Active & Passive Voice: Active voice means that a sentence has a subject that acts upon its verb. Passive voice means that a subject is a recipient of a verb’s action.
Active & Passive Voice is one of the most important and scoring subjects in English section of major Bank exams such as IBPS, SBI, RBI etc. as well as SSC recruitment exams. In order to excel in this particular subject, you need to be proficient in English grammar.
Active and Passive Voice
Let us first understand the meaning of voice, and what is active voice and passive voice.
What is Voice of a verb?
The voice of a verb expresses whether the subject in the sentence has performed or received the action.
Example:
- The watchman opens the door.
- The door is opened by the watchman.
Types of Voices of Verb
Verbs have two voices
- Active Voice
- Passive Voice
Active Voice
In Active Voice, the one doing the action is mentioned as the subject and is given more importance, whereas the other one just participating in the action is mentioned as an object and given lesser importance.
For Example:
- Rajat spoke to Ramesh tonight.
(Here, Rajat is doing the action of speaking, so he is the subject; Ramesh is only participating in the action, so he is an object.)
Passive Voice
Although most of the sentences are written in Active form there are certain situations when people opt for passive sentences. Such cases happen when the doer of the action is either unidentified or doesn’t want to be identified. It also is used when the participant is more important than the doer of the action.
For Example:
- My car was stolen last night (You don’t know the identity of the thief)
- He was fired from the job (The guy who fired him doesn’t want to be identified)
- The Captain was praised for his performance (The ones praising are not as important here as the captain)
Forms of Active & Passive Voice For All Tenses
Here we mentioned forms of active and passive voice for all three main tenses.
Present Tenses
1. Simple Present
When a sentence in present tense becomes passive, we use “am, is, are” with the object of the sentence. The action changes from simple present to past participle.
Example:
- He picks me up at 10. (Active Voice)
- I am picked up at 10. (Passive Voice)
2. Present Progressive
In present progressive, we use the be-form (am, are, is) that’s suitable to the object along with “being”. The action word is changed from progressive to past participle form.
Example:
- I am speaking with him. (Active Voice)
- He is being spoken with. (Passive Voice)
3. Present Perfect
In present perfect, we use “have, has” with “been” with the object. The action word remains in past participle form.
Example:
- He has given her all the instructions. (Active Voice)
- She has been given all the instructions. (Passive Voice)
4. Present Perfect Progressive
In present perfect progressive, we use “been being” with the object. The action word remains in past participle form.
Example:
- I have been meeting him for a long time. (Active Voice)
- He has been being met for a long time. (Passive Voice)
Past Tenses
1. Simple Past
When a sentence in past tense becomes passive, we use “was, were” with the object of the sentence. The action word is changed from progressive to past participle form.
Example:
- He gave me the right advice. (Active Voice)
- I was given the right advice. (Passive Voice)
2. Past Progressive
In past progressive, we use the be-form (was, were) that’s suitable to the object along with “being”. The action word is changed from progressive to past participle form.
Example:
- I was talking to him. (Active Voice)
- He was being talked to. (Passive Voice)
3. Past Perfect
In past perfect, we use “had” and “been” with the object. The action word remains in past participle form.
Example:
- I had informed him about it earlier. (Active Voice)
- He had been informed about it earlier. (Passive Voice)
4. Past Perfect Progressive
In past perfect progressive, we use “been” and “being” together. The action word remains in past participle form.
Example:
- I had been meeting the children for twenty years. (Active Voice)
- The children had been being met for twenty years. (Passive Voice)
Future Tenses
1. Simple Future
When a sentence in future tense becomes passive, we use “will be” with the object of the sentence. The action will convert from simple present form to past participle form.
Example:
- I will speak to him. (Active Voice)
- He will be spoken to. (Passive Voice)
2. Future Progressive
In future progressive, we use the be-form (was, were) that’s suitable to the object along with “being”. The action word is changed from progressive to past participle form.
Example:
- He will be meeting Sarah next week. (Active Voice)
- Sarah will be being met next week. (Passive Voice)
3. Future Perfect
In future perfect, we use “had” and “been” with the object. The action word remains in past participle form.
Example:
- He will have gifted Rajesh the watch by now. (Active Voice)
- Rajesh will have had been gifted the watch by now. (Passive Voice)
4. Future Perfect Progressive
In future perfect progressive, we use “been” and “being” together. The action word remains in past participle form.
Example:
- He will have been talking to the Principal. (Active Voice)
- The Principal will have been being talked to. (Passive Voice)
Active & Passive Voice Rules For Conversion of Sentence
Below are the active-passive voice rules to follow for changing an active sentence into a passive voice. Before heading to the rules of active-passive voice, let’s check the examples of active and passive voice sentences.
Conversion of Active and Passive voice examples
- Rita wrote a letter. (Subject + Verb + Object)
- A letter was written by Rita. (Object) + (auxiliary verb) + (past participle) + (by subject).
- She cooks food. (Subject + Verb + Object)
- The food is cooked by her. (Object) + (auxiliary verb) + (past participle) + (by subject)
Rules for active-passive voice conservations
Here we mentioned some rules for active-passive voice conservations. This will help them gain conceptual knowledge and understand the variety of questions asked in the exams even better.
Rule 1. Identify the (S+V+O) Subject, Verb and object in the active sentence to convert to passive voice
Example:
- He drives car. (Subject – He, verb – Drives, object – Car)
Rule 2. Interchange the object and subject with each other, i.e. object of the active sentence become the subject of the passive sentence.
Example :
- Active voice : She knits sweater. (Subject – She, Verb – Knits, Object – Sweater)
- Passive Voice : The sweater is knitted by her. (Object sweater is interchanged with the subject She).
Rule 3. In passive voice sometimes the subject is not used, i.e. the subject in passive voice can be omitted if the sentence without it gives enough meaning.
Example :
- Milk is sold in liters
Rule 4. Change the base verb in the active sentence into the past participle ie. third form verb in a passive sentence i.e. preceded by (By, With, to, etc). Base verbs are never used in passive voice sentences.
Example:
- Active voice: She prepares dinner.
- Passive voice: The dinner is prepared by her.
- Active voice: She knows him.
- Passive voice: He is known to her.
- Active voice: Juice fills the jar.
- Passive voice: The jar is filled with juice.
Rule 5. While conversion of Active voice sentence to Passive voice sentence, the pronoun used in the sentence also changes in the following manner.
Example:
Active Voice Pronoun – Passive Voice Pronoun
- I – Me
- We – Us
- He – Him
- She – Her
- They – Them
- You – You
- It – It
Rule 6. Use the suitable helping or auxiliary verb (is/am/are/was, etc.). The rules for using auxiliary verbs in passive voice sentences are different for each tense.
Example:
- The letter is written by her
- A book was not bought by her
- Chocolates are being eaten by them.
Question with solved example:
Q1. − Tony makes lemonade.
A – Lemonade is made by Tony.
B – Lemonade is made by the Tony.
C – Lemonade was made by Tony.
D – Lemonade has made by Tony.
Q2. My father loves me.
A – I loved my father.
B – I was loved by my father.
C – I were loved by my father.
D – I am loved by my father.
Q3. We hate him.
A – He has hated by us.
B – He is hated by us.
C – He was hated by us.
D – He will hated by us.
Q4. Savita does not like me.
A – I am not like by Savita.
B – I am not liked by Savita.
C – I was not liked by Savita.
D – I were not liked by Savita.
Q5. My friends are watching the match.
A – The match is watched by my friends.
B – The match had being watched by my friends.
C – The match is being watched by my friends.
D – The match has being watched by my friends.
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