Urdu Verb Conjugation Basics: Present, Past and Future

Every verb begins as an infinitive in -na

The dictionary form of an Urdu verb always ends in ـنا, romanised as -na: bolna (to speak), likhna (to write), parhna (to read), jana (to go), khana (to eat). Remove that ending and what remains is the stem - bol, likh, parh, ja, kha - the piece that every other form is built from.

One property of the verb matters before you conjugate anything: whether it is transitive, meaning it can take a direct object. Likhna and parhna are transitive because you write something and read something; bolna and jana are intransitive. That single fact decides how the verb behaves in the past tense, so it is worth noting alongside the meaning when you learn a new verb.

The copula: hoon, ho, hai, hain

Hona, 'to be', is the most common verb in the language and the ending of most other tenses, so it comes first. In the present it has four forms matched to the person: main hoon, tum ho, yeh hai or woh hai, and hum hain, aap hain, woh hain for the plurals. Notice what is missing - the present forms carry no gender at all.

Gender appears as soon as you move to the past. There the forms split four ways: tha for a masculine singular subject, thi for feminine singular, the for masculine plural, and thin for feminine plural. This is the pattern for the whole verb system, not just for hona - gender hides in the present and shows itself in the past.

Habitual present: stem plus ta, ti, te

For things you do generally or repeatedly, add ta, ti or te to the stem and follow it with the present form of hona. The ending agrees with the subject: ta for masculine singular, ti for feminine, te for masculine plural and for tum and aap. So main bolta hoon is 'I speak' from a man, main bolti hoon from a woman, and aap bolte hain is the respectful 'you speak'.

This is the tense English learners reach for far too rarely, because English uses the same simple present for habits and for what is happening right now. In Urdu the two are separate, and using the habitual for something happening at this moment sounds odd.

Present continuous: stem plus raha, rahi, rahe

To say something is happening right now, keep the stem and insert raha, rahi or rahe before the copula. The middle piece agrees with the subject in the same way as before: raha for masculine singular, rahi for feminine, rahe for plural. Main bol raha hoon is 'I am speaking'; hum sun rahe hain is 'we are listening'.

Once you see it, the architecture of the whole system becomes obvious. Stem, then an agreeing piece, then the copula. Change the middle piece and you change the aspect; change the copula and you change the time frame, since replacing hoon with tha gives 'I was speaking'.

The past, and the ne construction

With an intransitive verb the simple past is straightforward: the verb agrees with the subject in gender and number, so main gaya is 'I went' from a man and main gayi from a woman. Nothing else changes.

With a transitive verb in the past, Urdu does something no European language does. The subject takes the postposition ne, and the verb then agrees with the object instead of the subject. Main ne kitaab parhi has a feminine ending because kitaab is feminine, whoever is speaking. Main ne khat likha has the masculine ending because khat is masculine. There is one more wrinkle worth knowing early: if the object itself carries ko, the verb agrees with nothing at all and falls back to the plain masculine singular form.

• Intransitive past: no ne, and the verb agrees with the subject
• Transitive past: the subject takes ne, and the verb agrees with the object
• If the object carries ko, the verb stays in the default masculine singular
• ne appears only in the past - never in the present, the continuous or the future

The future: stem plus ga, gi, ge

The future is built from the stem, a personal ending, and finally ga, gi or ge, which carries gender and number. Main boloonga is 'I will speak' from a man and main boloongi from a woman; woh bolega and woh bolegi cover the third person; hum bolenge and aap bolenge take the plural.

The politeness override from the pronoun system applies here too, and this is where beginners slip most audibly. Aap always takes the plural, so aap karenge is correct and aap karega is not, however clearly the rest of the sentence is aimed at one person.

Commands come in politeness levels

Imperatives in Urdu are not one form but three, matched to how you address the person. With tum, add o to the stem: bolo, likho, suno. With aap, add iye: boliye, likhiye, suniye. For an extra layer of courtesy - a request to an elder, a first meeting with in-laws - add iyega instead: boliyega, suniyega, kijiyega. A handful of very common verbs are irregular in the aap form, notably karna, which gives kijiye rather than the shape the rule would predict.

That is the whole framework. Learn one verb thoroughly across all of these tenses and the rest follow the same moulds, with only a short list of irregular past forms to memorise separately. BolNama's verbs section gives hona, the most irregular verb of all, as a free sample table; the remaining conjugation tables and the grammar topics behind them are part of Premium.

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