Question

Change the following statement into passive voice. Why haven't they allowed you to go?
A) Why haven't you been allowed to go?
B) Why haven't you been allowed to go?
C) Why were you not allowed to go?
D) Why were you not allowed to go?

Answer 1

Hint: A subject who acts on the verb is the subject of an active voice sentence. In passive voice, a subject benefits from the action of a verb. In passive forms, the verb be is coupled with a past participle. In passive sentences, what is typically represented by the verb's object (or occasionally another argument) is now expressed by the subject, and what is usually expressed by the subject is either omitted or indicated by some adjunct of the clause.

Complete answer:
In a sentence, an action can be expressed in two ways: active and passive voice.Regardless of the tense, the passive voice always utilises the past participle form of the primary verb. In order to change the active voice into passive voice place the direct object of the active sentence in the subject slot of the sentence.Let's have a look at the available possibilities:

Option A) Why haven't you been allowed to go?: This option is incorrect as ‘you’ which is the object of the sentence cannot come before the auxiliary verb. Thus making the structure of the sentence wrong.

Option B) Why haven’t you been allowed to go?: Option B is accurate because the above sentence is in the active voice, and to change it to the passive voice, the subject (they) takes the place of the object (you), and vice versa. In addition, because the statement is in the present perfect tense, 'been' is inserted after 'you' and before the primary verb's past participle form (allow).

Option C) Why were you not allowed to go?: The tense of the sentence in the active voice is present perfect. The structure of the active voice in the sentence is: Subject + has/have not V3+ object. According to the rules of transformation, the correct structure is: Object + has/have not + been+V3+ by Subject. Therefore, this option is incorrect.

Option D) Why were you not allowed to go?: The tense used is incorrect. We cannot make use of ‘were’ and ‘you’ cannot be placed before the auxiliary verb. Thus, this option is incorrect.

Therefore the correct answer is option ‘B’.

Note: In order to change an active voice to passive voice:
- Recognize the various forms of present tenses.
- Place the object at the start of the sentence. The topic of an active voice sentence usually comes first, followed by a description of the action it performs on the direct object.
- Before the main verb, add the auxiliary word "be."
- Before the subject, add the preposition "by."
- Maintain the right tense from the original text when moving from active to passive voice.