Question

Choose the correct passive form of the past tense from the options below:
The rat___________ by the cat last night.
a) Were chased
b) Chases
c) Was chased
d) Was chasing

Answer 1

Hint: The active voice of the given statement should be – ‘The cat chased the rat last night.’ The sentence reflects the tense to be in the simple past tense.

Complete answer:
 Let’s look at the given options-
Option a ‘Were chased’ is the incorrect option because the word ‘were’ is used with the plural of a noun. Though the passive form of the past tense is correctly identified, there is a disagreement of the subject with the verb.
Option b ‘Chases’ is in the Simple Present Tense. Hence, the option is incorrect. the question demands the passive form of past tense. On the other hand, the passive of simple tense should have been ‘Is chased’ and not ‘Chases’. ‘Chases’ is used in the active voice.
Option c ‘Was chased’ is the correct option. The subject-verb agreement is fulfilled and the passive form of the past tense is correctly placed.
Option d ‘Was chasing’ is incorrect. The given option is used in the active form of a sentence. The passive form should be ‘Was being chased’.
So, the correct answer is “Option c”.

Note:
 We use the simple past tense form of the verb to indicate an action that began and ended in the past itself. Its passive voice is formed by adding ‘was or were’ with the main verb.