Perfect Continuous Tense – Structure & Usage

In this segment of rules of the tenses, we shall cover Present Perfect Continuous, Past Perfect Continuous and Future Perfect Continuous Tense on this page. Earlier we have covered Indefinite, Continuous and Perfect tenses.

After covering the Perfect Continuous Tense, we shall provide you with Practice Sets containing Sentences related with Tenses for the competitive Exams in which they become the part of Common Error Portion.

Perfect continuous Tense is the combination of Perfect Tense and Continuous Tense. The action had begun at some point of time and is still on. Let us do its tense-wise usage below –

Structure and Usage of Present/ Past/ Future Perfect Continuous Tense –

Present Perfect Continuous Tense –

It indicates the action going on in the present tense from some point of time.

Check the Recognition – से रहा है, से रही है, से रहे हैं

Structure – Sub + has/have + been + V1 + ing + Obj + Since / For + time.

Since is used with point of time such as – Morning, Evening, Last Night, Names of days ( Sunday, Monday etc. ) , Months ( January, February etc. ), Years ( 2001, 2002 etc.), any date ( 29th of Dec. 2014 etc. ), any season ( Winter, summer etc ) etc.

For is used for period of time – Two minutes, Two days, Two months, Two years etc.

e.g. Children have been playing since morning.

It has been raining for two hours.

Past Perfect Continuous Tense –

It indicates the action going on in the past tense from some point of time.

Recognition – से रहा था, से रही थी, से रहे थे

Structure – Sub + had + been + V1 + ing + Obj + Since / For + time.

e.g. The teacher had been teaching for the last half an hour.

I had been waiting for you for half an hour.

Future Perfect Continuous Tense –

It indicates the action going on in the future tense from some point of time.

Recognition – से रहे होगा , से रही होगी , से रहे होंगे

Structure – Sub + will/shall + have + been + V1 + ing + Obj + Since / For + time.

e.g. She will have been cooking food since morning.

They will have been playing for fifteen minutes.

Note – How to make negative and interrogative sentences –

For making negative sentence, you will have to insert ‘not’ after the first helping verb and for interrogative sentence, these helping verbs will come before the subjects. See the examples –

• They have not been reading since morning.
• Has the teacher been teaching for two hours ?

Check your knowledge by translating them –

1. वह दो घंटे से पढ़ रही है ।
   
2. क्या वे सुबह से टीवी देख रहे हैं ?
3. रवि दो घंटों से पढ़ रहा होगा।