balls.
Independent and dependent event Find the probability that a ball drawn at random is red or
An event is said to be independent if its happening is not white.
affected by the happening of other events. Thus in the throw of 20
 A ball can be selected from 20 in C1 = 20 ways.
a dice repeatedly, coming up of 5 on the first throw is n(S) = 20
independent of coming up of 5 again in the second throw. Let A be an event that the ball drawn is red or white.
An event is said to be dependent if its happening is affected by
 n ( A )  7 C 1  4 C 1  7  4  11
the happening of other event. Thus if we are successively
 p(a) = 11/20
drawing cards from a pack the events would be dependent.
Ex.5 A committee of 5 students is to be chosen from 6 boys and
Formula to compute probability of an event 4 girls. Find the probability that the committee contains
If an event can happen in ‘m’ ways and fail to happen in ‘n’ exactly 2 girls.
ways then the probability (P) of the happening of the event is 10
 5 students can be selected from 10 in C5 ways
given by
n(S) = 252
m
P= n(a) = 4
C 2  6 C 3  6  20  120
mn
No. of cases favourable to the occurence of the event n( A) 120 10
= p(a) =  
Total no. of exhaustive cases n( S ) 252 21
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EXERCISE

1. A and B are two mutually exclusive events such that 9. 3 coins are tossed simultaneously, what is the
1 1
probability of getting at least one tail ?
P (a) = and P (b) = . Find P(A  B) 1 3 7
3 5
(a) (b) (c) (d) 1
1 8
8 8 8
(a) (b) 4
15 15
10. If the probability of A failing in an competition is
5
7 7
(c) (d) None of these and that of B failing the same competition is , then
15 10
the probability that either A or B fails is :
2. From a pack of 52 cards, two are drawn one by one
without replacement. Find the probability that both of 1 11
(a) (b)
them are jacks. 2 25
1 11 25 5 19
(a) (b) (c) (d) (c) (d) None of these
221 850 204 24 50
3. 4 cards are drawn from a well-shuffled pack of 52 11. 51 tickets are numbered from 1 to 51. One ticket is
cards. Find the probability that they are of black color drawn at random out of these tickets. What is the
or face cards.
probability that the ticket number is a multiple of 2 or 5 ?
2 3 4 2 1
(a) (b) (c) (d) None (a) (b)
5 5 5 5 5
4. The probability of raining on day 1 is 0.3 and on day 3
2 is 0.5, What is the probability of raining on both the (c) (d) None of these
5
days ?
(a) 0.2 (b) 0.15 (c) 0.06 (d) 0.25 12. Out of 13 candidates for a job, there are 4 girls and 9
boys. It is desired to select 2 persons for the job. The
5. If a dice is thrown 4 times, what is the probability that
probability that atleast one of the selected person will
an odd number will come up exactly 3 times ?
be a girl is :
8 1 3 5 (a) 25/39 (b) 5/13 (c) 14/39 (d) 7/13
(a) (b) (c) (d)
16 4 16 16
13. Pankaj has 10 pairs of dark black socks and 10 pairs of
6. What is the probability that there are 53 Mondays red socks. He keeps them all in the same bag. If he
and 53 Tuesdays in a leap year ? picks out three socks at random, then what is the
(a) 1/7 (b) 2/7 probability that he will get a matching pair ?
(c) 0 (d) None of these (a) ( 210 C 210C1 ) / 20 C3 (b) (10 C 310C1 ) / 20 C 3
(c) 1 (d) None of these
7. Two dice are thrown. The probability that the same
number will appear on each of them is 14. A bag contains 5 blue, 3 black and 10 red balls. If three
balls are drawn at random, find the probability that one
1 1
(a) (b) is blue, one is black and one is red.
6 18
4 5 25 9
1 (a) (b) (c) (d)
(c) (d) None of these 21 147 136 19
36
15. In a race where 3 horses are running, the chance that
8. A bag contains 7 green and 3 blue balls. Two balls are 1 1
drawn at random. Find the probability that they are of horse A will win is , that B will win is and that
5 15
the same color.
1
7 3 C will win is . Assuming that a dead heat is
10
(a) (b) impossible. Find the chance that one of them will win.
15 5
8 11 1 1 1
(c) (d) None of these (a) (b) (c) (d)
15 30 480 160 240
 [ 83 ]
16. In an essay competition, the odds in favor of 24. A bag contains 21 tickets numbered from 1 to 21. A
competitors A, B, C, D are 1 : 4, 1 : 5, and 1 : 6 and ticket is drawn and then another ticket is drawn
1 : 7 respectively. Find the probability that one of without replacement. Find the probability that both
them wins the competition. tickets will show even numbers.
114 1 319 17 5 3 4 9
(a) (b) (c) (d) (a) (b) (c) (d)
120 120 420 114 12 14 19 11

17. In a bag containing 13 white and 5 black balls. Two 25. What is the probability that a number selected from the
balls are chosen at random and the first one is found numbers 1, 2, 3,….,30 is prime number, when each of
to be white. The probability that the second one is the given numbers is equally likely to be selected ?
also white is. 3 1
(a) (b)
11 12 13 5 25 3
(a) (b) (c) (d)
17 17 18 17 11
(c) (d) None of these
30
18. If the probability of A to fail in an examination is 0.2
and that of B is 0.3, then the probability that either A 26. One card is drawn from a pack of 52 cards, each of the
or B fails is 52 cards being equally likely to be drawn. Find the
(a) 0.5 (b) 0.06 (c) 0.44 (d) 0.1 probability that the card drawn is red and a queen.
1 7 1 1
19. In a class of 11 pupils, 5 are boys and the remaining (a) (b) (c) (d)
are girls. From it 2 pupils are selected at random. The
13 13 26 2
probability that both are girls, will be.
27. A word consists of 10 letters; 6 consonants and 4
2 vowels. Three letters are chosen at random. What is the
5 6 6 3 probability that more than one vowel will be selected ?
(a) (b) (c)   (d)
11 11  11 11
17 1 1 4
(a) (b) (c) (d)
20. The probability that a company executive will travel
42 3 7 5

2 1 28. A bag containing 4 black and 8 red, balls, two balls are
by plane is , and will travel by train is . Find the drawn from the bag in succession without replacement.
5 3
probability of his travelling by plane or by train. What is the probability that both the balls are red ?

11 2 3 1 1 5 13 14
(a) (b) (c) (d) (a) (b) (c) (d)
15 15 5 15 7 11 33 33
29. The probability of success of three students P, Q and R
21. What is the chance of throwing a number greater than 1 1 1
in one examination are , and respectively. Find
3 with an ordinary dice whose faces are numbered 2 3 4
from 1 to 6 ? the probability of success of at least two.
2 2 1 1 1 7 7 3
(a) (b) (c) (d) (a) (b) (c) (d)
3 5 3 2 6 25 24 5
30. A boy and his friend appear in an interview for two
22. Two balls are to be drawn from a bag containing 4 red
and 6 yellow balls, find the chance that both balls will vacancies in the same post. The probability of boy’s
be yellow. selection is (1/3) and the probability of his friend’s
selection is (1/5). What is the probability that only one
7 5 1 10 of them is selected ?
(a) (b) (c) (d)
12 3 3 22 4 2 8 2
(a) (b) (c) (d)
5 7 15 5
23. Out of 10 outstanding students in a college, there are
4 boys and 6 girls. A team of five students is to be 31. Find the probability that the number chosen randomly
selected for a program. Find the probability that three from the first 1000 natural numbers is a multiple of 4 or
are boys and two are girls. a perfect square.
11 9 10 5 530 133 381 1093
(a) (b) (c) (d) (a) (b) (c) (d)
25 11 21 21 200 500 1000 4000
[ 84 ]
32. The probability that a man will get a plumbing contract 38. Amelia, Betty, Cindy, Dorothy, Elly and Frida are
seated on chairs numbered 1 to 6 respectively. Their
2
is .The probability that he will not get an electric birthdays fall on the 21st, 2nd, 19th, 31st, 18th and 5th,
3
respectively of the same month. If the seat number of
5 a lady matches with the remainder of her birth date
contract is . If the probability of getting at least one
9 when the birth date is divided by 15, we say that she
is “properly seated” else we say that she is “wrongly
4
contract is , what is the probability that he will get seated”. How many of these ladies are ‘wrongly
5 seated’ and in how many other ways could these
both the contracts? wrongly seated ladies have been ‘wrongly seated’?
14 24 14 7 (a) 5, 9 (b) 5, 44 (c) 5, 74 (d) 5, 43
(a) (b) (c) (d)
9 45 45 9
39. There are 3 books on Mathematics, 4 books on
33. There are 30 coins out of which 20 are biased. Out of Geography and 6 books on Microbiology (all these
the 20 biased coins, 15 always show head while the rest books are distinguishable) which are to be arranged on
always show tails. The probability of getting at least 14 a shelf. Let A be the event that no two books on
tails in a single throw of 30 coins is: Microbiology are together and B be the event that all
(a) 10 × 2-40 (b) 11 × 2-20 the books on the same subject are always together. Find
(c) 10 × 2 -10
(d) 11 × 2-10 the ratio of the probability of the event A occurring to
that of the probability of event B.
34. From a pack of 52 well shuffled cards, if two cards are 490 30
drawn one after the other without replacement, what is (a) (b)
3 7
the probability that neither of them is a 5 or a 7?
75 81
473 4 473 (c) (d)
(a) (b) (c) (d) None 221 65
668 51 663
Directions (40 - 41) : Answer the questions on the basis of
1 P 4P  1 6P  1 the data given below.
35. If , , are the probabilities of three
3 2 4
mutually exclusive events, then p lies in which of the 1 2 3
following intervals?
1 3  1 17   1 17   5 17  4 5 6
(a)  ,  (b)  ,  (c)  ,  (d)  , 
14 14   4 38   6 38   38 38 
7 8 9
36. Each cell in a 4 × 2 grid is to be painted with one colour
out of four colours red, blue, green and yellow, such
The figure given above shows a square sheet of paper
that no two squares painted with the same colour are in
which, when folded along the dotted lines, is divided
the same row or in the same column. Find the number
into nine congruent squares. An open box (cube) is to
of ways to do this.
be formed using this sheet of paper such that:
(a) 4! × 8! (b) 23 × 4! (c) 9 × 2! (d) 9 × 4!
(i) Each face of the cube to be formed is one of the small
37. Raju is a movie freak. Last Sunday, he watched five squares.
movie shows one after the other in his favourite (ii) The square that form the cube must not be cut out
multiplex. This multiplex has six screens, each screen separately; instead they must be folded along the dotted
showing a different movie. On each screen, a movie is lines to form the cube.
repeated five times a day. If Raju watched exactly one
movie twice and the other three movies only once, then (iii) There should be no overlap o f any two squares.
in how many ways could he have watched the movies? The squares that are not required to form the cube may
be cut out from the sheet of paper.
3! 6!
(a) 6  (b) 60
2! 2! 40. If only square 1 is colored yellow, then in how many
6! 5! ways can a cube with one yellow face be formed?
(c) 6 (d) 6 (a) 6 (b) 2 (c) 11 (d) 8
2! 2!
 [ 85 ]
41. If the squares in first row are colored red, those in the 44. In a residential colony, 60% are males. If 5% of the
second row are colored green and those in the third males are children (boys) and 10% of the females are
row are colored blue, then in how many ways can we children (girls), find the probability that a child selected
form a cube whose faces are of only 2 colours? at random happens to be a boy.
(a) 6 (b) 5 (c) 8 (d) None
5 3 108 4
(a) (b) (c) (d)
42. Amit and Bhargav are playing a game of cards. They 14 7 203 7
play n games in all. Each of them gets 1 points for their
first win, 2 points for their respective second wins, 4 45. The probabilities of two events are such that
points for their respective third wins and so on. Amit 2 1 2
wins more games than Bhargav does. The sum of ht P (A  B)  ,  P (A B) 
5 10 10
epoints earned by Amit and Bhargav is 574. How many
If on a graph, P(A) is represented on the X-axis and
games does Amit win?
P(b) is represented on the Y – axis, then what is the
(a) 9 (b) 7 (c) 5 (d) 6
area of the region (on the graph) in which every point
43. The odds are 7 to 5 against A, a person who is now 30 satisfies the above relations ?
years old for living up to 70 yrs and the odds are 2 to
17 119
3 in favour of B who is now 40 yrs for living up to 80 (a) (b)
20 200
yrs. What is the probability that at least one of these two
persons will be alive 40 yrs hence? 19 40
(c) (d)
18 13 13 11 40 70
(a) (b) (c) (d)
20 14 20 12

NOTES :
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