“Can I buy medicine without a prescription?” in Urdu (English × Urdu)

When to use it

Use it at a chemist's shop in Pakistan to check whether a medicine is sold without a prescription.

“Can I buy medicine without a prescription?” · The sentence in English

In “Can I buy medicine without a prescription?” ‘Can’ moves before ‘I’; ‘without’ is a preposition before ‘a prescription’, and ‘medicine’ needs no article.

Can

auxiliary verbcan · tense: present · modal verb of ability or permission; it opens the question

I

pronounpersonal pronoun, always written with a capital letter

buy

verbbuy · form: base form (infinitive without "to") · main verb after "can"

medicine

noununcountable noun here, used in a general sense

without

prepositionpreposition

a

determinerindefinite article

prescription

nounnoun; a doctor's written order for medicine

“کیا نسخے کے بغیر دوا خریدی جا سکتی ہے؟” · The sentence in Urdu

In “کیا نسخے کے بغیر دوا خریدی جا سکتی ہے؟” the phrase ‘خریدی جا سکتی ہے’ is passive (‘can be bought’), so the subject is ‘دوا’ (medicine, feminine) and the verb is feminine. ‘کے بغیر’ (without) comes after ‘نسخے’ (prescription).

کیا

particleyes/no question particle

نسخے

nounoblique form of نسخہ 'prescription'

کے

prepositionfirst part of کے بغیر

بغیر

preposition'without'; کے بغیر follows the noun

دوا

nounfeminine noun 'medicine'; it makes the verb feminine

خریدی

verbخریدنا · form: perfective participle · gender: feminine · voice: passive · خریدی جا is passive: 'be bought'

جا

auxiliary verbجانا · role: passive auxiliary · جانا used to make the passive

سکتی

auxiliary verbسکنا · gender: feminine · 'can', feminine for دوا

ہے

auxiliary verbہونا · tense: present · present

What changes from one language to the other · English × Urdu

English asks about ‘I’; Urdu asks a general rule with a passive. English ‘without’ comes before the noun, Urdu ‘کے بغیر’ after it, and the Urdu verb agrees with the medicine.

Example conversation