Bengali verbs take a number of suffixes to convey person, formality, and tense. Notably, unlike many other Indo-Aryan languages, Bengali verbs do not inflect for number.
Bengali verbs fall into a number of inflectional patterns depending on the quality of the vowel in the stem and the final consonant of the stem.
Note that this article mostly focuses on Cholito Bhasha, the modern standard of the Bengali language.
Bengali verbs have four basic impersonal forms from which other most forms can be derived. These are the verbal noun, infinitive, conditional participle, and perfect participle. They are characterized by the following endings:
The verbal noun the form used in most dictionaries to indicate a given verb in Bengali. It is often used with adjectival auxiliaries.
It is also often used with postpositions along with the genitive case suffix.
The stem of the verb can be derived by removing the "-a" suffix at the end. (Ex. "dekha" has a stem of "dekh-").
The infinitive is used in combination with auxiliary verbs.
The perfect participle forms the basis of the perfective present and past tense.
It is also combined with a variety of light verbs to add finer semantic distinctions.
The simple present is the most variable tense and is different across the various inflection patterns of Bengali verbs.
The simple past can be derived by taking the conditional participle and removing the final "-le"/-লে. This is then replaced with a simple past suffix based on the person being conjugated for. All past suffixes begin with the consonant "l".
There are two aspects in Bengali: progressive, denoting an ongoing or continuous action and perfective denoting a completed action. Each aspect can then be rendered in the present or past tense.
The present compound tenses are formed with the following suffixes:
The past compound tenses are formed with the root -chi-/-ছি- combined with the aforementioned simple past tense suffixes.
Consonant-final verbs are the verbs whose stems end in a consonant.
To form the simple present of a consonant-final verb, the following suffixes are affixed to the stem:
Simple verbs are verbs whose stem does not change from the verbal noun stem when written. These verbs usually have stem vowels of "ô" (অ) and "ê" (এ) in the verbal noun. While the spelling does not change, the pronunciation of the stem will change to "o" (ও) or "e" (এ) only in the first person and second person very informal conjugations.
To form a progressive tense of a simple verb, combine the compound tense suffixes with the stem of the verbal noun minus -a/-আ. In this case, the vowel will change to "o" or "e".
The perfective aspect is formed by taking the stem of the verbal noun and adding -e/-এ. In this case, the stem vowel will change to "o" or "e".
Umlauting verbs are characterized by a final consonant and a stem vowel of "e" (এ) or "o" (ও) in the verbal noun. This vowel is retained only in the simple present in 2nd person familiar, 3rd person familiar, and polite forms, as well as in the imperatives for 2nd person familiar and 2nd person very familiar. In all other forms of the verb, the stem vowel undergoes the changes of "e"/এ > "i"/ই and "o"/ও > "u"/উ.
Note that this alternation is often absent in Shadhu Bhasha and in Eastern Bengali. In these cases, all conjugations of the verb use a form with the "i" or "u" vowels; ergo, the verbal nouns of the above two verbs would be "খুঁজা (khũja)" and "লিখা (likha)".
These verbs show an alternation pattern where the verbal noun's stem vowel of "a"/আ changes to "e"/এ in the perfect participle only. All other verb forms retain the original stem vowel of "a".
Vowel-final verbs are the verbs whose stems end in a vowel. Between that vowel and most suffixes that begin in a vowel is the semivowel "ẇ" to act as a glide consonant. These verbs often show a high degree of vowel mutation across verb forms.
To form the simple present of a vowel-final verb, the following suffixes are used:
-aẇa verbs have a prominent stem vowel of -a-/-আ-. They show an alternation pattern of the vowel in their impersonal forms as follows:
| verbal noun | পাওয়া (paoẇa) |
|---|---|
| infinitive | পেতে (pete) |
| progressive participle | পেতে-পেতে (pete-pete) |
| conditional participle | পেলে (pele) |
| perfect participle | পেয়ে (peẏe) |
| habitual participle | পেয়ে-পেয়ে (peẏe-peẏe) |
| 1st person | 2nd person | 3rd person | 2nd person | 3rd person | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| very familiar | familiar | familiar | polite | |||
| simple present | পাই (pai) | পাস (pash) | পাও (pao) | পায় (paẏ) | পান (pan) | |
| present continuous | পাচ্ছি (pacchi) | পাচ্ছিস (pacchish) | পাচ্ছ (paccho) | পাচ্ছে (pacche) | পাচ্ছেন (pacchen) | |
| present perfect | পেয়েছি (peẏechi) | পেয়েছিস (peẏechish) | পেয়েছ (peẏecho) | পেয়েছে (peẏeche) | পেয়েছেন (peẏechen) | |
| simple past | পেলাম (pelam) | পেলি (peli) | পেলে (pele) | পেলো (pelo) | পেলেন (pelen) | |
| past continuous | পাচ্ছিলাম (pacchilam) | পাচ্ছিলি (pacchili) | পাচ্ছিলে (pacchile) | পাচ্ছিল (pacchilo) | পাচ্ছিলেন (pacchilen) | |
| past perfect | পেয়েছিলাম (peẏechilam) | পেয়েছিলি (peẏechili) | পেয়েছিলে (peẏechile) | পেয়েছিল (peẏechilo) | পেয়েছিলেন (peẏechilen) | |
| habitual/conditional past | পেতাম (petam) | পেতিস (petish) | পেতে (pete) | পেত (peto) | পেতেন (peten) | |
| future | পাব (pabo) | পাবি (pabi) | পাবে (pabe) | পাবে (pabe) | পাবেন (paben) | |