Translation (Arabic to Bengali/English and Vice Versa)
What is tested
A short English or Bengali paragraph to render into Arabic, and an Arabic passage to render into English or Bengali. Marks reward meaning, grammar and idiom - not ornate vocabulary.
Arabic into English/Bengali
- Untangle verb–subject–object order: «كتبَ محمدٌ الرسالةَ» = "Muhammad wrote the letter."
- Perfect (كَتَبَ) = past; imperfect (يكتب) = present/habitual; سـ / سوف + imperfect = future.
- كان + imperfect = past continuous; قد + perfect = already.
- Passive «كُتِبَ» = "was written"; the doer disappears and the subject becomes na'ib al-fa'il, marfu'.
- Idafa reads as "X of Y", with definiteness only on the second term.
English/Bengali into Arabic
- Verb first, then doer, then object - though a nominal sentence (مبتدأ + خبر) is equally correct and often safer.
- A verb preceding a plural subject stays singular: حضرَ الطلابُ.
- Reported speech after قال takes إنّ + accusative subject.
- Non-human plurals take feminine singular adjectives: الكتبُ مفيدةٌ.
Worked example
"He said that he would come tomorrow." قال إنَّهُ سيأتي غدًا. Reasoning: قال introduces reported speech with إنّ; ـهُ is the ism inna; "would come" maps onto the future سيأتي; غدًا is an adverb of time in the accusative.
Traps
- Word-for-word rendering; English "there is" becomes هنا/يوجد, not a literal phrase.
- Dropping final case vowels from the Arabic version - examiners deduct.
- Transliterating names inconsistently within one answer.