The Imperfect Tense

The imperfect tense expresses an incomplete action in the past. Very often such an action has some duration or repetition. The imperfect tense may be used as an equivalent of the past indefinite tense in English.

The imperfect tense is formed by adding the past tense form of the verb 'to be' to the present participle. The latter always precedes the verb. The forms are as follows:

Singular: میں ، تو ، وہ جاتا تھا

maiN, tuu, vah jaataa thaa

'I, you, he, it went' (masculine)

میں ، تو ، وہ جاتی تھی

maiN, tuu, vah jaatii thii

'I, you, she, it went' (feminine)

Plural: ھم ، تم ، وہ ، آپ جاتے تھے

ham, tum, vah, aap jaate the

'we, you, they went' (masculine)

ھم ، تم ، وہ ، آپ جاتی تھیں

ham, tum, vah, aap jaatii thiiN

'we, you, they went' (feminine)

The participle agrees with the subject in number and gender.

In the negative sentences, the negative particle نہیں nahiiN ('not') can be put either before or after the participle.

ھم نہیں جاتی تھیں

ham nahiiN jaatii thiiN

'we (women) didn't go'.