Understanding Active and Passive Voice Conversion

The question asks us to identify the correct active form of a given passive voice sentence. The original sentence is: "Was the culprit being chased by the police?"

First, let's identify the voice and tense of the original sentence.

• Voice: The sentence is in the passive voice because the subject (the culprit) is receiving the action, not performing it. The phrase "by the police" indicates the agent performing the action.
• Tense: The verb construction "was being chased" indicates the Past Continuous Passive tense.

To convert a passive voice sentence to the active voice, we follow these general steps:

1. The agent (the doer of the action, mentioned after 'by') in the passive sentence becomes the subject in the active sentence. In this case, "the police" becomes the subject.
2. The subject of the passive sentence becomes the object of the active sentence. In this case, "the culprit" becomes the object.
3. The verb in the passive sentence needs to be changed to its corresponding active voice form, maintaining the original tense. For Past Continuous Passive ("was/were being + past participle"), the active form is Past Continuous Active ("was/were + verb-ing").

Applying Conversion Rules to the Sentence

Let's apply these rules to the given sentence:

• Passive Subject: \(the culprit\)
• Passive Verb: \(was being chased\) (Past Continuous Passive)
• Passive Agent: \(the police\)

Converting to Active Voice:

• New Subject (from agent): \(The police\)
• New Object (from subject): \(the culprit\)
• Active Verb (Past Continuous Active): The Past Continuous Active form requires \(was/were + verb-ing\). Since "police" is generally treated as a plural noun (referring to multiple officers or the force collectively), the verb should ideally be "were chasing". However, sometimes it can be treated as singular. We need to check the options provided.

The resulting active sentence structure should be: \(The police + was/were chasing + the culprit\).

Analyzing the Options

Now, let's examine each option to see which one correctly represents the active form:

Conclusion

Based on the analysis, the original sentence "Was the culprit being chased by the police?" is in the Past Continuous Passive tense. The correct active form requires the Past Continuous Active tense. Option 3, "Was the police chasing the culprit?", is the only option presented in the Past Continuous Active tense, accurately transforming the passive sentence into its active counterpart by making "the police" the subject performing the action of "chasing" the "culprit".