Hindi can use a negative passive-looking predicate to describe an inability that feels physical, practical, habitual, or beyond the person's control: मुझसे अब इतना चला नहीं जाता “I can't manage to walk this much anymore.” The person is marked by से, not treated as an agreeing nominative subject, and the predicate is built from a perfective participle plus जाना under negation.
This is not simply an ornate substitute for सकना. The construction presents the action as something that does not successfully proceed “from” the experiencer. Its grammar grows out of the impersonal passive, but its most characteristic interpretation is inability, intolerance, or failure despite an attempt.
The core construction
The basic pattern is:
experiencer + से + (patient) + negative [perfective participle + form of जाना]
मुझसे अब इतनी देर खड़ा नहीं रहा जाता।
mujhse ab itnī der khaṛā nahīṃ rahā jātā.
I can't manage to remain standing this long anymore.
उससे चुप नहीं बैठा जाता।
usse cup nahīṃ baiṭhā jātā.
They just can't sit quietly.
बच्चों से इतनी गर्मी में सोया नहीं जाता।
baccoṃ se itnī garmī meṃ soyā nahīṃ jātā.
The children can't manage to sleep in this heat.
The participles रहा, बैठा, and सोया do not agree with the experiencers. With no nominative patient, the predicate appears in default masculine singular. A plural बच्चों से therefore still takes सोया नहीं जाता, not plural सोए नहीं जाते.
The meaning often carries more lived difficulty than neutral सकना. मैं इतनी देर खड़ा नहीं रह सकता states inability. मुझसे इतनी देर खड़ा नहीं रहा जाता evokes the action as physically hard to sustain. Context can also make the construction express reluctance or inability to bring oneself to act.
Agreement: the experiencer never controls it
If a transitive verb has an unmarked patient, that patient can control gender-number agreement. Otherwise the predicate defaults to masculine singular. This is the same agreement logic found in ordinary passives, but the से phrase has an ability-holder interpretation rather than a neutral English-style “by” phrase.
| Controller | Example predicate | Features |
|---|---|---|
| इतना खाना | इतना खाना नहीं खाया जाता | masculine singular |
| इतनी मिठाई | इतनी मिठाई नहीं खाई जाती | feminine singular |
| इतने लंबे लेख | इतने लंबे लेख नहीं पढ़े जाते | masculine plural |
| इतनी मोटी किताबें | इतनी मोटी किताबें नहीं पढ़ी जाती हैं | feminine plural |
मुझसे इतनी मीठी मिठाई नहीं खाई जाती।
mujhse itnī mīṭhī miṭhāī nahīṃ khāī jātī.
I can't manage to eat sweets this sugary.
उससे इतने लंबे लेख एक दिन में नहीं पढ़े जाते।
usse itne lambe lekh ek din meṃ nahīṃ paṛhe jāte.
They can't get through such long articles in one day.
दादी से ये बड़ी गोलियाँ नहीं निगली जाती हैं।
dādī se ye baṛī goliyā̃ nahīṃ niglī jātī haiṃ.
Grandmother can't swallow these large pills.
In the last sentence feminine plural गोलियाँ controls निगली जाती हैं. Respect for दादी does not create plural agreement because दादी से is oblique. If a patient is itself marked with को, it cannot control agreement, and default masculine singular normally appears.
Habitual difficulty, an immediate failed attempt, and a past failure
Different outer layers locate the difficulty differently. The simple habitual नहीं जाता presents a recurring or characteristic limitation. Progressive नहीं जा रहा है highlights a current attempt that is not succeeding. Perfective नहीं गया can report that someone failed to accomplish the event, though context may also permit an ordinary agentless passive reading.
मुझसे यह ढक्कन खोला नहीं जा रहा है।
mujhse yah ḍhakkan kholā nahīṃ jā rahā hai.
I can't get this lid open.
कल मुझसे वह भारी बक्सा उठाया नहीं गया।
kal mujhse vah bhārī baksā uṭhāyā nahīṃ gayā.
Yesterday I couldn't manage to lift that heavy box.
अकेले हमसे इतना काम नहीं किया जाएगा।
akele hamse itnā kām nahīṃ kiyā jāegā.
We won't be able to do this much work alone.
The future example can shade into refusal: the speaker may be saying that the workload is not feasible, not diagnosing a permanent lack of skill. Hindi tense and aspect remain on the outer passive layers: lexical कर-, perfective किया, passive जा-, future -एगा. English “won't be able” is a natural translation, but there is no single Hindi word corresponding to the whole English modal phrase.
Why the construction strongly favors negation
The ability-like inference is licensed most clearly by नहीं. Remove negation and a superficially similar passive normally becomes a neutral event description, not “can.” For a plain affirmative ability, Hindi ordinarily uses सकना or another ability expression.
मैं यह मशीन चला सकता हूँ।
maĩ yah maśīn calā saktā hū̃.
I can operate this machine. (male speaker; neutral ability)
मुझसे यह मशीन चलाई नहीं जाती।
mujhse yah maśīn calāī nahīṃ jātī.
I can't manage to operate this machine.
क्या तुमसे पाँच किलोमीटर चला नहीं जाता?
kyā tumse pā̃c kilomīṭar calā nahīṃ jātā?
Can't you manage to walk five kilometers? (familiar; potentially challenging)
The negative question can sound surprised, impatient, or critical. A neutral information question is often better with क्या तुम पाँच किलोमीटर चल सकते हो? “Can you walk five kilometers?” The positive-looking क्या तुमसे इतना काम किया जाएगा? more readily asks whether that much work will be done through/by you; it does not automatically ask about ability.
Negation and auxiliary placement
Negation has two common positions. The intransitive impersonal pattern especially favors नहीं between the lexical participle and जाना: चला नहीं जाता, उठा नहीं जा रहा. With an explicit transitive patient, नहीं also naturally precedes the passive complex: यह दवा नहीं निगली जाती. Focus and rhythm can instead yield दवा निगली नहीं जाती. Neither placement changes the agreement controller.
In present habitual negatives, the final present copula may be omitted: मुझसे इतना खाया नहीं जाता is complete. Progressive forms normally retain है/हैं: खोला नहीं जा रहा है. The passive infinitive किया जाना cannot by itself serve as a finite inability statement.
Common Mistakes
Making the से-marked experiencer control agreement
❌ हमसे इतनी दूर चला नहीं जाते।
Incorrect — plural हमसे does not control the default impersonal predicate.
✅ हमसे इतनी दूर चला नहीं जाता।
hamse itnī dūr calā nahīṃ jātā.
We can't manage to walk that far.
Ignoring an unmarked feminine patient
❌ मुझसे यह दवा निगला नहीं जाता।
Incorrect — feminine दवा controls both participles.
✅ मुझसे यह दवा निगली नहीं जाती।
mujhse yah davā niglī nahīṃ jātī.
I can't swallow this medicine.
Using a direct pronoun before से
❌ मैंसे अब दौड़ा नहीं जाता।
Incorrect — मैं has the oblique form मुझ- before से.
✅ मुझसे अब दौड़ा नहीं जाता।
mujhse ab dauṛā nahīṃ jātā.
I can't manage to run anymore.
Leaving an infinitive as the whole predicate
❌ उससे इतना काम नहीं किया जाना।
Incorrect as a finite inability statement — किया जाना is only a passive infinitive.
✅ उससे इतना काम नहीं किया जाता।
usse itnā kām nahīṃ kiyā jātā.
They can't manage to do this much work.
Key Takeaways
- Mark the ability-holder with से and build the negative predicate from a perfective participle plus जाना.
- The से phrase never controls agreement; an unmarked patient controls it, otherwise masculine singular is the default.
- नहीं जाता, नहीं जा रहा, नहीं गया, and नहीं जाएगा present habitual, ongoing, past, and prospective difficulty.
- The construction is characteristically negative. Use सकना for neutral affirmative ability.
- Interpret the predicate in layers rather than matching it mechanically to English “can't.”
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Start learning Hindi →Related Topics
- Passive voice with जानाB1 — Build Hindi passives from a perfective participle plus जाना, with the patient controlling agreement and the outer verb carrying tense, aspect, and mood.
- Impersonal passiveC1 — Understand Hindi impersonal passives with default masculine singular agreement, से-marked experiencers, inability readings, and deliberative uses.
- Passive across aspect and tenseB2 — Combine the Hindi passive with habitual, progressive, perfective, future, subjunctive, and modal layers without copying English tense forms.
- सकना ability and possibilityA2 — Use सकना to express ability, practical possibility, and context-dependent permission while keeping its agreement and tense marking clear.
- सकना versus पानाB1 — Choose सकना for capacity or feasibility and verb-stem plus पाना when actual attainment under the circumstances is at issue.