Future participles indicate an imminent action or an action which is going to happen some time in the future.
Their form is as follows:
[masculine singular oblique form of an infinitive|form of वाला]
For instance: जानेवाले लोग (“the people who are about to go”)
The suffix may be adjoined or separated from the masculine singular oblique form of the infinitive:
जाने वाले
Like other participles, future participles may be used attributively:
दिल्ली जाने वाले लोग वहां खड़े हुए हैं – “The people who are about to go to Delhi are standing over there”
They may also be used predicatively:
हम दिल्ली जानेवाले हैं – “We are about to go to Delhi”
The predicate use of future participles may be viewed as a finite verbal usage. In other words, the form
[masculine singular oblique infinitive|वाला] [form of होना] can be viewed as a kind of future verb form, often implying imminent action:
मैं कुछ तो बोलने वाली थी – “I was going to say something”
6 replies on “Future Participles”
other than wale there can be other elements for showing future participle? its my question
No, “wala” is the only suffix use with future participles.
Hello,
First thanks for your website, it seems to me to be pretty accurate and complete. I had a question, it’s something you just can’t say in English without a periphrasis because the modality in English is, well, expressed through modals and not regular verbs.
“He was going to have the power to do X” which I actually would like to say “He was going to be able to do X” but English isn’t that flexible I think. In Hindi, I had guessed it could be “वह X कर सकने वाला था”, and after looking up I see you can use the future participle with the past perfective: मैं कुछ तो बोलने वाली थी – “I was going to say something”.
But I have a native speaker with me, and she says “you can’t say it” but without any other argument, so I thought I could ask a knowledged person about that. I know it’s grammatically correct and that it can convey a meaning, or at least that it has a meaning in some languages, but I’m curious about why it wouldn’t make sense to a native speaker’s ear.
Thanks
Thanks, I’m glad you like the site. That’s a good question. Indeed, the sentence “वह X कर सकने वाला था” is incorrect. The reason is that compound verbs cannot be used in certain situations (see the heading “When Compound Verbs Are Not Used” on the page https://hindilanguage.info/hindi-grammar/verbs/compound-verbs/). Compound verbs are those verbs that are comprised of a verb stem (e.g. कर) followed by some form of an auxiliary verb (e.g. सकना). The list on the page I mentioned above is not complete. Compound verbs can be used in habitual participles; here’s an actual example from a Microsoft support webpage written in Hindi: “अगर आप किसी कंप्यूटर को स्वतः लॉग ऑन के लिए सेट करते हैं, तो कंप्यूटर तक भौतिक पहुँच कर सकने वाला कोई भी व्यक्ति कंप्यूटर की सभी सामग्री तक पहुँच प्राप्त कर सकता है, जिसमें ऐसे सभी नेटवर्क शामिल हैं, जिससे वह कनेक्ट हो” (translation: “If you set a computer for automatic log on, then any person with physical access to the computer can obtain access to the entire contents of the computer”). In this example, the participle was “भौतिक पहुँच कर सकने वाला” (“able to physically access”). However, in my limited experience, I’ve only seen such participles (i.e. those containing compound verbs) used as habitual participles. I’ve never seen them used as future participles. My best guess is that there is one more rule to add: compound verbs aren’t used in future participles. Future and habitual participles have the same form in Hindi, e.g. “करने वाला”; what distinguishes them is the context, e.g. when followed by some form of होना like था or है we know that a future participle is intended, as in “मैं थोड़ा काम करने वाला हूँ” – “I’m going to do some work”).
Well thanks, it’s pretty complete. But then how would you say “He was going to be able to do…”, you would have to use a periphrasis? Notice English is using a periphrasis already because their modals have a very restricted use, hehe.
Your blog is very good btw, I get to say that in every comment but I’m actually impressed, you’re the only proper one I have seen and you give the right insights on how to analyse the structures with the proper terms. Did you get to study Hindi at a graduate level? Also, woukd you be aware of any dictionary that would be accurate and a little complete? For example, especially for verbs, I need to know how they are used, like if you just say मिलना is to meet, you cannot make up a sentence out of it, you need to know if it’s transitive, intransitive then with which postposition, etc. I think the Collins online isn’t doing that much of a bad job already, but if you have better in mind, I’m in.
That’s a good question. Rather than using सकना, perhaps we could use words like संभव (possible) or क्षमता (ability) or सक्षम (capable) to express the sentence. These words are a bit formal, though. One example is “वह X करने में सक्षम होने वाला था” (fill in something for X); this is literally “He was going to be capable of doing X”. That’s the best I can do! Ask the Hindi-speaker you mentioned if this sentence seems natural.
Thanks for your kind compliments. I have not formally studied Hindi in any academic institution. My wife speaks Hindi as her first language, and I’ve been exposed to a lot of Hindi conversations; I’ve just been trying to figure out what everyone is saying! 🙂 I have read a lot of books about Hindi as well. Before I studied Hindi, I had studied ancient Greek, where I learned to analyze grammar.
I own the Oxford Hindi-English dictionary, but I don’t consult it often. Most often, I use my very own personal dictionary (i.e. my wife). 🙂 I use shabdkosh.com occasionally, and Google Translate is often helpful as a dictionary or thesaurus. However, none of these resources offers examples in context, unfortunately. Google Translate is pretty good – you can type a sentence (in English or French) and it will usually give you a reasonable translation; of course, there’s always a risk that the sentence it creates is awkward. The way I learned a lot of vocabulary was by reading BBC Hindi news articles. Good luck with learning Hindi, and let me know if you have any more questions.