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GRAMMAR SECTIONS
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Verbs
Syntax
Grammar
Possession
[-] Particles
Emphatic Particles April 20, 2012

Negative Particles
तो This section is just a very broad overview of some of the grammatical concepts related to Hindi verbs that are discussed in detail
भी elsewhere on the site. Please refer to individual articles for more detail.
यूँ
ही Verbs are words which convey an action or a state.

[-] Miscellaneous
Verbs have several basic attributes:
[-] Affixes
वाला
Tense
Echo Words Voice
Pair Words Mood
Interjections Aspect
Adverbs Person
Conditional Sentences Number
[-] Postpositions Gender
को Transitivity
Conjunctions Modality
[-] Verbals
[-] Participles Below is a concise summary of these characteristics, followed by tables that demonstrate the general forms of verbs.
Verb Stem + रहा
Habitual Participles
Future Participles Person
Passive Participles
Perfect Participles “Person” refers to the relative relationship between the speaker and the listener (or writer and reader). There are three

Imperfective Participles grammatical persons in Hindi: the first person, second person, and third person.

Conjunctive Participles
Infinitives
Number
[-] Verbs
Participle + जाना
Number refers to the plurality of the subject of a verb – i.e., whether it is singular or plural.
Compulsion Idioms
Infinitive + होना
Modality Gender
[-] Mood
Imperative Mood Hindi verbs have gender. English verbs, of course, have no gender. The gender of the verb is determined by the subject of the
Presumptive Mood verb, or in the case of most transitive perfect verbs, the gender is determined by the object of the verb (see the sections on
Subjunctive Mood transitivity and ergativity below).
Aspect
Tense Verbs have two grammatical genders: masculine, and feminine.
Negation
[-] Idiomatic Verbs
जाना Tense
चुकना
िमलना “Tense” refers to the relative time of the action.
चाहना
There are three basic tenses in Hindi:
चािहये
सकना
Present
देना
Past
पाना
Future
लगना
होना
[-] Voice Voice
Passive Voice
Causative Verbs Voice refers to the relationship between the subject of a verb and the action of the verb.
Iterative Constructions
Continuity There are two voices in Hindi:
Multiple Subjects
Ergativity Active
Transitivity Passive
Indirect Verb Constructions
Compound Verbs
Conjunct Verbs
The Active Voice
[-] Basic Verb Forms
If the verb employs the active voice, then the subject performs the action of the verb. For instance, in English, in the sentence
Future Perfect
“Jack threw the ball”, the verb “threw” is in the active voice. “Jack” is the subject of the verb, and the subject performed the action
Future Continuous
upon the object, “ball”.
Future Perfect Continuous
Past Perfect Continuous
Present Perfect Continuous The Passive Voice
Future
Past Perfective If the verb employs the passive voice, then the subject receives the action of the verb. For instance, in English, in the sentence
Past Perfect “The ball was thrown by Jack”, the verb “was thrown” is in the passive voice. Ball is the subject of the verb “was thrown”, yet
Present Perfect receives the action of the verb. The agent of the verb (who or what performed the action) is marked by the preposition “by” (the
Past Continuous “agentive preposition”).
Present Continuous
Past Habitual
Present Habitual Transitivity
[-] Adjectives
ऐसा A transitive verb is a verb which may take an object. In the sentence “Jack threw the ball”, “ball” is the object of the verb.

Reflexive Adjective
A sentence with an active, transitive verb can be transformed into an equivalent sentence with a passive verb, as in the previous
Indefinite Adjectives
example. Note that the object in the active sentence becomes the subject in the passive sentence, and the subject in the active
Interrogative Adjectives
sentence is marked with the agentive preposition, “by”.
Superlative Adjectives
Comparative Adjectives
Since only transitive verbs have objects, and the object of an active verb becomes the subject of a passive verb, in English only
[-] Pronouns
transitive verbs can have passive forms. However, in Hindi, intransitive verbs may also be grammatically passive. In Hindi, passive
Reflexive Pronouns
verbs may be used to express inability, or simply to express passivity.
Indefinite Pronouns
Relative Pronouns
Demonstrative Pronouns Ergativity
Interrogative Pronouns
Personal Pronouns Hindi is a so-called “partially ergative language”. In other words, in some situations, a verb must agree with its object, and not with
[-] Nouns its subject. This is very different than English, in which the subject always controls the verb. Hindi is only partially ergative, since
Case the verb agrees with the object only in a particular situation: when the verb is both transitive and perfect/perfective. Some verbs,
Gender however, are exceptions to this general rule.

For example, consider the following sentence:

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लड़के ने िकताब पढ़ी (“The boy read the book”).
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The verb पढ़ी is transitive and perfective, and therefore must concord with its object, िकताब (“book”). Thus, since िकताब is
feminine, the verb is feminine, although the agent (“boy”) is male. The agent (who or what performs the action) is marked with the
agentive postposition, ने.
NEWS

JANUARY 8, 2015

Happy New Year 2015! Aspect

Happy new year! Last year, I added about 30
new... Read “Aspect” refers to the kind of action of the verb. There are three basic verb aspects in Hindi:

JANUARY 1, 2014 Habitual Aspect

Happy New Year 2014! Continuous Aspect
Happy new year! I was very productive in Perfect Aspect
2013. I... Read Perfective Aspect

LINKS The Habitual Aspect

CrazyLassi's Hindi Lessons
The habitual aspect refers to habitual or general actions or states.

Glovico

The Continuous Aspect

Hindi Urdu Flagship
The continuous aspect refers to continual, ongoing actions or states.
Hindi Verbs

iSpeakHindi
The Perfective Aspect

The perfective aspect refers to actions which are viewed as a simple whole.
italki

Hindi has a past perfective verb form.

Jim Becker's Hindi Links

Justlearn The Perfect Aspect

KitaabWorld The “perfect” aspect is really a combination of aspect and tense which indicates a completed action which has relevance at some
time.
Learning Hindi
Hindi has a present perfect and past perfect in addition to the past perfective.

MindurHindi

Non-Aspectual Forms
Omniglot

Hindi has several verb forms which have no distinct aspect, such as the future tense verbs, imperative mood verbs, and some
PicturEverything.com's Online Guide subjunctive mood forms.

Trying to learn Hindi

Mood
Tutorical
The “mood” of a verb refers to a form of the verb which indicates modality. Modality qualifies the verb according to some category,
such as necessity, possibility, obligation, ability, etc.

There are four basic grammatical moods in Hindi:

The Indicative Mood

The Imperative Mood
The Subjunctive Mood
The Presumptive Mood

The Indicative Mood

The indicative mood is used for general indications. For instance, in English, the statement “I ate some food” indicates a certain
fact.

The Imperative Mood

The imperative mood is used to issue imperatives, such as commands and exhortations. For instance, the English sentence “Eat
some food” issues a command, and the sentence “Let’s eat some food” issues an exhortation.

The Subjunctive Mood

The subjunctive mood is used for subordinate clauses and various modalities, such as wishes, polite exhortations, possibilities,
uncertainties, conditional statements, etc.

The Presumptive Mood

The presumptive mood presumes some situation. For instance, the most common idiom in English used the word “must”: “He
must have eaten some food”.

Modality

Other kinds of modality can be expressed in Hindi which do not employ grammatical moods. In English, a the verbal auxiliary “can”
is used to express ability. This is an example of verbal modality, but it is not a grammatical mood. Likewise in Hindi, many kinds of
modalities can be expressed apart from grammatical moods.

Summary of Verb Forms

The basic genius of Hindi verbs is the combination of components which indicate verbal characteristics such as tense, aspect,
voice, and mood, etc. As such, the Hindi verbal system is quite elegant.

The most fundamental combination is aspect and tense/mood.

Usually, an aspectual component (usually a participle) is combined with a copula (form of the verb होना, “to be”) to create a
combination of aspect and tense/mood. The aspectual component also indicates gender, and the copula indicates tense (and
person, number, gender, and mood).

For instance, to form the “3rd person singular masculine present active continuous indicative” form of the verb जाना (“to go”),
simply combine the aspectual component जा रहा with the copula है, as in वह जा रहा है (“he/she/it is going”). To form the “1st
person plural present active habitual subjunctive” form of the verb रहना (“to remain/stay/abide/live(somewhere)”, simply combine
the habitual aspectual रहता with the component हो (third person singular present subjunctive form of होना), as in शायद वह वहां
रहता हो (“perhaps he lives there/used to live there”). Again, to form the “3rd person plural past active continuous indicative” form of
the verb जाना, simply combine the aspectual जा रहे with the copula थे, as in वे लोग जा रहे थे (“those people were going”).

Each component encodes part of the verbal characteristics. Since रहती encodes the feminine gender, singular (or plural) number,
and habitual aspect, and है encodes the third person, singular number, and indicative mood, the combination रहती है is third
person, singular, feminine, present, habitual, active, and indicative”.

It is very important to recognize these patterns, since it drastically simplifies learning Hindi verbs, versus simply memorizing the
many forms.

The basic aspectuals are as follows:

Habitual: the imperfective participle

Continuous: verb stem + form of रहा (the perfect participle of the verb रहना (“to remain/continue/abide”, etc.)

perfect: perfect participle

To demonstrate, review the tables below:

Indicative Mood

Verbs in the indicative mood can appear in the present, past, and future tenses.

Present Tense

Present tense indicative verbs can appear in the habitual, continuous, and perfect aspects.

Habitual Aspect

The present habitual form of a verb is formed as:

imperfective participle + form of होना

PRONOUN MASCULINE FORM FEMININE FORM

मैं खाता हूँ खाती हूँ

हम खाते हैं खाती हैं

आप खाते हैं खाती हैं

तुम खाते हो खाती हो

तू खाता है खाती है

यह/वह खाता है खाती है

ये/वे खाते हैं खाती हैं

Continuous Aspect

The present continuous verb form is formed as: verb stem + form of रहा + form of होना

PRONOUN MASCULINE FORM FEMININE FORM

मैं खा रहा हूँ खा रही हूँ

हम खा रहे हैं खा रही हैं

आप खा रहे हैं खा रही हैं

तुम खा रहे हो खा रही हो

तू खा रहा है खा रही है

यह/वह खा रहा है खा रही है

ये/वे खा रहे हैं खा रही हैं

Perfect Form

The present perfect form of a verb is formed as: perfect participle + form of होना. Note that although a perfective aspecual is used,
the aspect is that of the present perfect – a completed action which results in a state or relevant situation in the present time.

PRONOUN MASCULINE FORM FEMININE FORM

मैं खाया हूँ खाईखायी हूँ

हम खायेखाए हैं खाईखायी हैं

आप खायेखाए हैं खाईखायी हैं

तुम खायेखाए हो खाईखायी हो

तू खाया है खाईखायी है

यह/वह खाया है खाईखायी है

ये/वे खायेखाए हैं खाईखायी हैं

Past Tense

Past indicative verbs can appear in the habitual, continuous, perfect, and perfective aspects.

Habitual Aspect

The past habitual form of a verb is formed as:

imperfective participle + past tense form of होना

PRONOUN MASCULINE FORM FEMININE FORM

मैं खाता था खाती थी

हम खाते थे खाती थीं

आप खाते थे खाती थीं

तुम खाते थे खाती थीं

तू खाता था खाती थी

यह/वह खाता था खाती थी

ये/वे खाते थे खाती थीं

Continuous Aspect

The present continuous verb form is formed as: verb stem + form of रहा + past tense form of होना

PRONOUN MASCULINE FORM FEMININE FORM

मैं खा रहा था खा रही थी

हम खा रहे थे खा रही थीं

आप खा रहे थे खा रही थीं

तुम खा रहे थे खा रही थीं

तू खा रहा था खा रही थी

यह/वह खा रहा था खा रही थी

ये/वे खा रहे थे खा रही थीं

Perfect Form

The past perfect form of a verb is formed as: perfect participle + past tense form of होना. The aspect/tense is that of the past
perfect – a past action which resulted in a state which had relevance at some past time. For instance, in English, “I had finished
my work”.

PRONOUN MASCULINE FORM FEMININE FORM

मैं खाया था खाईखायी थी

हम खायेखाए थे खाईखायी थीं

आप खायेखाए थे खाईखायी थीं

तुम खायेखाए थे खाईखायी थीं

तू खाया था खाईखायी थी

यह/वह खाया था खाईखायी थी

ये/वे खायेखाए थे खाईखायी थीं

Future Tense

The future tense is formed as: verb stem + first suffix + second suffix

The first set of suffixes is:

SUFFIX CONDITION

ऊँ If the subject is मैं

ओ If the subject is तुम

ए If the subject is singular

एँ If the subject is plural

The second set of suffixes is:

SUFFIX CONDITION

गा If the subject is masculine and singular

गे If the subject is masculine and plural

गी If the subject is feminine, whether singular or plural

PRONOUN MASCULINE FORM FEMININE FORM

मैं खाउँ गा खाऊँगी

हम खाएँ गे खाएँ गी

आप खाएँ गे खाएँ गी

तुम खाओगे खाओगी

तू खाएगा खाएगी

यह/वह खाएगा खाएगी

ये/वे खाएँ गे खाएँ गी

Imperative Mood

The imperative form of a verb is formed by adding a suffix. The suffix indicates the relative social status of the speaker/writer
versus the addressee.

KIND SUFFIX

Intimate none (verb stem alone)

Familiar ओ

Formal इए/इये

Neutral ना (identical to the infinitive)

Deferential इएगा/इयेगा

KIND FORM

Intimate खा

Familiar खाओ

Formal खाइयेखाइए

Neutral खाना

Deferential खाइएगा/खाइयेगा

Subjunctive Mood

The subjunctive mood is used for hypothetical situations and in subordinate clauses, etc.

Refer to the article about the subjunctive mood for more information.

Present/Past Tense

Non-aspectual

The basic subjunctive is formed like the future tense form of a verb, without the secondary suffix.

PRONOUN FORM

मैं खाउँ

हम खाएँ

आप खाएँ

तुम खाओ

तू खाए

यह/वह खाए

ये/वे खाएँ

Habitual Aspect

The habitual subjunctive form of a verb is formed as:

imperfective participle + subjunctive form of होना

PRONOUN MASCULINE FORM FEMININE FORM

मैं खाता हूँ होऊँ खाती हूँ होऊँ

हम खाते हों खाती हों

आप खाते हों खाती हों

तुम खाते हो खाती हो

तू खाता हो खाती हो

यह/वह खाता हो खाती हो

ये/वे खाते हों खाती हों

Continuous Aspect

The continuous subjunctive verb form is formed as: verb stem + form of रहा + subjunctive form of होना

PRONOUN MASCULINE FORM FEMININE FORM

मैं खा रहा हूँ होऊँ खा रही हूँ होऊँ

हम खा रहे हों खा रही हों

आप खा रहे हों खा रही हों

तुम खा रहे हो खा रही हो

तू खा रहा हो खा रही हो

यह/वह खा रहा हो खा रही हों

ये/वे खा रहे हों खा रही हों

Perfect Form

The subjunctive perfect form of a verb is formed as: perfect participle + subjunctive form of होना

PRONOUN MASCULINE FORM FEMININE FORM

मैं खाया हूँ होऊँ खाईखायी हूँ होऊँ

हम खायेखाए हों खाईखायी हों

आप खायेखाए हों खाईखायी हों

तुम खायेखाए हो खाईखायी हो

तू खाया हो खाईखायी हो

यह/वह खाया हो खाईखायी हो

ये/वे खायेखाए हों खाईखायी हों

The following 20 articles are posted under this category:

Infinitive + होना

Compulsion Idioms

Participle + जाना

Negation

Tense

Aspect

Mood

Indirect Verb Constructions

Transitivity

Ergativity

Multiple Subjects

Continuity

Iterative Constructions

Causative Verbs

Voice

Idiomatic Verbs

Modality

Compound Verbs

Conjunct Verbs

Basic Verb Forms

« Infinitives Grammar Participle + जाना »

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Name

Kamlini s • a year ago

hi david

what does गन्दगी पैदा कर िदया करते हैं , mean ?

what type of verb construction is कर िदया करते हैं ? please direct me to the appropriate page to learn more about this
construction

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