Cleft Sentences: It was...who / What I need is...
विभाजित वाक्य (Cleft Sentences)
Cleft sentences split a plain statement in two to spotlight exactly one piece of information — a structural way of adding emphasis that Hindi often achieves with a single emphatic particle instead.
Grammar Comparison
व्याकरण तुलना
Splitting a sentence purely to highlight one part
John broke the vase. → It was John who broke the vase. (splits the sentence to spotlight 'John' specifically)
जॉन ने ही फूलदान तोड़ा। (the emphatic particle ही achieves a similar spotlight, without restructuring the sentence)
Hindi's emphatic particle ही can spotlight any word in a sentence just by attaching right after it, without needing to physically break the sentence into two clauses. English cleft sentences do the same spotlighting job through structure instead: It was + the emphasized word + who/that + the rest of the sentence (It was John who broke the vase), or What + subject + verb + is + the emphasized word (What I need is more time). Both English patterns exist purely to shine a grammatical spotlight on one piece of information, the same function ही performs with a single particle.
Vocabulary
शब्दावली
| English | Pronunciation | Hindi |
|---|---|---|
| It was John who broke the vase. | it wuz jon hoo brohk thuh vayz | जॉन ने ही फूलदान तोड़ा।jon ne hī phūldān toṛā. |
| What I need is more time. | wut eye need iz mor tym | मुझे जिस चीज़ की ज़रूरत है वह है और समय।mujhe jis cīz kī zarūrat hai vah hai aur samay. |
| It's the weather that's the problem. | its thuh WETH-er thats thuh PROB-lem | समस्या मौसम ही है।samasyā mausam hī hai. |