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Draft:Souvik Mandal

Could somebody take a look at Draft:Souvik Mandal. It's a bit of a mess. I suspect there may be the germ of a good article in there, but it's quite badly written. Hopefully, somebody more familiar with the culture will be able to make more sense out of it than I can. Thanks. -- RoySmith (talk) 17:52, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

RoySmith, appears to me as a poor attempt to write an article about a temple located in a Mandal in Birbhum district. I cant see anything that makes it notable for an article in mainspace. It could have been a part of the village article where this temple is located, but without the name of the village, there isn't much to do in that article. I will drop a note asking the same to the uploader, if he can elaborate more. --DBigXrayᗙ 19:22, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
Shout out to @Titodutta: if he can add some value there. --DBigXrayᗙ 19:46, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
Despite the normal definition of mandal, do you not think the draft title might just be the name of the uploader? Compare 'Uploadsou14' with 'Souvik'. Cesdeva (talk) 20:41, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
User:Cesdeva Indeed, that is a possibility and it was my first hunch, but lets AGF. Lots of users have their username based on their hometown. --DBigXrayᗙ 20:53, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
AGF always. I just think the editor might have inadvertently put their personal name as the title. I've found a goverment document from Birbhum district which lists a person with said name. Not going to post a link for privacy reasons. Cesdeva (talk) 21:02, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
Yes, Sauvik is a common Bengali name, a quick google search is enough, no need for secret govt docs for that. --DBigXrayᗙ 21:06, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
Sorry I wasn't clear, i'm on about the full name: Souvik Mandal Cesdeva (talk) 21:09, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
Agreed that is also a possibility. Since Mandal is a common surname in India. That said what actually are you proposing here ? Please make a complete statement with your suggestions/proposal. Dropping one liners isn't really helpful. --DBigXrayᗙ 21:17, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

DBigXray. Clearly the draft uploader is enthusiastic, and we should do our very best to guide the editor and the draft through the AfC process. But if they've accidentally outed themselves, then we should act in their benefit. I guess I'm proposing that until we hear otherwise from the draft uploader, RoySmith or another admin move the draft to a new title, without a history merge, to protect the identify of the editor. I'll drop a note at AN. Cesdeva (talk) 21:36, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

First, as we just discussed, there is nothing concrete to suggest this authors name is what you claim it is. A possibility is far from conclusive evidence.
Second, There is nothing in the draft body that suggests the draft is for self promotion of this person.
Third, If indeed the person's name is what you suspect, the person has himself added it in full knowledge. Possibly to convert the article to a vanity BIO at a later point of time, but as I said, this is just a possibility, we cannot act on possibilities there is no hurry and no reason to not AGF on the new author. I would suggest you not to make any post on AN on this but keep an eye on this authors talk page. --DBigXrayᗙ 21:41, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
I was merely proposing a pre-emptive, non-destructive act to potentially protect the identity of an editor. At no point have I questioned the author's good faith. I'm sure plenty of new editors have honestly titled their draft after their personal name, not aware of any potential consequences. In case I'm not on the money, and in respect your judgement, I won't post at any Admin noticeboard. Cesdeva (talk) 21:58, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
Thanks, there is no reason to hurry. First let him respond to talk page Q that I asked.--DBigXrayᗙ 22:02, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
The author requested rename for the 2 drafts here. New drafts are at Draft:Bahira Kaalimaata and Draft:Bhandir Bon--DBigXrayᗙ 22:16, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
User:DBigXray Thanks for the update. Cesdeva (talk) 22:24, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

Need help on wikimedia commons

Hello. With the efforts of User:Gazoth, now we have more than 114 thousand images uploaded from Press Information Bureau on Wikimedia Commons under the license GODL-India. Unfortunately, over thirty thousand of them are still not categorized. I'll be very grateful, if some users can lend a hand in helping me categorizing these images at Category:Images from Press Information Bureau needing categories. My apologies if this isn't the right place to ask for this. Thanks. —Sarvatra (talk, contribs) 13:25, 19 January 2019 (UTC)

If people didn't upload so much crap, there wouldn't be so much of a problem. I've just looked at that category and it is ridiculous. Why duplicate the PIB in such a way if the stuff is open for use anyway - should have been done selectively, as and when required. Just because some things can be done is not a reason to actually do them. This strikes me as another example of why Commons is such a terrible project. - Sitush (talk) 13:31, 19 January 2019 (UTC)
Umm, that wasn't very helpful, but thanks anyway :| —Sarvatra (talk, contribs) 13:37, 19 January 2019 (UTC)
Plus, there are some confusion that "images" don't come under "data". --Titodutta (talk) 01:00, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
The most salient observations regarding these uploads which smack of bot-spamming. Commons' supposed 'scope' of inclusion has lost any rational meaning, way way back and hence, we are with a million images, half of which don't stand any chance of use. ∯WBGconverse 18:59, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
@Winged Blades of Godric: I wasn't going to respond to Sitush's snap judgment, but since you have deliberately tagged me, I feel compelled to respond. Any batch upload on Commons would fail the criteria of achieving near-100% usability of images. I knew that most images that my bot would upload would not be used, but that wasn't the point. One of my aims for the PIB batch upload was to make them more accessible to others. Disk space is cheap, but making other volunteers' work easy is not. Sitush's suggestion of uploading images selectively assumes that most editors are aware that PIB images are available in a Commons-compatible license and that all PIB images are easily searchable. I would put the probability of the former to be very low, since it took me several months to find out about GODL-India license while being a fairly active editor on India-related topics in English Wikipedia. The probability of a Dutch editor using a PIB image while writing about a Dutch politician in nlwiki would be almost nil without my bot's uploads.
Even if you are aware that you can use PIB images, it is quite hard to find images as PIB's built-in custom search mixes text and image results. You'd have to be aware of "site:" parameter in Google search that restricts results to a particular domain, but the average Wikipedia editor wouldn't be aware of this. Also, it requires Google to have crawled almost all of PIB's images, which hasn't happened yet and probably never will. If you search for Ibrahim Solih on Google images, you don't get even a single image of him, but a similar search on Commons returns multiple images uploaded by my bot, including the one used in his article. Even if you do get images, the list is often incomplete. For example, the official photograph of Manohar Parrikar used in the infobox of his article does not appear in Google search and most images in the results are inferior to the one used in the article. Due to this issue, it took me a lot of time to manually add images to List of current Indian governors article and even after that most images were sub-par. After my bot completed uploading PIB's archive, the images had to be swapped out with better ones.
It's quite easy to label somebody's edits in a hasty manner, but it looks like it's quite hard to assume good faith and bother to find out the reasons behind the edits. —Gazoth (talk) 23:54, 21 January 2019 (UTC)
Doesn't alter a thing. It is a Commons problem, not a problem for this project. I think most people regularly involved with this project would say that they have enough on their plate as it is. - Sitush (talk) 21:41, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
You seem to be mistaken. I did not ask for your help and I was even going to completely ignore this thread until WBG decided to tag me in their unnecessarily rude comment. My comment wasn't an advertisement for this effort, it was solely meant to be a justification of my edits. —Gazoth (talk) 23:31, 23 January 2019 (UTC)
I am not mistaken. This thread was an appeal for help, even if not by you. - Sitush (talk) 08:31, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
Alright, alright. I get it. Nobody was mistaken, but me. Once again, my apologies for starting this. I request the editors to please put this debate to rest now. Thank you. —Sarvatra (talk, contribs) 11:46, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

I recently came across the source Bimal Kanti Paul (2012), "Indian Famines: 1707-1943", in William A. Dando (ed) (ed.), Food and Famine in the 21st Century, ABC-CLIO, pp. 39–57, ISBN 978-1-59884-730-7 {{citation}}: |editor= has generic name (help). This source was being cited in the article Great Famine of 1876–1878 which I had written in 2008. (See this talk page discussion). When I examined the source, I noticed that some paragraphs seemed familiar. They had my style of writing. Indeed after some rummaging, I found text that had been lifted (i.e. copied verbatim) from the same Wikipedia article to which it was now being cited. Who is the author of the source? He is Bimal Kanti Paul, a professor at Kansas State University. I offer below two example. (There might be others as well. I had written several Indian famine articles around that time.)

Example 1, from the source: "After the Great Famine, a large number of agricultural laborers and handloom weavers in South India immigrated (sic) to British tropical colonies to work as indentured laborers on plantations. The excessive deaths experienced in this famine also neutralized natural population growth in the Bombay and Madras presidencies between the first and second censuses of British India carried out in 1871 and 1881, respectively. The Great Famine was to have a lasting political impact on events in India. Among the British administrators in India who were unsettled by the official reactions to this famine and, in particular, by the stifling of the official debate about the best form of famine relief, were William Wedderbum and A. O. Hume. Less than a decade later, they would found the Indian National Congress and, in turn, influence a generation of nationalists such as Dadabhai Naoroji and Romesh Chunder Dutt, for whom the Great Famine would become a cornerstone to [sic] the economic critique of the British Raj." (Bimal Kanti Paul (2012), Indian Famines: 1707-1943, p.50, volume 2 (Classical Famines))

Contrast with my version at the end of my first edits of 23rd and 24th May 2008 (see here, and scroll to the top to view the date of edit):

After the famine, a large number of agricultural laborers and handloom weavers in South India emigrated to British tropical colonies to work as indentured laborers in plantations.[1] The excessive mortality in the famine also neutralized the natural population growth in the Bombay and Madras presidencies during the decade between the first and second censuses of British India in 1871 and 1881 respectively.[2] The Great Famine was to have a lasting political impact on events in India; among the British administrators in India who were unsettled by the official reactions to the famine and, in particular by the stifling of the official debate about the best form of famine relief, were William Wedderburn and A. O. Hume.[3] Less than a decade later, they would found the Indian National Congress and, in turn, influence a generation of nationalists such as Dadabhai Naoroji and Romesh Chunder Dutt for whom the Great Famine would become a cornerstone of the economic critique of the British Raj.[3]

(In those days, I favored the more formal "would" for future-in-the-past constructions, in contrast to "was to." )

Example 2, "The Great Famine was preceded by an intense drought on the Deccan Plateau. Earlier, after the Bihar famine of 1873-1874, Mr. Temple, who was now Famine Commissioner for the Indian government, insisted not only on a laissez-faire pol-icy with respect to the grain trade, but also on stricter qualification standards for relief and on more meager relief rations for those in need. Two kinds of relief were offered: "relief works" for able-bodied men, women, and working children, and Food and Famine in the 21st Century `gratuitous (or charitable) relief" for small children, the elderly, and the indigent." (Bimal Kanti Paul (2012), Indian Famines: 1707-1943, pp.49–50, volume 2 (Classical Famines))

My version of 24 May 2008 (see here, and scroll above for date of edit):

"The Great Famine was preceded by an intense drought (or "crop failure") in the Deccan Plateau.[4] Earlier, after the Bihar famine of 1873–74, in which mortality was avoided, the Government of Bengal and its Lieutenant-Governor, Sir Richard Temple, were criticized for excessive expenditure, which had included the costs of importing rice from Burma and providing generous charitable relief.[5] Sensitive to any renewed accusations of excess in 1876, Temple, who was now Famine Commissioner for the Government of India,[6] insisted not only on a policy of laissez faire with respect to the trade in grain,[7] but also on stricter standards of qualification for relief and on more meager relief rations.[6] Two kinds of relief were offered: "relief works" for able-bodied men, women, and working children, and gratuitous (or charitable) relief for small children, the elderly, and the indigent.[8]

We are all familiar with the Wikipedia injunction about discontinuing editing if you are uncomfortable with your words being mangled, stolen, sold, etc., though I can't seem to find the exact quote right now; still, it would have been nice of some attribution had been given to Wikipedia. The irony now is that the copied material is copyrighted in this source—anyone choosing to copy the words again will be violating their copyright not our original. I am used to my words being copied on various India-related websites; even OED copied part of the definition of the British Raj that I had contributed in 2009 or thereabouts. But that was two or three sentences of fine print. These are whole paragraphs of text; they have been published by a fairly reliable publisher. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:41, 20 January 2019 (UTC)

More examples from other Wikipedia Indian famine pages

Example 3. Plagiarism involving copying from the article Chalisa famine
Éxample 3,

(From: Bimal Kanti Paul (2012), Indian Famines: 1707-1943, p. 44, volume 2 (Classical Famines)) The Chalisa Famine 1783-1784
The Chalisa famine of 1783-1784 in India followed unusual El Niño events that began in 1780 and caused droughts throughout northern India, especially the Delhi territories, present-day Uttar Pradesh, Eastern Punjab, Rajputana, and Kashmir; at the time, these areas were controlled by different Indian rulers. Chalisa (literally, "of the fortieth" in Hindustani) refers to the Vikram Samvat calendar year 1840 (1783). The Chalisa famine was preceded by a famine in the previous year, 1782-1783, in southern India, including the city of Madras and surrounding areas under British East India Company rule and extending to the Kingdom of Mysore.

My edited version of 18 May 2008 (see: here)

The Chalisa famine of 1783-84 in South Asia followed unusual El Nino events that began in 1780 CE and caused droughts throughout the region.[9] Chalisa (literally, "of the fortieth" in Hindustani) refers to the Vikram Samvat calender year 1840 (1783 CE).[10] The famine affected many parts of North India, especially the Delhi territories, present-day Uttar Pradesh, Eastern Punjab, Rajputana, and Kashmir, then all ruled by different Indian rulers.[11] The Chalisa was preceded by a famine in the previous year, 1782-83, in South India, including Madras City and surrounding areas (under British East India Company rule) and in the extended Kingdom of Mysore (under the rule of Haider Ali and Tipu Sultan).

Example 4. Plagiarism involving copying from the article Doji bara famine
Example 4,

(From: Bimal Kanti Paul (2012), Indian Famines: 1707-1943, p. 44, volume 2 (Classical Famines)) Doji Bara Famine, 1791-1792 The Doji Bara famine, also known as the Skull famine, of 1791-1792 in India was brought on by a major El Niño event, lasting from 1789 to 1795, which produced prolonged droughts due to the failure of seasonal monsoon rains for four consecutive years beginning in 1789. This famine caused widespread fatalities in Hyderabad, Southern Maratha Kingdom, Deccan, Gujarat, and Marwar, all of which were governed by Indian rulers at that time. Even in regions such as the Madras Presidency (governed by the British East India Company), where this famine was less severe, half the population perished in some of its districts. In other areas, both the famine and the year 1791 came to be known in folklore as the Doji Bara (also Doĝi Bar) or the "Skull famine," because people died in such numbers that they could not be cremated or buried. As a consequence, skulls and bones of famine victims remained in open areas. As in the Chalisa famine of a decade earlier, many areas were depopulated, due to deaths or migration. It is thought that a total of 11 million people may have died during the years 1789–1792 as a result of starvation and the accompanying epidemics of diseases.

My edited version of 22 May 2008 of the WP article Doji bara famine

The Doji bara famine (or Skull famine) of 1791-92 in South Asia was brought on by a major El Niño event lasting from 1789 CE to 1795 CE and producing prolonged droughts.[12] The El Niño event, recorded by William Roxburgh, a surgeon with the British East India Company, in a series of pioneering meteorological observations, caused the failure of the South Asian monsoon for four consecutive years starting in 1789.[13] The resulting famine, which was severe, caused widespread mortality in Hyderabad, Southern Maratha Kingdom, Deccan, Gujarat, and Marwar (then all ruled by Indian rulers).[11] In regions like the Madras Presidency (governed by the East India Company), where the famine was less severe,[11] and where records were kept, half the population perished in some districts, such as in the Northern Circars.[14] In other areas, such as Bijapur, although no records were kept, both the famine and the year 1791 came to be known in folklore as the Doji bora or the "skull famine," on account, it was said, of the ground being "covered with the skulls of the unburied dead."[14] As in the Chalisa famine of a decade earlier, many areas were depopulated from death or migration. It is thought that a total of 11 million people may have died during the years 1789–1792 as a result of starvation or accompanying epidemics of disease.[15]

Example 5. Plagiarism involving copying from the article Rajputana famine of 1869
Example 5,

(From: Bimal Kanti Paul (2012), Indian Famines: 1707-1943, p. 48, Rajputana famine of 1869, volume 2 (Classical Famines)) "As a result, many inhabitants of famine-stricken regions in Rajputana—for example, two-thirds of the population of Marwar—fled the famine-stricken regions with their livestock. Unfortunately, they did not go to the British territory of Ajmer, where relief work had been arranged. Instead, many wandered in search of food until they died from starvation. Furthermore, late in 1868, epidemics of cholera broke out among vulnerable populations, so there was no harvest in the spring of 1869. In May 1869, many villagers who had fled earlier returned to their villages, believing that the monsoon that year would be early. However, the rains failed to start until mid-July; in the interim, many thousands more died of starvation. The autumn harvest promised to be abundant, but locusts attacked the ripening crops. As a consequence, the crop harvest was only one-eighth of the normal yield. In September and October 1869, heavy rains fell; although they were good for the following spring harvest, they caused an epidemic of malaria that killed many more people."

My edited version of 22 May 2008 of the WP article Rajputana famine of 1869:

"Many inhabitants of the famine-stricken regions of Rajputana (for example, two-thirds of the population of Marwar) emigrated with their livestock or herds.[16] Initially, they did not go to the British territory of Ajmer, where relief works had been arranged; many wandered in search of food until they died from starvation.[16] Late in 1868, epidemics of cholera broke out among the vulnerable population, and there was no harvest in the spring of 1869.[16] In May 1869, many villagers, who had emigrated earlier now returned to their villages believing that the rains would be early. However, the rains held off until mid-July and, in the interim, many thousands more died of starvation.[16] Even so, the autumn harvest promised to be abundant, but swarms of locusts descended upon the fields and destroyed the young crops.[16] In September and October 1869, there were heavy rains that, although good for the spring harvest, caused an epidemic of malaria and killed many more.[16]

Example 6. Plagiarism involving copying from the article Indian famine of 1896–97
Example 6,

(From: Bimal Kanti Paul (2012), Indian Famines: 1707-1943, pp. 50–51, Indian famine of 1896–1897, volume 2 (Classical Famines))

This famine began in four Bundelkhand districts of the Allahabad Division early in 1896, and then spread to many parts of the country, including the United Provinces, the Central Provinces and Berar, Bihar, parts of the Bombay and Madras presidencies, and the Hissar district of the Punjab. It also affected the princely states of Rajputana, Central India Agency, and Hyderabad. During the two years, this famine affected an area of 307,000 square miles with a population of 69.5 million. Although large-scale relief was available throughout the famine-stricken regions in accordance with the Provisional Famine Code of 1883, mortality—both from starvation and from accompanying epidemics—was very high. Approximately 5 million people in the British-ruled territory died. "

My edited version of 19 June 2008 of the WP article Indian famine of 1896–97:

"The Indian famine of 1896–97 was a famine that began in Bundelkhand, India, early in 1896 and spread to many parts of the country, including the United Provinces, the Central Provinces and Berar, Bihar, parts of the Bombay and Madras presidencies, and the Hissar district of the Punjab; in addition, the princely states of Rajputana, Central India Agency, and Hyderabad were affected by the famine.[17] All in all, during the two years, the famine affected an area of 307,000 square miles and a population of 69.5 million.[17] Although large-scale relief was offered throughout the famine-stricken regions in accordance with the Provisional Famine Code of 1883, the mortality, both from starvation and accompanying epidemics, was very high: approximately 1 million people are thought to have died as a result of the famine."[17]

Example 7. Plagiarism involving copying from the article Indian famine of 1899–1900
Example 7,

(From: Bimal Kanti Paul (2012), Indian Famines: 1707-1943, p. 51, Indian famine of 1899–1900, volume 2 (Classical Famines)) "Indian Famine of 1899-1900 This famine began with the failure of the summer monsoon rains in 1899 over a large part of western, central, and southern India. It affected an area of 476,000 square miles and a population estimated at 59.5 million. Nearly half of all famine-affected people resided in British India. This famine was especially severe in the Central Provinces and Berar, the Bombay Presidency, the minor province of Ajmer-Merwara, and the Hissar district of Punjab. It also caused great distress in the princely states of the Rajputana Agency, the Central India Agency, Hyderabad, and the Kathiawar Agency. Additionally, small areas of the Bengal Presidency, the Madras Presidency, and the North-Western Provinces were acutely impacted. The population in many areas had only barely recovered from the famine of 1896-1897 when the new famine struck; like the earlier famine, the 1899-1900 event was preceded by a drought. In 1899, there were also significant crop failures throughout India, so that inter-regional trade could not be relied upon to stabilize food prices."

My edited version of 16 November 2009 of the WP article Indian famine of 1899–1900:

"The Indian famine of 1899–1900 began with the failure of the summer monsoons in 1899 over west and Central India and, during the next year, affected an area of 476,000 square miles (1,230,000 km2) and a population of 59.5 million.[18] The famine was acute in the Central Provinces and Berar, the Bombay Presidency, the minor province of Ajmer-Merwara, and the Hissar District of the Punjab; it also caused great distress in the princely states of the Rajputana Agency, the Central India Agency, Hyderabad and the Kathiawar Agency.[18] In addition, small areas of the Bengal Presidency, the Madras Presidency and the North-Western Provinces were acutely afflicted by the famine.[18] The population in many areas had barely recovered from the famine of 1896–1897.[19] As in that famine, this one too was preceded by a drought.[19] The Meteorological Office of India in its report of 1900, stated, "The mean average rainfall of India is 45 inches (1,100 mm). In no previous famine year has it been in greater defect than 5 inches (130 mm). But in 1899 the defect exceeded 11 inches."[19] There were also large crop failures in the rest of India and, as a result, inter-regional trade could not be relied upon to stabilize food prices.[20]

References

  1. ^ Roy 2006, p. 362
  2. ^ Roy 2006, p. 363
  3. ^ a b Hall-Matthews 2008, p. 24
  4. ^ Roy 2006, p. 361
  5. ^ Imperial Gazetteer of India vol. III 1907, p. 488, Hall-Matthews 1996, pp. 217–219
  6. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference igi-III-488 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ Hall-Matthews 1996, p. 217
  8. ^ Imperial Gazetteer of India vol. III 1907, pp. 477–483
  9. ^ Grove 2007, p. 80
  10. ^ Bayly 2002, p. 503
  11. ^ a b c Imperial Gazetteer of India vol. III 1907, p. 502
  12. ^ Grove 2007, p. 80
  13. ^ Grove 2007, p. 81
  14. ^ a b Grove 2007, p. 82
  15. ^ Grove 2007, p. 83
  16. ^ a b c d e f Cite error: The named reference igi-III-487b was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  17. ^ a b c Imperial Gazetteer of India vol. III 1907, p. 490
  18. ^ a b c Imperial Gazetteer of India vol. III 1907, p. 491
  19. ^ a b c Imperial Gazetteer of India vol. III 1907, p. 492
  20. ^ Drèze 1995, p. 75

Discussion

@Doug Weller:@Sitush: In this instance, the publisher ABC-CLIO is a fairly respect American publisher of educational material. The editor of the volume is: William A. Dando, whose biography at the end of the book (page 339) says: "Editor William A. Dando is Professor Emeritus, Department of Geography, Geology, and Anthropology, Indiana State University. He has taught courses on the geography of food and famine, as well as on climatology. His interests lie in agriculture, hunger/famine in Russia, climate and food, and application of geotechniques to food, famine, and agricultural problems. He is a member of the Association of American Geographers and the National Council for Geographic Education." The author of the chapter, "Indian famines 1707–1943" is Bimal Kanti Paul, whose biography on pages 339–340, says, "Bimal Kanti Paul is Professor of Geography at Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kansas. He is a hazards geography specialist with additional interests in health and population geography and quantitative analysis. His area specialty is in South Asia. Currently he is the Book Review Editor of the Professional Geographer and Editor of Special Publications of the National Council for Geographic Education. " Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:08, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
Gobsmacked. Email Dando. Or I will if no one else wants to. Doug Weller talk 16:24, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
I would prefer that you do, as you are an admin. But there's more. Each one of the famine articles I wrote in 2008, half dozen or more, seem to have been copied. I'll make a collapsed set of examples of them. Btw, Dando was 54 on September 24, 1988 according to the Grand Forks Herald (North Dakota) on September 24, 1988 (see here and scroll down) That means he is 84 now. He might not be active academically. Writing to the publisher might be better. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:38, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
The various editorial boards of which Paul is a member, including in his role as a book reviewer, are going to have a fit of the vapours. - Sitush (talk) 17:04, 20 January 2019 (UTC)
@Fowler&fowler: do you still plan to add the examples? Ping me please so I don't miss your reply, I lost track of this. Doug Weller talk 08:50, 24 January 2019 (UTC)
@Doug Weller: Sorry for the delay. I will do so in the next few hours. Thanks for the reminder. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:52, 24 January 2019 (UTC)
@Doug Weller: I've added several more examples from WP India famines of the 19th century. I managed to find an email for Dando. I will send it to you by emai. I don't know if it is a working email, but it is worth a try. Thanks for doing this. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 22:09, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

@Doug Weller: "Plagiarism" might be too strong a word to level at someone, in the absence of their perspective. I am happy to change it to something like, "Possible infringement of Wikipedia CC BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL" or "Possible Wikipedia copyright violation" Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:21, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler: I guess there is one big question, which is what do you or we want from this? Only the author of the text has any official standing as they are the copyright holder. I don't think the WMF would want to get involved and if the publisher admitted wrongdoing, that would leave them open to a copyright suit. I think you should template the relevant articles with the backwards template at Wikipedia:Copyright problems. You could ask for more advice at Wikipedia talk:Copyright problems. I've just emailed a university and said I was emailing them just so that they knew that one of their students had, several years ago, copied from one of our articles. If I were in your shoes I think I'd do something like that. Let ABC-CLIO know that there was a problem (saying that you thought you should know but not suggesting any action to take) and maybe emailing Dando saying your were surprised/disappointed/whatever to discover that your work had ended up in his work. Ditto Paul. If it was something online we could expect them to do something about that, but books? Unless you want to sue, I don't think there's much more we can do other than what I've suggested, but of course someone at Talk:Copyright problems might have other ideas. Doug Weller talk 15:41, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
It isn't about damages but rather acknowledgement and integrity. Paul is in a very tight spot because it casts a bad light on everything he has ever done. But, in my opinion, that doesn't mean we should brush it under the carpet. And we most certainly should avoid using Paul as a source anywhere on Wikipedia - we don't use plagiarists, regardless of whether we describe them with precisely that term or with some fudged version. - Sitush (talk) 16:04, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia is copied and pasted without attribution by 100s / 1000s of academics or sources. Typically these are not high quality sources or notable publishers. "ABC-CLIO" is not a serious publisher.

When the Oxford University Press copied and pasted from Wikipedia in one of their medical textbooks that turned out to be news worthy.[1]Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 16:47, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

@Doug Weller: I'll post on WP:Copyright problems. Let's see what they say. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 21:09, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
@Doc James: The OED lifted a few sentences in June 2008 from the British raj article. Their paragraph is "The British Raj was instituted in 1858, when, as a consequence of the Indian Rebellion of the previous year, the rule of the British East India Company was transferred to the Crown in the person of Queen Victoria (proclaimed Empress of India in 1876). In 1947 the British Indian Empire was partitioned into two sovereign dominion states, the Union of India (later the Republic of India) and the Dominion of Pakistan (later the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and the People's Republic of Bangladesh) " It was taken from our version of late March 2008: " The system of governance was instituted in 1858, when the rule of the British East India Company was transferred to the Crown in the person of Queen Victoria (and who, in 1876, was proclaimed Empress of India), and lasted until 1947, when the British Indian Empire was partitioned into two sovereign dominion states, the Union of India (later the Republic of India) and the Dominion of Pakistan (later the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and the People's Republic of Bangladesh). See here, here, and here . But it was a few sentences, and I chalked it to being a form of flattery. It still stands in the OED. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 21:09, 25 January 2019 (UTC) PS We had a version, which had the extra bit, "when in consequence of (or consequent to) the Indian Rebellion of 1857, the rule of the British East India Company ..." but I can't seem to find it now. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 21:19, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

I use this template Template:Backwards_copy Than one can pull a list here Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:04, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

@Doc James: Thanks. Will do. Hadn't realized that the Atlantic link, which I haven't read yet, was about you. Looking forward. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:40, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Bharat Ratna prefix/suffix

I've seen official guidance somewhere that the Bharat Ratna, Padma Shri etc are never to be used as a prefix or suffix to a name. Can we add this to our own guidance at WP:NCIN? - Sitush (talk) 08:18, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

As per this, we shouldn't be using the Bharat Ratna, Padma Shri and such awards as honorific despite a section of the Indian media treating it as such. Regards. << FR (mobileUndo) 08:53, 29 January 2019 (UTC)
Indeed. I think that is what I used some months ago when I went on a big cleaning=up exercise but I've noticed this last week or so that a lot of mis-use has crept in again. - Sitush (talk) 08:56, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

An Editor has added [2] Urdu scripts on Kashmir (that is on my watchlist), against Wikipedia:INDICSCRIPTS and stated in edit summary that Alternate name in Urdu as being a regional and state language spoken across the border. Its a disputed region therefore WP:INDICSCRIPTS does not apply here. If this logic has to be followed then it will open possibilities of addition of INDIC Scripts on a large number of articles from Kashmir, Arunachal, etc. Posting here as this needs to be discussed. --DBigXrayᗙ 09:33, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

What happens over a border or the fact of a region being disputed is not in itself a reason to ignore INDICSCRIPTS. However, the consensus only applies to articles solely within the ambit of WP:INDIA, which is unfortunate because I frequently see Urdu scripts being warred over. My larger concern would be that someone pushing that type of thing is quite likely to take a nationalist stance in other edits, which can be highly problematic. - Sitush (talk) 09:49, 30 January 2019 (UTC)
I would use INDICSCRIPTS to counter non-English scripts in only some Kashmir-related articles. The logic runs along the following lines: If there is a policy about not using Indic scripts in India-related articles, then their use would be problematic in articles about larger regions, such as Kashmir, which contain the domain of an India-related article as a major geographic or ethnic stake holder. The policy would not apply to Azad Kashmir or Aksai Chin or K2 or Gilgit and so forth, that lie outside the territory of Indian control. (It is true that Kashmir is disputed territory, one in which India's sovereignty over its state of J&K remains formally unrecognized by the major powers, with the possible exception of Russia. But Indian control has now lasted 70 years; it is more than just temporary occupation.) Arunachal Pradesh, on the other hand, does not have the status of a major dispute such as Kashmir. I would use INDICSCRIPTS there. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:56, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Search Helper script

Hello, please check this script User:Titodutta/scripts/SearchHelper.js, to install on your Special:MyPage/common.js use please use: importScript('User:Titodutta/scripts/SearchHelper.js'); Writ Keeper created Google search script. The script adds several quick search options, see screenshot, how it looks. Please comment or suggest if any other search option is needed. --Titodutta (talk) 09:29, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

I really like it, especially the Indian newspaper search. << FR (mobileUndo) 10:45, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

AFD in progress about Aziz Bagh

Please consider commenting at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Aziz Bagh (2nd nomination). --Doncram (talk) 18:53, 3 February 2019 (UTC)

A proposal has been made to apply the equivalent of extended confirmed protection to any article related to conflicts between India and Pakistan. Interested editors are invited to comment on the proposal. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 15:52, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Correcting geography articles of Telangana (from 2007)

In 2007, User:Sumanthk created a plenty of articles (https://xtools.wmflabs.org/pages/en.wiki.x.io/Sumanthk) about places in Telangana (then Andhra Pradesh). There are more than 200 such articles. These are obviously notable articles, per WP:NGEO. But there is a problem with all these articles. For example, Kerameri; the lead sentence says "Kerameri or Kerimeri is a village and a Mandal in Adilabad district in the state of Telangana in India". This means that the village "Kerameri" and the mandal "Kerameri" have been clubbed into one article. The village and the mandal have the same name, but are not the same. A mandal consists of a group of village, whereas a village is just one village. So there should two different articles. Also this turns problematic while we look at the respective Wikidata item and links from other languages. In this case, Wikidata item: Kerameri (Q3430024), has interwiki links to English, Vietnamese, Nepali, Telugu, and Pampanga Wikipedias. The former two have articles as "village and mandal", whereas the latter three just say "mandal". This is confusing. So I propose to convert all such articles represent "mandals" i.e. removing village-related lines from the articles. I would like to hear more thoughts on this before making changes at mass. KCVelaga (talk) 05:17, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Splitting is fine in theory but often unnecessary because the articles do in fact address the two situation (village and mandal). I certainly wouldn't worry about it if the purpose is primarily to help out Wikidata - there are much more pressing issues here than fixing their mess. For example, vast numbers of Indian village articles are still unsourced, unreliably sourced and full of puffery. Helping out Wikidata isn't, to the best of my knowledge, even a policy. - Sitush (talk) 05:22, 30 January 2019 (UTC)
@Sitush: Thanks for the response. I agree that helping out Wikidata isn't a policy. But I am worried because I do contribute to Wikidata also. However, my primary intention is not that. Keeping the Wikidata part aside; Yes, the articles "address the two situation", but I don't think it will be practicable in the long run, for two reasons. It will be confusing for readers, atleast some of them, because they're two different entities (village and mandal). The body of the article seems to club info of both, without much clarification. It might be complicated for editors as well, to put information in such a way they represent both. Considering the above mentioned example, there is a line "Kerimeri is located at 19.4333°N 79.0500°E", this points to the village "Kerimeri", but not the mandal. Another line "villages in Kerameri mandal include ...." here it speaks about the mandal. The transport information is again to the village but not the mandal, because mandal is a group of villages. Similar confusion exists when we add info about population, area, postal code etc. These values are different for both. Also having it this way, will fail consistency. Only the articles created by this user (may be some others who created following him) are in this style. But the all the later creations have separate articles for village and mandal. For example, Vemuru mandal and Vemuru, Thullur mandal and Thullur. KCVelaga (talk) 07:57, 30 January 2019 (UTC)
Yes, the coordinate and transport issues etc are valid concerns, although they could still be wrapped in a single article. Let's see what others think. - Sitush (talk) 08:02, 30 January 2019 (UTC)
I'd strip the mandal content, not the village. With some exceptions, mandal articles are fairly useless to readers. They offer less insight than village articles, and any important subjects are reiterated or covered at a higher district or state level. I wouldn't be too worried about creating new articles for them, unless you really wanted to. If you split the content, that would take forever. You've probably realised that if all 200 articles were created by the same editor, they will have strings of text in common. Running AWB through the list to strip the mandal content may be possible. Once that content is gone, you could cleanly fix the ledes by stripping "and a mandal" from them. Cesdeva (talk) 16:50, 30 January 2019 (UTC)
@Cesdeva: Thanks for the response. What you said makes sense to me. I use AWB, but mostly for patrolling every now and then, but I am not an expert with it. Some articles were created by other users as well. @Titodutta: will it be possible to get a list of all such articles? Basically all the articles having such strings. Pinging @Vin09 and IM3847: as they work with geography related articles of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana extensively. KCVelaga (talk) 05:15, 1 February 2019 (UTC)
So, as Cesdeva suggested, I'll be stripping of the mandal content. In most of the articles, the mandal content is just the word "mandal" or a line about it. The readership for villages is more than for mandal. But if there is an exceptional case, like if we have impressive content about the mandal and less content about the village, I'll be stripping of the village content and making it a mandal article. Please feel free to revert and start a discussion on the talk page if it is needed. KCVelaga (talk) 17:43, 4 February 2019 (UTC)
That seems like a good way forward. - Sitush (talk) 17:57, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Tamil Nadu Vanniyar Public Properties Welfare Board - notability

Is Tamil Nadu Vanniyar Public Properties Welfare Board a notable governmental department? How far down the bureaucratic line do we usually go? - Sitush (talk) 08:27, 26 January 2019 (UTC)

Per ToI says there is a statute - Tamil Nadu Vanniyakula Kshatriya Public Trusts and Endowments (Protection and Maintenance) Act, 2018 - for the same and is along the lines of Wakf Board. Srikanth (Logic) 03:57, 6 February 2019 (UTC)

Anyone can help an inquirer with info about Delhi history?

Hi friends, the Wikipedia Reference Desk has received a query about the history of the location of the statue of Rafi Ahmed Kidwai in Delhi. If anyone can help, please answer at the Reference Desk. With thanks!!70.67.193.176 (talk) 16:10, 6 February 2019 (UTC)

India Assessment bar

Hello, some time ago we discussed fixing YuviPanda's assessment bar. With the support of IndicTech-Com and specially User:Jayprakash12345, some changes are made and a temporary version of the fixed script may be seen at: User:Titodutta/scripts/AssessmentBar.js.
I am not confident that the script is fixed, because I almost never used this script (or I don't remember). Anyone who remembers all the features of this script, please comment. perhaps User:AshLin, User:BPositive?--Titodutta (talk) 06:45, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

What was this intended for? I vaguely remember some attempt to add project banners to a swathe of unassessed India-related articles but it is years ago. I think someone somehow worked out how many relevant articles lacked the India Project banner and came here asking could the situation be fixed. - Sitush (talk) 16:16, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
Some editors may have used it at Tag & Assess 2014. There's a documentation page here, from 2012, which I think details its functionality. Cesdeva (talk) 17:54, 25 January 2019 (UTC)
That guide was written by me during the first Tag & Assess, post the first WikiIndia Conference. We tried using in 2014 but it was not functional at that time. AshLin (talk) 14:58, 26 January 2019 (UTC)
That was it! Thanks to you both. A snappy name but I couldn't remember it. Have you had chance to look at it now, AshLin? Does it seem to be any more functional than in 2014, bearing in mind what Tito says above. - Sitush (talk) 15:08, 26 January 2019 (UTC)
I deployed another random unassessed article on glitch using a similar WP:PETSCAN query, can you please replace the URL and try. For reference the old code is on github and some documentation at User:YuviPanda/Madam_Hut and needs some refactoring should it be made to work. Srikanth (Logic) 10:28, 7 February 2019 (UTC)

Police station, CD block HQ, fire station… Wikipedia not a directory

Ajf773 has deleted information about police station and fire station from the Baranagar page noting Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not#Wikipedia is not a directory.The point made was “every city has at least one police and fire station, what makes these ones so special”.I had undone the deletion with the argument, “There is a gulf of difference between the advanced countries and backward countries. Here administrative and civic facilities are limited and so are important. The information provided here is basic and minimum.” These have again been deleted. Drmies, an admin, deleted the information, “The headquarters of Ketugram II CD Block are located at Gangatikuri” from the Gangatikuri page with the comment “so?”. I have placed back the material with a note on the talk page of Gangatikuri, “CD block HQ … so? Well, CD blocks are large development administrative areas in the post-colonial era. The headquarters of each such area is an important centre where administrative offices and other facilities are located. In extensive agricultural areas, these small adiminstrative locations are in focus” It is still there. I have been adding content/ information about community development blocks, subdivision etc, with the focus mainly on rural areas. Recently, I have also started working on town/ village pages. I work mostly on pages related to Wet Bengal and the surrounding areas. With this NOT A DIRECTORY issue, hundreds of pages put up by me and others, will get affected. Pages with information about police stations, headquarters of community development blocks, probably even municipalities, other civic bodies, educational institutions and so on will get affected. Such deletions will make a mess of the pages. Please have a look at one of my more recent community development block page and a village page – Goalpokhar I and Kushmandi, Dakshin Dinajpur. These are different, in a long way, from what is published about the more developed countries. With all the push for standardisation and globalisation, I am doubtful about who will come from where and what will remain of such pages. Is it worth spending all the time and effort? I still have the heart to say, Cheers, - Chandan Guha (talk) 01:27, 8 February 2019 (UTC)

  • Thanks, sir, for your quick response. I have added another reference in the Gangatikuri page. I will subsequently add it in other similar pages. It is that demand for secondary sources that frightens me. I have spent hours searching for sources. For some community development block pages in Jharkhand, I am unable to get the area of that block in government websites and the demand is for secondary sources. It is really frightening. Thanks once again. - Chandan Guha (talk) 02:08, 8 February 2019 (UTC)

One of your project's articles has been selected for improvement!

Hello,
Please note that Pondicherry, which is within this project's scope, has been selected as one of Today's articles for improvement. The article was scheduled to appear on Wikipedia's Community portal in the "Today's articles for improvement" section for one week, beginning today. Everyone is encouraged to collaborate to improve the article. Thanks, and happy editing!
Delivered by — MusikBot talk 00:05, 11 February 2019 (UTC) on behalf of the TAFI team

Mullum Malarum

I have listed this article at PR as I want any potential issue to be solved before I take it to FAC. I hope someone regularly monitoring this page will read this and post comments. --Kailash29792 (talk) 06:59, 11 February 2019 (UTC)

Durganagar, Kolkata

◆◆Durganagar, and Laketown location is same details. But Laketown page wikipedia name is Laketown, Kolkata . Kindly see the page :-https://en.m.wiki.x.io/wiki/Lake_Town,_Kolkata .So at this point if Laketown page main name is Laketown , Kolkata possible, so why can not possible for Durganagar page name as Durganagar, Kolkata ? ◆◆A new person name Jeet Dev remove previous Durganagar, Kolkata page Information. Today i again write previous page information of Durganagar, Kolkata. About 4 months ago of date 4 October 2018 time 8:23 the page information i put and you verified it. But recent 2 days a person name jeet dev remove the all previous page information which information is no need for this page as compare previous information. Today again jeet dev remove all previous page information so i again put previous page information because it is better from jeet dev information. So you Kindly take a action jeet dev which information is no good than previous information which edit 4 months ago. The previous 4 month's edit information is better than jeet dev information. — Preceding unsigned comment added by AmitMondal1299 (talk • contribs) 20:01, 14 February 2019 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Washim#Basim

 You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Washim#Basim. Shhhnotsoloud (talk) 08:44, 15 February 2019 (UTC)

The 800 pound gorilla in Washim is that it has suspected copyright violations with 97.4% confidence. (See its talk page.) The sections I checked had been copied verbatim from the Maharashtra State Gazeteer, 1977. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:22, 17 February 2019 (UTC)

User:Za-ari-masen and Eastern Nagari script

Hello, I came across this user's contributions recently, and would like someone to take a look. Examples below:

I have left a message on his talk page and directed his attention to this discussion thread. — Nearly Headless Nick {c} 19:19, 17 February 2019 (UTC)

Azad Kashmir vs. Pakistan Occupied Kashmir in a Movie Plot

Hi all, at Uri: The Surgical Strike I've seen Azad Kashmir get changed a couple of times to Pakistan Occupied Kashmir. Yes, I'm aware this is a sensitive area, which is why I'm here to ask if there is an agreed-upon way to handle this, so as not to run afoul of ArbCom determinations. Thoughts? The Wikipedia article on the region points to Azad Kashmir, so that would seem to be the "preferred" designation, but feedback is appreciated. Thanks, Cyphoidbomb (talk) 17:13, 17 February 2019 (UTC)

It is very simple: if you are going to use, "Jammu and Kashmir" for the Indian state, then you have to use "Azad Kashmir, " Gilgit-Baltistan" for the corresponding Pakistani-administered regions. "Pakistan Occupied Kashmir" or "Indian Occupied Kashmir" would be POV. "Pakistan administered/controlled Kashmir" and "India(n) administered/controlled Kashmir," applied equally, would be the corresponding more neutral usage. I don't know anything about an ArbCom decision, but I'd be surprised if they could come up with anything other than the formulation above. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 17:48, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
Consensus is for Jammu and Kashmir and Azad Kashmir; excluding exceptional cases (which this ain't). ∯WBGconverse 18:02, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
  • I would have agreed with Fowler and WBG if this was a Geographic article but this is not, it is a movie article. Cyphoidbomb did not clarify this in the OP that the only one time this word is used in the article, is in the Uri: The Surgical Strike#"Plot" section of the article, where it is expected that the names and words used in the movie will be used. The movie uses the word "Pakistan Occupied Kashmir" so it is only understandable that the users are trying to oppose the replacement of a plot keyword of the movie with the word "Azad Kashmir" which is never used in the movie. Both the names represent a particular view point, so neither of the two is entirely a safe option. The word "Pakistan Occupied Kashmir" is used multiple times in the climax scene as a major plot keyword, so the word should be used in the plot section of the article as it is used in the movie, The movie itself is made from the Indian view point and changing the plot keywords appear as attempts to introduce a conflicting POV into the movie plot. The redirect link Pakistan Occupied Kashmir clarifies this anyway, so this is not a big question of renaming an article. It is a known fact that Santa Claus and Atlantis island don't exist. But there is absolutely no need to clarify that they don't exist in every movie article plot that uses these terms.--DBigXrayᗙ 04:48, 18 February 2019 (UTC)
  • In a direct quote, yes. So, if we were directly quoting a character in the movie, and added, "The major general said, 'I propose that we go into Pakistan Occupied Kashmir tonight.' " that would be OK. But in reported speech we would have to use a neutral word: "The major general proposed that they go into Pakistan Administered/Controlled Kashmir that night." This is because in the second instance we are writing for the Wikipedia readership Fowler&fowler«Talk» 09:42, 18 February 2019 (UTC)
  • User:Fowler&fowler Thanks for the kind comments, yes the plot was written in reported speech. It will be acceptable to me if we use "Pakistan administered Kashmir" as a more neutral option as compared to "Pakistan Occupied Kashmir" or POK that is actually used in the movie. I will update the article plot with this term if you or others have no more objections. --DBigXrayᗙ 10:09, 18 February 2019 (UTC)

An engineering college

Traditionally; all colleges (and secondary schools) have been kept at AfDs (and continue to be so) because some found it a wastage of time to debate on these whilst some believed that all schools and colleges secure enough media-mention but which can't be immediately located due to factors of systemic-bias et al

My personal observation is that most of the private engineering colleges (which have been mushrooming like anything in the last decade or so) does not get any significant coverage in more than 75-80% of cases. The same about secondary schools, roughly. Always almost; these articles attract a constant flux of promo-spam and it's difficult to distinguish between an encyclopedic article and a brochure.

I have thus nominated Ghanashyam Hemalata Institute of Technology and Management (and it's duplicate:-Ghanashyama Hemalata Institute of Technology and Management) for deletion over this AfD because I am unable to locate an iota of reliable coverage despite it's verifiable existence.

I will be grateful, if other members of this project let their views known here and/or over the AfD. About whether I was correct in my hypothesis that these colleges usually never manage to garner any non-advertorial significant coverage (and that it's not our inability to access regional sources; which's affecting the issue) and whether routine private colleges (which does not pass GNG in the most loosest of interpretations) need be deleted. And anything else.∯WBGconverse 15:26, 19 February 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for your observations, it is indeed often the case that these articles attract spam. A case-by-case handling of the matter, however, might be more pertinent than a reaction based on a blanket assessment that such institutions usually never manage to attain notability (and I paraphrase you). Notability requires third-party sourcing, which the case in question clearly seems to lack. Send similar articles that are lacking to AfD. MikeLynch (talk) 18:01, 19 February 2019 (UTC)
MikeLynch, I appreciate your viewpoint (and it's quite natural to think so). But, regrettably some users believe that schools et al are default notable (which may be true in USA, UK et al). See this discussion for the broader locus, which has continued as usual at AfDs.
The Gnome might be able to surmise the situation, more aptly. ∯WBGconverse 18:37, 19 February 2019 (UTC)
Greetings, Winged Blades of Godric. It continues to be my humble yet strong belief that Wikipedia should be treating schools as it treats every other subject. Despite the crystal clear language of the relevant guideline's text, quoted in full at the tail end of this message, myriads of Wikipedia editors continue to treat any and all forms of educational entities, or entities that lay claim to an educational purpose, as something sacrosanct. I have little to offer on this specific case, above and beyond that general statement. I have come to accept that specifically non-acceptable arguments (such as WP:NOTHARMINGANYONE, or Wikipedia should be about everything) are, effectively, endorsed and accepted by the community. Take care. -The Gnome (talk) 12:51, 20 February 2019 (UTC)
WP:NSCHOOL states : All universities, colleges and schools, including high schools, middle schools, primary (elementary) schools, and schools that only provide a support to mainstream education must satisfy either this guideline (WP:ORG) or the general notability guideline, or both. No need to add emphasis anywhere. -The Gnome (talk) 12:51, 20 February 2019 (UTC)
All this reminded me of a post I had made here some seven years ago, which I just managed to retrieve. It is about historic high schools in India. The old high schools pages listed in the post are only in slightly better state (of readability and comprehensiveness) than they were then. Yet we are spending our time and attention on the brand new ones. But then this is par for the course in India-related topics: people prefer to make new pages, even if they are listy stubs of a few lines, than develop existing pages into readable articles. Sigh. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:02, 20 February 2019 (UTC)
I just discovered a better list of old high schools in Category:Schools_in_Colonial_India. For anyone looking to clean up old articles, the pages in this list might be a good place to begin. Some of them might be well developed, but plenty are not. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:12, 20 February 2019 (UTC)

2016 Uri attack badly in need of attention re: recent edits

The article 2016 Uri attack has seen a flood of IP edits over the last few months that seem to have completely changed the meaning of parts of the article. At least half of these edits have to be vandalism, but I honestly have no idea which version of the article is the last good one, or which intermediate edits may be salvageable. Many edits and series of edits have been reverted, but I strongly suspect these reverts have left older vandalism untouched. I think the article could really use review, top to bottom, by someone familiar with this topic area. Thanks. Someguy1221 (talk) 05:49, 1 March 2019 (UTC)

Discussion at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#India/Pakistan

 You are invited to join the discussion at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#India/Pakistan. DBigXrayᗙ 11:25, 2 March 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gaur Niwas

I have nominated this article about a place called Gaur Niwas in Dehradun for deletion.You are welcome to join the discussion. If someone can help me find references, that would be of great help.--DreamLinker (talk) 15:50, 3 March 2019 (UTC)

Punjabi script

Hello WPI. I've just stumbled across recent edits to Punjabi script. At the moment, the article states that:

Punjabi (پن٘جابی) is a Perso-Arabic alphabet with eight new alphabets(ٻ ڄ ݙ ݢ ڳ ݨ ݪ ݢ‬) along with 39 urdu alphabets developed by Punjabi Language Acticists in Punjab, Pakistan to write the Punjabi language. It is generally written in the Nastaʿlīq calligraphic hand. Punjabi Script[1] is one of three scripts used for Punjabi, the others being Gurmukhi and Shahmukhi[2].

It is also used as the alphabet to write the Pothohari, Hindko and Saraiki Dialect. Punjabi script and Shahmukhi is written from right to left, while Gurmukhi is written from left to right..

It is also used as the alphabet to write the Pothohari, Hindko and Saraiki Dialect. Punjabi script and Shahmukhi is written from right to left, while Gurmukhi is written from left to right.

References

  1. ^ https://punjabialphabets.blogspot.com/2019/03/advance-punjabi-shahmukhi-script.html
  2. ^ http://www.unics.uni-hannover.de/nhtcapri/western-panjabi-alphabet.html

This article was originally created in 2011 by User:Kwamikagami as a redirect, most recently to Gurmukhi. Today new editor User:Punjab Post replaced the redirect with the article mentioned above. Is this notable? Not being a reader of Punjabi, I can find nothing about it online in English language WP:RS, and it seems to be WP:OR, or a low-notability project by the abovementioned "Punjabi language activists". The Hannover Uni reference doesn't seem to mention it. Is the script notable? Thanks for any assistance. Flapjacktastic (talk) 14:24, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

I suspect this is part of the POV battle over whether Saraiki is a dialect of Punjabi or a distinct language. (See also Saraikistan.) The user seems to be trying to change the Saraiki alphabet to the 'Punjabi script'. User is also changing mentions of Saraiki to 'dialect'. But even if we all agree that Saraiki *is* a dialect of Punjabi, its alphabet is still its alphabet. AFAICT, it isn't used to write other 'dialects' of Punjabi. So I think a mass revert of all this users edits is in order (this is the only topic they seem to be working on), and if needed a discussion could be opened as to whether Saraiki is a 'language' or a 'dialect'. BTW, the user knows their way around WP, e.g. I also reverted their changes to Template:Arabic-script sidebar, so they're not a newbie. If they become a problem, we might want to check if they're a sock from an old edit-war.
Regardless, IMO this name should be a rd to Gurmukhi. The reason is that our convention on WP (at least the last time I was involved in the discussions) was that a 'script' was a writing system, and an 'alphabet' was the application of that script to a particular language. For instance, the English alphabet and Italian alphabet are both applications of the Latin script. Usage in the lit is a bit inconsistent, but that's a reasonable approach. In this case, Gurmukhi is a script designed for Punjabi, so it's the only Punjabi script. Shahmukhi is not a distinct script, but a Punjabi alphabet based on the Arabic script. We might want to rd to Punjabi alphabet instead, but the hat notes should cover things.
— kwami (talk) 20:18, 4 March 2019 (UTC)
@kwamikagami bro for you kind information, Punjabi in 11th century was firstly written by Baba fareed in Perso-Arabic script, and gurmukhi was developed in 16th century, so old and original script is perso-arabic and this script is used by 100 million punjabis in pakistan while gurmukhi by only 27 million.
In general, there are 5-6 writing system for punjabi language and two major are Shahmukhi and Gurmukhi. Gurmukhi is used in india while shahmukhi in pakistan. Shahmukhi can write only majhi/lahori dialect, therefore for the unity of all dialects of Punjabi, in pakistan a new script was developed and the name of script is Punjabi/punjabi script. More info is in link >>https://www.omniglot.com/conscripts/punjabi.htm Thats why i created the page, Punjabi Script but wikipdia members reverted and asked me for discussion. So thats why i am telling details here. I request wikipedia administrators to publish the page Punjabi scipt or Punjabi Alphabets which will explain this script. still if you have any question then let me know. more source http://saanjo.com/1625-2/

Pathadippalam

Pathadippalam needs attention. Please see the concerns I expressed in the prod tag at the top of the article, and the TP discussion that began this morning. I am reluctant to move it to the correct spelling while there is an AfC with the correct spelling in draft space. Thank you. Atsme 📣 📧 15:58, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

WP:INCOTM

Hello, we had a project called Indian collaboration of the Month. In this project we used to improve an India-related article every month. It is currently inactive. I think we can restart this initiative. Any suggestion/opinion? Regards. --Titodutta (talk) 19:12, 25 February 2019 (UTC)

  • Hello, should we do this? Indian Collaboration of the Month has been a fantastic initiative, in my opinion. I am personally Ok to work any article the community thinks should be a collaboration of the month. Suggestions and comments please. --Titodutta (talk) 19:18, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
  • I welcome the idea, but my own time is quite limited, and I prefer to focus on topics I'm already familiar with; so I wouldn't be much help here, I'm afraid. Vanamonde (Talk) 19:44, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
  • I support the idea with the caveat that our track record on making this work is actually quite poor. The sad truth is that India articles are either contentious or on topics that don't excite anyone. But, we shouldn't give up so go for it and I'll be happy to contribute. --regentspark (comment) 20:30, 27 February 2019 (UTC)
  • I don't have time myself, but I can give you my personal opinion about collaborative writing born of my WP experience, if I may be allowed to be presumptuous. Collaboration works better for topics about things or geography than for those about people or history. If, however, the choice has to be in the latter group (i.e. people or history), it works better for making small improvements in a larger class of articles than for making major improvements in one article. For that reason, it works better for improving stubs, C or B class articles than for fine honing more developed articles. The returns on the time invested are much greater in the former case, and the likelihood of burnout is less. Luckily there is a huge backlog of entire classes of India-related articles that are in poor shape. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 01:19, 28 February 2019 (UTC)
  • A welcome initiative, Tito! I am not too active on wikipedia at the moment (seems to be an epidemic amongst the old-timers ;-)) but I'll at least try to help around the edges even if it is just with copy-editing and formatting gruntwork. Abecedare (talk) 02:35, 28 February 2019 (UTC)
  • Much in articles I've encountered has subsequently been taken out for lack of cited sources. See the article on Badlapur, Maharashtra before a wave of deletionist fervor swept so much away. Some of what was there was excessive, but much wasn't. Some of what was taken out was notable (e.g. the three schools with blue links that were removed, along with the entire Education secton), and sources should have easily been found for some of the rest. I've encountered other similar articles, and there may be many others. I suggest that people could be on the lookout for such articles to rescue, where so much of the work has already been done. Dhtwiki (talk) 17:10, 28 February 2019 (UTC)
Thanks for starting this discussion. I like the idea in general, but I am a bit concerned about how we should be doing this. I agree with some of the comments above. I prefer working on articles related to my area of interest (military history) than any other any other topic. I will do minor fixes, but wouldn't be interested in the content itself. Having said that, I really like the idea, but a process needs to be designed to keep this working. It can be INCOTM, or some way other. I am not able to suggest a perfect model now, but would like to hear opinion from others (shoud we send a mass message to members?). Lastly, I believe that WikiProject Military History's contest model (WP:MILCON) is a good one to explore. KCVelaga (talk) 11:27, 10 March 2019 (UTC)

FL Review

I have nominated List of state and union territory capitals in India for featured list removal here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets the featured list criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks; editors may declare to "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. Gotitbro (talk) 15:43, 17 March 2019 (UTC)

CAC/PAC JF-17 Thunder‎

CAC/PAC JF-17 Thunder (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) was recently fully protected because of POV pushing an edit warring. The fight continues in the form of edit requests on the talk page. I am completely ignorant about anything having to do with the military of Pakistan and India other than hoping that they don't nuke each other, so I would really appreciate it if someone else would look at the page and evaluate the edit requests. Thanks! --Guy Macon (talk) 15:08, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

Oh wow. Full protection! DiplomatTesterMan (talk) 15:22, 16 March 2019 (UTC)
...and we have had one editor blocked and another who unwatched the page, claiming that an ordinary editor asking him to stop edit warring equals an administrator forbidding him from wirting anything.
The talk page is now filled with multiple edit requests asking us to keep what Pakistan says happened and delete what India says happened. Needless to say, when two nations disagree about what happened, we should describe what each side claims, maintaining a WP:NPOV, and avoid Wikipedia saying or implying that one side is right and one side is wrong. If a recognized independent expert (and no, I don't mean some random person on Twitter) says that one side is right and one side is wrong we should also report what that expert said. If anyone here is willing to look at the page and help me sort out who the reliable sources are, I would greatly appreciate it. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:21, 17 March 2019 (UTC)

Redirects

Is the creation of redirects of the type City, District okay ? << FR (mobileUndo) 06:48, 18 March 2019 (UTC)

Assessment bar (new version)

Where can I find the new version of the assessment bar? Thanks in advance AshLin (talk) 08:42, 18 March 2019 (UTC)

AshLin this archived thread may be what you want. << FR (mobileUndo) 12:42, 18 March 2019 (UTC)
Thanks a lot! :) FR30799386 AshLin (talk) 12:45, 18 March 2019 (UTC)

Wikitext for section above

Can someone please sort out the wikitext for the section above. The transclusion is defective & no edit button appears for the Discussion section.— Preceding unsigned comment added by AshLin (talk • contribs) 14:40, 19 March 2019 (UTC)


American in India

 You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Americans#American expats in India . RightCowLeftCoast (Moo) 01:42, 22 March 2019 (UTC)

Kashmir Life

Could someone from WP:INDIA take a look at Kashmir Life and assess it per WP:NMAG or WP:NME? The magazine does apper to exist, but it's been flag as unreferenced since February 2016 and there never have appeared to have been any citatons to reliable sources added since the article was created back in January 2015. -- Marchjuly (talk) 05:09, 25 March 2019 (UTC)

Deeply disturbed at India-POV pushing in India-Pakistan conflict pages

I am deeply disturbed at India-POV pushing at a number of India-Pakistan conflict related pages. These are Indo-Pakistani War of 1965, in whose infobox it is being astoundingly claimed that the war ended in an Indian victory, on a basis of selectively adducing some sources, most of which are not exactly scholarly. The same is true of the page Indo-Pakistani wars and conflicts and a number of Kashmir-related pages. Since the number of Pakistani editors are considerably fewer now, it seems that the India-POV editors are getting away with highly unencyclopedic edits. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 04:02, 25 March 2019 (UTC)

(repeating my message on that page) This assertion is not at all true. The 1965 war was not a military victory for India, at most we can say that India had an advantageous position at the time of its conclusion. And while I do understand that this is not "evidence" as understood by WP, I have been the Director of the Corps of Engineers Archives & Museum in CME, Pune for almost 7 years and have domain knowledge not just because I was a military man but was a military historian too. This is faux nationalist POV bashing by a few editors and does India's military history and the interests of this encyclopedia no good. AshLin (talk) 05:51, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
I don't think the issue is so clear-cut, and I don't see any reason to lose sleep over it either. The result in the infobox was changed after due Talk:Indo-Pakistani War of 1965#Change in result in the infobox. This was certainly not an instance of the run-of-the-mill "POV pushing".
I am not an expert on wars, but I gather that there are many ways of assessing what the outcome is. And the scholarly consensus too can change over time. I have looked at at least a couple of the sources cited in that discussion and I found a nuanced analysis of what the objectives of the two sides were, how far they were achieved, and what the after effects were. Labelling it "POV pushing" is not justified. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 08:39, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
That doesn't hold water. The outcome of a war being successful is so traumatic & hurtful to the losing nation that it is unmistakeable. Claiming otherwise is being facetious. Claiming that defeat or victory depends upon scholarly sources is self delusion. Examples being in our case 1962 & 1971. 1962 lost us Aksai Chin & other parts to China, delivered a tremendous blow to India's national psyche & international stature. It led to a complete reversal of our international relations approach and the speedy expansion of the Indian Army in time for 1965 & 1971. The 1971 War resulted in the bifurcation of Pakistan, creation of Bangladesh a devastating military defeat of that nation and deep wound to the Pakistani psyche especially their armed forces; it triggered their quest for nuclear weapons. Nothing of the kind for either side in a month long conflict in 1965. AshLin (talk) 11:23, 25 March 2019 (UTC)
@Kautilya3: Whether or not it was an instance of "run of the mill POV pushing," it certainly was drastically selective, as it failed to consider the much larger set of sources, more academic, with higher Google Scholar citation index, which stated that the war ended in a military stalemate, although different political or strategic advantages were gained at the end. It stains credibility that in compiling the sources you have cited no drastic selection process was used. It strains credibility that for nine months, until I came along, one a blatantly false, and a second out-of-context, references were used to insert a statement in the lead of Indo-Pakistani wars and conflicts, "Most wars ended in defeat and disaster for Pakistan." What does "most" mean in the context of four wars? All four or three, when a majority of sources are declaring the wars of 1947 and 1965 to have ended in stalemates or lack of victory for either side? What are the chances that a similarly slanted pro-Pakistan statement would have survived even a few minutes? I think the editors who are majorly editing these pages need to do some soul searching. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:29, 25 March 2019 (UTC)

Indian elections

I have boldly redirected a newly created Chowkidar Chor Hai, which was clearly violating WP:BLP and was written in a POV tone. Similar POV content can be also seen at Rahul Gandhi#Indian general election, 2019.

Slogans are non-notable and serve no purpose since Wikipedia is not a soapboax. @Sitush and Utcursch: take a glance. 139.167.161.20 (talk) 18:09, 19 March 2019 (UTC)

Category:Political catchphrases and Category:Indian political slogans pages would make it clear to anyone that Wikipedia covers notable political slogans. regarding your accusation of BLP violations, I would like to understand the specifics of your concern because the article is well sourced to national and international reliable sources--DBigXrayᗙ 18:35, 20 March 2019 (UTC)

A new user has created few poorly sourced articles related to Hinduism: [3]. So someone with the relevant knowledge should have a look at them. - NitinMlk (talk) 22:59, 29 March 2019 (UTC)

Proposed deletion of "India City Competitiveness Index"

India City Competitiveness Index needs deletion. In the whole article there is no mention of the index, its definition or a single reference. Plus I could not locate any meaningful refrence (through shallow googling). Comments please? AshLin (talk) 06:08, 2 April 2019 (UTC)

Punjabi Alphabet

In general, there are 5-6 writing system for punjabi language and two major are Shahmukhi and Gurmukhi. Gurmukhi is used in india while shahmukhi in pakistan. Shahmukhi can write only majhi/lahori dialect, therefore for the unity of all dialects of Punjabi, in pakistan a new script was developed and the name of script is Punjabi/punjabi script. More info is in link >>https://www.omniglot.com/conscripts/punjabi.htm Thats why i created the page, Punjabi Script but wikipdia members reverted and asked me for discussion. So thats why i am telling details here. I request wikipedia administrators to publish the page Punjabi scipt or Punjabi Alphabets which will explain this script. still if you have any question then let me know — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rana Zubair Punjabi (talk • contribs) 07:04, 4 April 2019 (UTC)

Interested editors might like to read the recent discussion on this, archived here, particularly the comments from User:Kwamikagami. The Omniglot page is new, and I'm guessing it was contributed by a Wikipedia editor: it seems to have been published there quite recently, and it describes the Saraiki language as a dialect. Flapjacktastic (talk) 13:23, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
To summarize, my question is how this dishonestly named "Punjabi script" is different from the Saraiki alphabet. If it is distinct, I'd think we would just create a subsection in Shahmukhi for the additional letters. But User Rana Zubair Punjabi tagged 'Saraiki alphabet' for notability, so I suspect his motivation is a political objection to Saraiki being presented as a distinct language -- a seemingly chronic dispute on WP. Of course, the Saraiki alphabet exists regardless of whether Saraiki is a 'language' or a 'dialect'. (I have no opinion on that question, though there do seem to be quite a few RS's that speak of Saraiki as a language.) — kwami (talk) 20:23, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
Punjabi Alphabet is different from saraiki Alphabets because there are 2 additional words which can not be found in saraiki, these are ݢ and ݪ. Actually, the name is "Punjabi Alphabet" not punjabi script. As English nd italian alphabet is are from latin script. Punjabi Alphabet are from perso-arabic and the name is given becuase it is used to write punjabi language. The page should be created for Punjabi Alphabet because it is for the 100 million people in pakistan.rana (talk) 06:33, 6 April 2019 (UTC)

Rejection of arranged marriage or abandonment?

I recently happened upon the Narendra Modi page. Its lead has the curious verbal subterfuge: "He left home after graduating from school, partly because of an arranged marriage which he rejected. Modi travelled around India for two years and visited a number of religious centres ..." This is presumably summarizing a slightly longer verbal sleight-of-hand from his early childhood section, which states, "Engaged while still (sic) a child to Jashodaben, a girl from a family who (sic) lived close by, Modi rejected the (sic) arranged marriage at the same time he graduated from high school.[1] The resulting familial tensions contributed to his decision to leave home in 1967.[2]" Let us for a moment forget what the "biography," which is cited, says, but what does "rejection of an arranged marriage" mean? How is it different from the more common form of abandonment, or desertion, practised in relatively large numbers by Hindu men in small-town and rural India? He is, after all, legally married to the lady, the infobox says it. The Wikipedia lead and introduction section seem to be implying that this one was somehow more principled. We can't say that this is because the biography says so, because there are many high-quality sources, e.g. a New York Times article written by a Pulitzer prize winner, Ellen Barry, as well as many others in the Guardian, Washington Post, Financial Times, CNN, The Hindu that simply state: he was married in 1968, abandoned his marriage, and thereafter did not acknowledge his marital status publicly until Spring of 2014. Surely there is more NPOV language than what is currently in the article. Wikipedia is written for an international audience. Most global readers will not be able to parse "rejecting a marriage," let alone what it means to do so for 45 years. Pinging @Vanamonde93:. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:29, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler: I think you know why the article is as dispassionate as possible; because the alternatives, given the editors active in the area, are a hagiography or a total mess. Even so, if you have alternative wording to suggest, go ahead and suggest it; I'm all ears. I'm confused as to why you are raising this here before raising it at the talk page, though. Vanamonde (Talk) 14:59, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
The word "abandonment" would imply that they lived as a married couple at some point of time, but the book cited in the article suggests otherwise. It says that they were engaged when Modi was 3, provides no timeline for a marriage ceremony and adds that he left when he was 17 and Jashodaben was 15. According to the book, they never cohabited or consummated the marriage. The NYT article also suggests that the marriage was never consummated. Although, I have to add that the cited book may not be neutral, and perhaps was the same one mentioned in the NYT article as being distributed to journalists by BJP. If the standard for changing the wording was interpretation by an international audience, the word "abandonment" would be a worse choice for leaving an unconsummated forced child marriage. —Gazoth (talk) 15:13, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
@Vanamonde93: I did post at the article’s talk page a few days ago, but then reverted because all the sources, at least the books, seemed very poor ones. It was only when I discovered the newspaper articles this morning that I realized what NPOV language might encompass for this article. I posted here this time after Regents Park’s post on my talk page about using WT:IN for more general topics, which I suspected this might become, given the contrasting views on Indian marriage. Per that advice, I pinged you, though upon rereading it is possible I may have misunderstood his meaning. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:58, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
@Gazoth: I’m sitting in a doctor’s office, so I’ll be brief. All the words child marriage, forced, unconsummated are POV and unreliable. For in a sense all arranged marriages have an element of coercion, otherwise they wouldn’t be called arranged. Unconsummated is neither here nor there. Obviously it was not strong enough reason for Mr Modi to acknowledge the marriage and seek a divorce early on before his wife’s own aspirations became thwarted. All we reliably have is: some kind of marital arrangement was made for him in his teenage years that involved a young woman. At the age of 18 he, but not her, abandoned the further obligations implicit in those arrangements, and had no further contact with the woman. Whether or not he left home, roamed the Himalayas, toyed with becoming a monk, is irrelevant to those obligations. For the next 45 years he denied in reliably recorded public statements that he was married. In Spring 2014, in a sworn affidavit in the election registry, he affirmed that he was married to the same young woman the unexplicated relational obligations to whom he had abandoned in 1968. His official marital status in Indian official pronouncements is: married to but estranged from —— in 1968. That is all we have. I’m sure we can say that without the various rationales. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:20, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
Fowler&fowler, that's an overly simplistic view. There's a difference between a marriage arranged between adults and a marriage arranged between toddlers. It is not POV to assert that such a marriage is forced, unless you want to contend that babies have agency. The assertion of child marriage is also not POV since the legal minimum was 18 for boys in India until 1978. On the other hand, your assertion that the marriage had a legal basis is unsubstantiated.
You are accusing somebody of abandoning an obligation that was forced upon them without their consent. Your assertion that he chose not to pursue a divorce depends upon the assumption that divorce was a socially acceptable option for a person in his situation, but that is simply not true for a 1960s rural India. —Gazoth (talk) 20:31, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Marino 2014, p. 21.
  2. ^ Marino 2014, pp. 22–23.
I think the current text is misleading. The way it reads now, it appears that he never got married because he "rejected" the notion of an arranged marriage. Since he did have an arranged marriage, abandoned is the more accurate verb. However, I suggest going with whatever reliable sources says. --regentspark (comment) 20:32, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
@Gazoth: To toddle is to take small tottering steps. A toddler is therefore a child who is learning to walk (OED). Modi's wife is two or three years younger that he. Obviously he was not a toddler when the engagement arrangements were made, although she might well have been. Here is an NPOV version that says nothing you are objecting to:

"Some time during his childhood, a form of traditional betrothal with a girl, and leading to eventual marriage, was arranged for him by his family. In 1968, when he was 18, they were married, however, soon thereafter, he, but not her, abandoned the further obligations implicit in this arrangement. Mr Modi had no further contact with the young woman, Jashodaben Chimanlal. For the next 45 years he denied in reliably recorded public statements that he was married. However, in Spring 2014, before the national elections that swept him to power, Mr Modi affirmed in a sworn affidavit that he was indeed married and his spouse was indeed Ms Chimanlal." There are plenty reliable citations for these:

Some references relevant to Mr Modi's marriage.
Fowler&fowler«Talk» 03:16, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
  • Annie Gowen (January 25, 2015), Abandoned as a child bride, wife of Narendra Modi hopes he calls, The Washington Post Quote: "NEW DELHI — She’s waiting for him, as she has been all her life. But when Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi dined with Barack and Michelle Obama at a glittering banquet Sunday night, his wife wasn’t by his side. Modi, 64, kept his teenage marriage a secret for decades during his political ascent and only last year admitted that his wife exists.The wife, Jashodaben Chimanlal Modi, is a retired teacher who lives in a small town in Modi’s home state of Gujarat. Although she had not heard from her husband in years, she says she still hopes to join him one day in the capital as his spouse. ... Narendra Modi, the son of a man who sold tea in a railway station, comes from a lower caste called Ghanchi. He and his wife were promised to each other as young adolescents in keeping with the traditions of their community. They were then married in a small ceremony when she was 17 and he was 18. ...Narendra Modi left shortly thereafter to wander in the Himalayas with little more than a change of clothing in his rucksack, ... Modi never returned to his wife but never divorced her, even as he became the high-profile chief minister of Gujarat and, last year, India’s premier. He never publicly spoke of his wife, ... Meanwhile, she subsists on a small pension from her time as a teacher. She keeps a small photo of her husband tucked in her prayer book and spends long hours in solitude. “I wake up at 5 a.m. I pray at home. I go to the temple. My life is spent in prayer now,” she said. Her brother says she gets depressed from time to time. “When she feels dejected, we try to lift her mood,” the brother said. “We say, ‘The morning will come soon.’ We try to tell her that he will call her one day, soon. She has full faith that he will call her to him.”
  • Kai Shultz; Hari Kumar (February 7, 2018), Narendra Modi’s Estranged Wife Escapes Unhurt From Car Crash in India, The New York Times Quote: "For most of his political career, Mr. Modi did not publicly acknowledge that he was married. He left his marital status blank on several election registration forms when he was chief minister of the state of Gujarat. But under increased scrutiny as a candidate for prime minister in 2014, Mr. Modi revised his official biography to note the relationship. The marriage, which was arranged, occurred about 50 years ago in a small town in Gujarat when Mr. Modi and Ms. Chimanlal were teenagers, according to The Indian Express. A biography of Mr. Modi distributed to journalists by his political party, Bharatiya Janata, said that the two had never lived together and that the marriage had never been consummated. Mr. Modi is said to have left Ms. Chimanlal soon after their marriage to wander in the Himalayas, where he considered becoming a monk. In past elections, Mr. Modi played up his apparent bachelor status, arguing that he could not be corrupt because he had no family to support."
  • CNN Library (September 12, 2018), Narendra Modi: Fast Facts, CNN {{citation}}: |author= has generic name (help) Quote: "Marriage: Jashodaben (Chimanlal) Modi (1968-present, separated); Entered into an arranged marriage as a teenager to Jashodaben Chimanlal. When he filed his nomination for prime minister, he was forced to acknowledge the marriage after almost 50 years of claiming to be single."
As for your pleas about the cruelties of child marriage, and how Mr Modi might be a victim, please consider the raw deal his wife got in all this—a young woman who had accepted the same social arrangements to mean marriage—had no say in this, and by one act of abandonment had all her options closed. Please reread the Washinton Post quotes above. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 03:16, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
There are conflicting sources for the exact year of marriage. The NYT article that you linked says that he left the marriage when he was 17, BBC [4][5] says that they were married in 1967 when he was 17, his brother told Caravan that they were married when Modi was 13. There doesn't have to be a single victim in a child marriage and the fact that Jashodaben ended up in a worse condition doesn't change that. —Gazoth (talk) 05:20, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

@Gazoth: OK, so we'll change it to:

"During his childhood, as a part of a custom traditional to his caste, his family arranged a betrothal to a girl, Jashodaben Chimanlal. The two were married when he was a teenager. Sometime thereafter, he abandoned the further obligations implicit in the custom, such as cohabitation, and the couple went on to lead separate lives, neither marrying again, the marriage itself remaining unmentioned in Mr Modi's public pronouncements for the next 45 years. However, in April 2014, shortly before the national elections that swept him to power, Mr Modi affirmed in a sworn affidavit that he was married and his spouse was Ms Chimanlal. The couple has remained married, but estranged."

How does that sound? I would imagine this is fairly NPOV and in resonance with the sources listed by you. This is for the Early Life section, and would need to be summarized further for the lead. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 10:34, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

PS Whether it really was a child marriage for him (i.e. took place before his 18th birthday) is not certain, though it seems it was so for her. True, as you stated, in a such a marriage both parties can be victims. However, there was only one victim of the abandonment. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 10:47, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
This sounds fine to me, but you should probably discuss this on the article talk page too. —Gazoth (talk) 15:01, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
Sounds good. But let us not get so technical here. We all know what marriage means. I would just say "he abandoned the marital obligations, and...". -- Kautilya3 (talk) 17:58, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

A new newsletter directory is out!

A new Newsletter directory has been created to replace the old, out-of-date one. If your WikiProject and its taskforces have newsletters (even inactive ones), or if you know of a missing newsletter (including from sister projects like WikiSpecies), please include it in the directory! The template can be a bit tricky, so if you need help, just post the newsletter on the template's talk page and someone will add it for you.

– Sent on behalf of Headbomb. 03:11, 11 April 2019 (UTC)

I'm afraid some people are promoting strange POV in a number of clothing related pages: Kurta, Shalwar kameez, Muslin, History of clothing in (sic) the Indian subcontinent and probably quite a few others, citing obscure references that make the case that kurta and shalwar are depicted in the Ajanta caves, ... I am dismayed to see these articles in much worse shape than they were ten years ago. I have intervened at Kurta, and will do so in Shalwar kameez, but I don't want to waste more time haggling about trifles. Could some good samaritans or admins please step in and stem the rot? Best regard, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 22:40, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

hi, this user user:Fowler&fowler has been messing around a lot in the Kurta article and pushing his what i believe anti-indian agenda in it frequently deleting history and images from ajanta, gupta era related to kurta without any given reason, removing indian sub continent origin from intro and trying to bring sources which mention that stitched clothing was unknown to Hindus before arrival of muslims the notion which should be very much questionable, please make him stop doing that. The user has now resorted to similar vandalism in Shalwar Kameez article by shoving central asia in the mix even though shalwar kameez is not known in central asia.175.136.101.184 (talk) 03:10, 15 April 2019 (UTC)

Interesting discussion all. However, that Goa should still be described as being in ‘Southwestern India’ is problematic for a number of reasons.

Firstly, if you go through the history of the page you will see the change from ‘Western’ to ‘southwestern’ was done by a vandal who referenced pig farming as their source material.

Secondly, to a casual reader, for whom Wikipedia is intended, Goa may be inferred to be a South Indian State. It is not and therefore the current description is misleading.

Goa is neither linguistically not politically a South Indian State. Users navigating the North Indian and South Indian pages (from this perspective) would be confused. Additionally, it also ignores Goa’s recent history and it almost being merged with Maharashtra (which is not in South India).

Thirdly, the simplest answer is the right answer. The above conversation seems to ignore the fact that Goa was described as being in Western India rather than southwestern India for a number of years. Given that the change was done by a vandal, the simplest answer would be to revert to the original.

I propose reverting to Goa being in Western India. Goingoan (talk) 13:23, 9 February 2020 (UTC)

I'm afraid some people are promoting strange POV in a number of clothing related pages: Kurta, Shalwar kameez, Muslin, History of clothing in (sic) the Indian subcontinent and probably quite a few others, citing obscure references that make the case that kurta and shalwar are depicted in the Ajanta caves, ... I am dismayed to see these articles in much worse shape than they were ten years ago. I have intervened at Kurta, and will do so in Shalwar kameez, but I don't want to waste more time haggling about trifles. Could some good samaritans or admins please step in and stem the rot? Best regard, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 22:40, 13 April 2019 (UTC)

hi, this user user:Fowler&fowler has been messing around a lot in the Kurta article and pushing his what i believe anti-indian agenda in it frequently deleting history and images from ajanta, gupta era related to kurta without any given reason, removing indian sub continent origin from intro and trying to bring sources which mention that stitched clothing was unknown to Hindus before arrival of muslims the notion which should be very much questionable, please make him stop doing that. The user has now resorted to similar vandalism in Shalwar Kameez article by shoving central asia in the mix even though shalwar kameez is not known in central asia.175.136.101.184 (talk) 03:10, 15 April 2019 (UTC)

Deletion of reliable Indian Government sourced content from Indian state articles

Recently, content supported by reliable Indian Government sources have been deleted from Indian state articles' leads, for example this. The editor , who removed the contents argued that the "Government Definitions" shouldn't be used in "Geographic Places" and he seems to only care about what's written in Oxford Dictionaries and Encyclopedia Britannica. Point is, Indian states are political entities not geographical places, so Indian govt sources from institutes like Ministry of Home Affairs (India), Ministry of Culture (India) and Ministry of Minority Affairs should be mentioned there as well for the sake of WP:NPOV. Moreover, states are not bound within a single geographical region either. States like Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh are well into central India. Text like "Uttar Pradesh is in northern India" is just as confusing when you find its neighbouring state Bihar "is a state in eastern India"

I agree that mentioning multiple regions in the opening sentence may be confusing but Germany has it, Turkey has it and Spain also mentions Western and Southern Europe in the lede. And none of these articles seem to cite Britannica, etc. not to mention that Britannica is not considered that much reliable as per this. And this can be taken care of by mentioning which govt. sources are grouping the states within which zone in the latter part of the lede. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 09:37, 19 March 2019 (UTC)

Discussion from GotitBro's talkpage
Deletion of reliable content from Indian state articles

Why are you deleting reliable govt. sourced content from articles like Uttar Pradesh and Bihar? Different Indian Govt. sources group states into different regions that need to be highlighted in the article. The regional terms like North India or East India are not mentioned in the article bodies either. If you want, different govt. definitions can be added in the article body and then highlighted in the lead. Check Germany which mentions it being part of "Central and Western Europe". Lead fixation can be corrected as well. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 07:10, 19 March 2019 (UTC)

@Fylindfotberserk: We don't use government definitions for geographic places, only widely accepted ones are used and placing administrative territories in multiple regions is generally avoided. For Bihar, the general definition is that it is in eastern India as can be seen from Bihar at the Encyclopædia Britannica, for Uttar Pradesh as well it is generally accepted as a northern state ("Uttar Pradesh". Lexico UK English Dictionary. Oxford University Press. n.d.). The WP:STATUSQUO for a long time has been the same and I don't see anything that has changed. Gotitbro (talk) 07:21, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
States are government defined not geographic so I believe they need to highlight govt. definitions. Secondly, why should we rely on Britannica and Oxford for definitions only. Check Germany, lede mentions it to be: ...is a country in Central and Western Europe while Germany at the Encyclopædia Britannica mentions it in "north-central europe". And thirdly, is there a consensus regarding how a Political region be defined? - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 07:30, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
@Fylindfotberserk: As I said multiple regional locators such as those added by you and an editor before are avoided as confusing and unclear, Germany might as well be a exception here. It makes no sense to list a state as "north, north-central, eastern etc." all in one go which renders it completely meaningless and confusing. There is a reason the articles described the locations of the states as are definitively accepted. We'll follow the STATUSQUO here and the widely/generally accepted definitions as such. Gotitbro (talk) 07:37, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
Why would Germany be an exception. Obviously its geo-political position has been discussed heavily in Wikipedia. I agree that "north, north-central, eastern etc." looks confusing and can be cleaned but Germany being part of "Central and Western Europe" is just as confusing. The thing is, a lot of states do not fall in a specific region. Do you think Uttar Pradesh is absolutely Northern Indian, obviously it has a big chunk in Central part of India. And you didn't explain why we should follow "Britannica" like a sheep. European country articles do not follow it as it is. Sorry I'm not convinced. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 08:04, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
Well then it should be discussed at the article of Germany. States might not a fall in a "specific" region but we aren't going to list a myriad zones in the lead. The generally accepted definitions were used before and Britannica is definitely a useful guideline, pointing to any resource does not mean being a sheep. The precedent and STATUSQUO has been clear for a long time, don't see anything that's changed since and needs convincing. Gotitbro (talk) 08:10, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
You didn't provide a concensus or rule regarding this. And why should we consider only Britannica? Doesn't make any sense since European articles do not copy paste from those sites. I agree that multiple regions mentioned might be confusing but we can correct those by mentioning which govt. sources are grouping the states within which zone. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 09:36, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
The WP:LEAD has to be straightforward and uncomplicated, by mentioning multiple zones/regions add on top of that mentioning govt. sources is the opposite of that. Moreover the govt. zones shouldn't be used to describe the location of the states especially when their location is widely described otherwise [also the government zones are for administrative purposes which do not consider the situation of places]. Britannica isn't the only source but it is definitely a guideline and has been used as the basis of a lot of articles on Wikipedia. What you're suggesting is just confusing and simply unencyclopedic. Gotitbro (talk) 09:46, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
What about removing the geographical identifier altogether. We can write it as "Uttar Pradesh is a state in the Upper and Middle Gangetic plains of India, etc, etc". That would be succinct enough. I saw a lot of articles where this has been done. I find the "northern India" confusing since if you see the geography neutrally, you'll find that UP is into central India as well. I don't think 2 sentences Britannica should have that much priority. Nonetheless, Britannica also mentions Uttar Pradesh as multiple regional "north-central India". And about the Bhojpuri region? The one in UP is northern Indian region and neighboring one in in Bihar be is eastern Indian? Kinda absurd don't you think? For identifying a state geographically, you need a geographic source not Britannica. I agree with some of the things you say but not all. I agree that mentioning multiple regions in the opening sentence doesn't look good but they are needed. If not in the first few sentences, then in the latter part of the lead. See Spain. And you want, that can be added into the article body as well. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 10:29, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
That is confusing as well, not everyone what the Gangetic plains are etc. While descriptors such as north-central etc. might be kind of acceptable they aren't applicable here as again these aren't accepted widely. The two sentences of Britannica do hold weight because if we go completely technical on geographic basis we'll be straying away from writing for an encyclopedia. Mentioning multiple regions in the lead is definitely not needed and adding a few supporting in the body isn't helpful wither. In the end fact of the matter is, UP is considered a northern state regardless of that it borders Bihar and similarly for other states. Being pedantic and adding a multitude of regions for technicality isn't going to help the WP:READER. Gotitbro (talk) 10:46, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
"Northern" is confusing and vague as hell. A neutral Non-South Asian will definitely think that Uttar Pradesh is not the same as Punjab or Kashmir location wise if he compares it in an Atlas. Gangetic plains or Ganges river is much more specific. And Indian govt. definitions for an Indian state is far from trivial information. I'm flexible enough to agree to some of your concerns but you are getting too much rigid with your POV using Britannica and Oxford dictionaries as supports. Even Great Britain article doesn't have a single reference to Encyclopedia Britannica. And what's this "accepted widely"? By Britannica? You don't seem to accept Britannica's definition of Uttar Pradesh as "north-central" either. Your definition that UP is "northern Indian" is unsourced. Secondly, Britannica is not considered much reliable and is only suitable when there's no source supporting a specific topic. See Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_115#Is_Encyclopedia_Britannica_a_reliable_source. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 14:07, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
The govt. sources used for zonal arrangements are definitely trivial and best ignored. I don't see anything related to POV in here, simply restoring the STATUSQUO before this multiple region conundrum is clearly not that. UP is clearly a northern state and was thus as such in the article from the beginning, I don't see any reason to unnecessarily table sources for this. [Though descriptions such as "north-central" are better than "northern, north-central, eastern" etc.] The location of Bihar can be discussed, its also best done at its Talk page. Yes, Britannica is tertiary but its definitely WP:RS and has served as the basis for many articles on Wikipedia even the ones being discussed now; so it definitely serves as guideline to follow for encyclopedic articles. Also look at the GA version of the article for Uttar Pradesh. Gotitbro (talk) 7:36 pm, Today (UTC+5.5)
Since it is a Govt. sources versus "widely accepted" Britannica sources, it is better to have the centralized discussion. I moved it to WP:IN. Check it. I forgot to mention it. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 14:21, 19 March 2019 (UTC)

Discussion

This is definitely a better avenue for such a discussion. Though I think I have listed the issues I had with these recent changes other editors can discuss further. Gotitbro (talk) 14:12, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
I have reverted to the original version with a different rationale in edit summary. Please resolve the issue with consensus here in the WikiProject before this is taken further as it affects a large number of articles of our nation. AshLin (talk) 14:22, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
  • Comment - Kautilya3, Then what to consider as a RS? Britannica, etc are not used in European articles either and not considered that much reliable. It is an issue since there are multiple government and other reliable source definitions for a state. I agree with GolitBro that mentioning multiple regions will be confusing, but mentioning, "Uttar Pradesh is a northern Indian state" for example is rather vague and for a casual non-South Asian reader confusing. Uttar Pradesh is nowhere close to definite northern Indian states like Jammu and Kashmir or Punjab.
I suggest we either delete these vague regional identifiers and use geographical features to write something like "Uttar Pradesh is a state in upper and middle Gangetic plains" like in Gujarat article and move the govt. definition somewhere else OR mention the different govt. definitions albeit in an Encyclopedic way like in Germany where both Western and Central Europe is mentioned. States like Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra are too big to be considered part of a single region. It doesn't feel right to say Uttar Pradesh is strictly a "northern" State while its adjoining states, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh are strictly "eastern" and "central". - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 15:46, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
Unrelated: It would be pretty cool if you can type my username as simply "Gotitbro" [without capitalization] :); kinda goes with the flow. Also, if you don't mind me asking, what does your username mean? Gotitbro (talk) 16:08, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
You can take any reasonable sample of scholarly and non-scholarly (e.g., newspapers/magazines) sources and see what terminology they use. Now that the elections are coming up, you will have plenty of news articles that divvy up the country into regions for the purpose of discussion and analysis. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 16:53, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
  • I too am not seeing the problem here. The Zonal Council based-division may be worth mentioning in Government and administrative sections of the respective articles but it probably is too obscure to include even there. As for how the other ministries (or say, the Indian Railways) decide to divide the country into regions for their internal administrative purposes is not really relevant to the rough geographic orientation presented in the lede sentences. Also, afaik, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh are generally regarded as being in Western India, Norther Indian, and Central India respectively (it is even in the name for the last two) and EB is simply one source reflecting that. However, if it is shown that, say, Maharashtra is often talked about as a Central Indian state in reliable sources that can be added to the lede. Abecedare (talk) 16:35, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
  • I want to restore the article to before what I consider the disruptive change. This would make it easier to review references with the object of moving them rather than wholesale deletion, even if consensus calls for fewer references and simplified text in the lead. I believe that's what's meant by returning to the status quo, not necessarily being consistent with other articles or encyclopedias, but what has been in place on this article for some time. BTW, the references are not just governmental ones. More than half are from Reuters, The Times of India (2), and Firstpost. The double regional allegiance of Bihar isn't just a matter of governmental whim but historical, as Bihar is linguistically allied with Uttar Pradesh, rather than West Bengal, although Bihar was once part of the Bengal Presidency. Dhtwiki (talk) 22:47, 19 March 2019 (UTC)
  • My suggestions/concerns -
  1. If by adding govt. sources or any press/news (historic/modern) references makes the lead confusing because of multiple definitions, then I would suggest we remove them altogether from the lead. Instead use geographical term as in Goa, Gujarat articles which mentions "Goa is a state on the western cost of India within the coastal region known as the Konkan" or "Gujarat is a state on the western coast of India with a coastline of 1,600 km" respectively. That is make the lead geography based. In that way we can say "Uttar Pradesh is a state on the upper and middle Gangetic plains of north-central part of India, etc etc" with the north-central part taken from Britannica. And the "part" part will be important. That way it will be easier for a reader to approximate the geographical location/span of Uttar Pradesh. Mentioning only "north" would not demark it from bonafide northern states like J & K, Himachal, Punjab, etc which are also categorized as such by Indian govt.
  2. Abecedare, As far as I know Uttar Pradesh is considered to be part of "central India" by two institutes, The Zonal councils of Ministry of Home Affairs (India) and Ministry of Minority Affairs and "north-central" by Ministry of Culture (India) but Geological Survey considers it as "northern Indian". So there are far less number of govt. sources that consider it "northern India". Even Britannica considers it as a "north-central" Indian state.
  3. Dhtwiki, Bihar also has languages like Maithili and Angika which are very much related to Bengali through script and all even if you do not consider Bhojpuri as an Eastern Indic language which it is. Not to mention, there are press articles which classify Gujarat and West Bengal as "north Indian" states as well. Bihar Govt itself considers it to be an "Eastern State" as do the Ministry of Culture (India), Ministry of Home Affairs (India) and Geological Survey. Ministry of Minority Affairs considers it "central" though. If only one definition is to be kept then Bihar should be considered "eastern Indian" and there are a lot of news articles also which support it as an eastern state including Britannica.
  4. Shouldn't govt definitions, Central or State, be included in the article? Atleast in the body. States are political entities, aren't they?
- Fylindfotberserk (talk) 11:25, 20 March 2019 (UTC)
@Fylindfotberserk: To address a couple of points you raise:
  • IMO, this source should be represented as "UP is included in the Central Zonal Council for settling inter-state disputes" rather than "the Ministry of Home Affairs regards UP as a Central State". Ditto for the dozens or possibly hundreds of such statutory bodies that group the states in different ways for administrative purposes.
  • On a positive note: if changing "is in North India" to "is in the Northern part of India" helps resolve the dispute, that is perfectly fine with me since, at least in my reading, the two are essentially equivalent in this context.
  • More broadly: Just like South Asia, South East Asia etc, North India, East India... are loose context-dependent terms whose amorphousness is best addressed in the dedicated articles on the topic instead of in the lede sentences of the state articles. For the latter, I recommend, (1) preserving the status-quo that simply lists the most common indicator, or (2) your "...X part of India" suggestion, or (3) for really contentious cases, adding a footnote along the lines "sometimes the state is classified as in X India,[1] or in Y India.[2]" in that order of preference. Abecedare (talk) 21:26, 20 March 2019 (UTC)
@Abecedare:,
  • I totally agree with your first point. No reason to mention the Ministry of Home Affairs.
  • On top of the "part" thing, I would suggest that we frame it like- "is in the north-central part of India" since north-central will be more precise geographically and I wouldn't recommend wikilinking the regions because those articles rely on govt sources quite much. The Britannica article on Maharashtra is quite precise from a neutral point of view. It writes : "Maharashtra, state of India, occupying a substantial portion of the Deccan plateau in the western peninsular part of the subcontinent". It mentions 'western' but since Deccan also extends upto central part of India, it covers the fact that a good portion of Maharashtra is in central India as well. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 10:40, 21 March 2019 (UTC)
Works for me. Will let others weigh in. Abecedare (talk) 01:19, 22 March 2019 (UTC)
@Abecedare:, 10 days passed. Probably I should edit the Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra articles as discussed here. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 17:15, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
@Fylindfotberserk: I think it would be fine to make the changes. If anyone objects, they can always revert and continue the discussion here or on the articles' talkpages. Abecedare (talk) 18:12, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
@Abecedare: "Deccan" means southern,so it does not cover the fact that Maharashtra is also spanning central India. And everybody does not know meaning of Deccan. Why don't we say directly central and south? BelgaumGoan (talk) 14:32, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
@Abecedare: I've edited the Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra articles accordingly. Take a look. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 18:40, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
Distinct improvement IMO. I particularly like that the edit removed the multiple-citations from the lede sentence since whenever I see that on wikipedia I imagine "somebody is saying something controversial and trying to force their way through by ref-bombing" rather than "lots of citations. must be really true". Abecedare (talk) 19:06, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
I think you have to say that Maharashtra is spanning western,central and south India. Its not just a govt defn. I also think so because of culture ethnicity, general beliefs and geography. Maharashtra is very big state and different parts have different tendencies..we can't say that Vidharbha, Amravati,Marathwada and many areas feel like western coastal. In history, British times, big parts of Maharashtra are in Central Provinces and Hyderabad State,and in history many empires ruled Maharashtra which were from south. Deccan area spans most of maharashtra and it translates to "southern" and this region is always associated with southern states.And Maharashtra Karnataka have similar cultures. You wrote in the article that it's part of deccan, isn't it more useful to say in English it is southern(everybody does not know the meaning of dakshin)? This has a long legacy and so it should not be removed. It is hard to agree with putting Maharashtra in one region,so can't you put more than one region? You don't have to write all definitions,but short phrase like "western,central and southern" or "southwest-central" is short and does not cause confusion for reader. What do you think.BelgaumGoan (talk) 23:55, 1 April 2019 (UTC)

@Abecedare: Thanks and I agree that refbombing is a part of POV pushing but since I'm inclusionist by nature, I typically do not delete relevant sources but try to balance it out by deleting overlinks and putting sources where it is due till we reach a consensus like in this case.


@BelgaumGoan: Sorry I forgot to invite you to this discussion. Anyway, we have agreed to neither include each and every geo-political definition nor to put a specific definition especially for larger states, but to have generalized description in the opening sentence, I believe this :- "..is a state in the western peninsular region of India occupying a substantial portion of the Deccan plateau." encompasses the "western,central and southern" thing. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 10:51, 2 April 2019 (UTC)

@Fylindfotberserk: thank you,but not everybody understands translation of "deccan". I think you should be more clear (saying in english) it expands both western,southern territories. Southern (english) vs deccan (sanskrit) makes it more clear to larger audience. and in that statement, ..is a state in the western peninsular region of India occupying a substantial portion of the Deccan plateau." you didn't say maharashtra also expands to part of central India. For example,Vidharbha is large part of maharashtra similar to Madhya pradesh and it was once considered Central Provinces. BelgaumGoan (talk) 13:39, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
I understand but as I had already explained that few posts above, the peninsular India covers central and southern part of the country, when you mention "western peninsular region" it covers the western, central and southern aspects of Maharashtra nicely. It is much better than mentioning only "western India". - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 16:35, 4 April 2019 (UTC)
@Fylindfotberserk:"Peninsular" does not mean geographical direction like South or Central.peninsular means surrounded by water.I think you have say directly south or Central rather than say peninsular. BelgaumGoan (talk) 03:49, 7 April 2019 (UTC)
Indian peninsula is in the "southern direction" just like Italian peninsula is in the south. I believe most readers already know that. We have agreed to put a broader geographic definition to give a rough idea of it's location and extent in the opening sentence rather a single "geographic direction" or "multiple direction" which are both vague and confusing. More specifics are provided in the following texts and coordinates are also given in the infobox. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 16:51, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
@Fylindfotberserk:I know India's peninsula is in south so it automatically implies that peninsular means south. But I am basically saying why do we need to indirectly suggest that it is south, rather than directly saying it is south? It will be clearer if you said south. And, why is "peninsular" more broad than saying "south"? Then following same logic, why don't we say "bounded by Arabian sea" instead of "Western" (since Arabian sea is toward west of India, it automatically implies western). And,nothing in the lead sentence implied "central" (also one of Maharashtra geography definitions), "deccan and peninsular" just covers southern. BelgaumGoan (talk) 14:50, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
@AshLin:,@Kautilya3:,@Gotitbro:,@Dhtwiki:, please can you look at my comments? I want to discuss this. Thank you. BelgaumGoan (talk) 00:58, 18 April 2019 (UTC)
Fylindfotberserk: The Agra province, initially a Mughal subah, then part of Ceded and Conquered Provinces, then of North-Western Provinces, then United Provinces of Agra and Oudh defined the southern boundaries of what in the 1950 became Uttar Pradesh. What does Government of India terminology have to do with idiomatic English? I say that as someone who created the Agra Province, Ceded and Conquered Provinces, and North-Western Provinces pages long ago, pages that use the term "northern India." How then, and by what tectonic shift in the English language, did regions that were in northern India, became north-central? I have accordingly changed the lead sentence in Uttar Pradesh back to reflecting "northern India." I don't see you have consensus here for whatever it is you are attempting to do. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 10:57, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
@Fowler&fowler: Just because you have created those articles doesn't mean that Uttar Pradesh is a strictly northern Indian state. Geographically it can never be compared to bonafide northern states like Jammu and Kashmir or Punjab. It covers substantial part of central India as well which is why most Government of India sources classify it under "Central" or "North-Central" zones. As far as consensus is concerned, Abecedare has agreed to it. And "north-central" is taken from Uttar-Pradesh at the Encyclopædia Britannica article which in its "mangled English" writes, Uttar Pradesh, the most populous and fourth largest state of India. It lies in the north-central part of the country.. According to some editors here, Britannica is a guideline to be followed. On a similar note tell me by what tectonic shift in the English language (or is it German), the Germany article lede mentions it to be ... a country in Central and Western Europe? Why not any specific location? Pinging @Abecedare: - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 18:12, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

@Fylindfotberserk: I should have explained more. The problem is that the term "north central" is not always well-defined. Often it means situated centrally (ie in the lateral center) and to the north. Thus North Central American English is the same as Upper Midwestern English spoken in such states at Minnesota, Michigan, North and South Dakota, but these are hardly in the vertical center of the US. In the US Census map, File:Census_Regions_and_Division_of_the_United_States.svg Minnesota is in North Central, and Louisiana in South Central, though neither is in the vertical center. In this way of thinking, Kashmir would be in north central India. In other words, you are attempting to make a science of something which is at best an art. Go with the least common denominator, one that is unambiguously understood. Northern India is easily understood. Later in the article, one can get into the specifics. But the lead of an article, especially the lead sentence is not where you want to get too specific. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 04:55, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler: Fair enough. I'm not a proponent of using multi-region definitions either and have reverted those kind of edits in the past. But after people started citing govt. sources, books, etc., I started taking them seriously. Anyway, it seems we have a consensus now which is why I posted the issue here. Nice talking to you sir. - Fylindfotberserk (talk) 18:50, 10 April 2019 (UTC)

Organisation/organization RfC

There is an RfC on whether all Wikipedia categories should use the spelling "organization" (regardless of the respective country) taking place here. Number 57 19:27, 18 April 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Carnatic music for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Carnatic music is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Carnatic music until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 06:30, 23 April 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Indore for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Indore is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Indore until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 07:10, 23 April 2019 (UTC)

History of domes in South Asia

Please give your input on changing History of domes in South Asia to History of Indo-Islamic domes on Talk:History of domes in South Asia#Change name to History of Indo-Islamic domes. Thank you! (Highpeaks35 (talk) 01:36, 25 April 2019 (UTC))

Confusion over Malabar

Can someone cleanup all links under Malabar#India? Many Wikipedians are confused on which articles to edit? Some edit the wrong Malabar article and cause confusion on what the article as a whole is talking about. Malabar articles need to be reviewed and here needs to be wider consensus on the topics of Malabar in India. I hope for cleanup relating to these articles so readers are not confused.Manabimasu (talk) 03:00, 25 April 2019 (UTC)

An invitation

I'd like to invite members of this project to familiarise themselves with MOS:TV and {{Infobox television}}. Category:Pages using infobox television with unknown parameters is a category that I keep on my watchlist and it is predominantly populated by Indian TV program articles. Having to fix 5 or more articles each day is not an unusual task for me and most of the articles that I have to repair reveal multiple errors throughout the article. More often than not, these are simple errors demonstrating a basic non-compliance with MOS:TV but especially the infobox instructions. Other errors include compliance MOS:CAPS, MOS:BOLD etc and all are avoidable by someone whop has taken the time to read the instructions. Your assistance in this matter is greatly appreciated. --AussieLegend (✉) 09:51, 25 April 2019 (UTC)

Train-the-Trainer 2019 Application open

Hello,
It gives us great pleasure to inform that the Train-the-Trainer (TTT) 2019 programme organised by CIS-A2K is going to be held from 31 May, 1 & 2 June 2019.

What is TTT?
Train the Trainer or TTT is a residential training program. The program attempts to groom leadership skills among the Indian Wikimedia community members. Earlier TTT has been conducted in 2013, 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018.

Who should apply?

  • Any active Wikimedian contributing to any Indic language Wikimedia project (including English) is eligible to apply.
  • An editor must have 600+ edits on Zero-namespace till 31 March 2019.
  • Anyone who has the interest to conduct offline/real-life Wiki events.
  • Note: anyone who has already participated in an earlier iteration of TTT, cannot apply.

Please learn more about this program and apply to participate or encourage the deserving candidates from your community to do so. Regards. -- Tito (CIS-A2K), sent using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 05:07, 26 April 2019 (UTC)

New AfC accepted article on the Deo Sun Temple is a mess

I've deleted earlier versions twice as pure copyvio. I've had to delete some of this for the same reason. I've posted some of my concerns to Talk:Deo Sun Temple but it still needs a lot of work. Eg the lead, which I haven't touched:

" Deo Sun Temple, Devark Temple, Deo Surya Mandir is a 8th-century CE sun temple at Deo about 10 kilometres southeast from Aurangabad district, Bihar[1][2] on the coastline of Bihar, India. [3] The Times of India News & Scientist say that The temple is Built by Chandravanshi King but some news say that This temple is built by God Vishvakarman in one night.[4][5] So no proof of who made and how. Deo is the place of historical importance where tourist can find ruins of ancient Deo Fort mainly built in the era of the king Raja Jagannath Singh. Inscriptions show that in the year 2017, the construction period of this mythological temple has completed one hundred fifty thousand seventeen years. [5] sun temple at Deo is one of Bihars top famous temples and attracts in holl times.[6]"

The temple definitely needs an article and deserves something much better than this. It even has a section heading "cculpture". Doug Weller talk 15:07, 29 April 2019 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ "Deo Temple - Welcome to Aurangabad Bihar".
  2. ^ "Welcome to Bihar Tourism". www.bihartourism.gov.in.
  3. ^ Srivastava, Priya. "Deo Sun Temple". Times of India Travel.
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference jagran.com was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference auto was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ Merala, Dilip (24 October 2017). "Chhath Puja 2017: Famous Sun Temples in Bihar to Witness Chhath Puja Celebrations". India.com.

Perarignar Anna Memorial vs. Anna Memorial

Hi all, recently I've encountered a problematic user who was adding a ton of poorly conceived honorifics to various biographical folk, and then he did weird stuff like move "MGR Memorial" to "Bharat Ratna Puratchi Thalaivar Dr.MGR and Puratchi Thalaivi Amma Selvi J Jayalalithaa Memorial" as if anyone would ever type that into a search engine. (See this) Another thing he did was move Anna Memorial to Perarignar Anna Memorial and I have since moved it back per WP:COMMONNAME, although I'd like to see if anyone wants to educate me on whether that was a good idea or not. (There was only one Google News hit for the longer term, whereas the simpler Anna Memorial was used far more often.) Also, what does "Perarignar" mean? Thanks, Cyphoidbomb (talk) 15:29, 28 April 2019 (UTC)

@Cyphoidbomb: There was nothing wrong in your actions, thank you for taking care of this. Popular politicians from Tamil Nadu tend to have a personality cult, which is often reinforced by fawning titles. All the additions that you have reverted were of the same kind, except Bharat Ratna. Although M. G. Ramachandran was awarded Bharat Ratna, a supreme court judgement prevents its use as a title, which means that such usage will never be common enough for the purpose of WP:COMMONNAME. Gazoth (talk) 19:22, 28 April 2019 (UTC)
@Gazoth: I appreciate the reply, thank you. Could I trouble you to add the MGR Memorial article to your watchlist, please? I'm still having a little trouble--in this edit, an IP editor (who is probably the problematic editor making changes while logged out) has added "Bharat Ratna Puratchi Thalaivar Dr.MGR and Puratchi Thalaivi Amma Selvi J Jayalalithaa Memorial" as the official name of the memorial. He added this Dec 2016 reference, which only supports "Bharat Ratna Dr.MGR and Jayalalithaa" as the proposed name. I also see this article, which indicates that the proposed name was supposed to be "Dr Puratchi Thalaivar MGR and Puratchi Thalaivi Amma Selvi J Jayalalithaa Memorial", which is closer to what the user is claiming, although in his version, the "Dr." comes before MGR. So if you or anybody could help me figure out what the correct official name is, I'd be appreciative. Thanks! Cyphoidbomb (talk) 16:22, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
And there's this source, which says the name is "Bharat Ratna Dr Puratchi Thalaivar MGR and Puratchi Thalaivi Amma Selvi Jayalalithaa memorial". Confusing. Cyphoidbomb (talk) 16:26, 29 April 2019 (UTC)
Cyphoidbomb, I have reverted the edit since it only talks about future plans to rename the memorial. If it was actually renamed, there would be news articles about it. Since are only news articles about proposed names, it looks like the renaming hasn't happened yet. —Gazoth (talk) 18:11, 29 April 2019 (UTC)

RFC on title of Kamarupi Prakrit

Please participate in a Request for Comments on the primary title of this language. Robert McClenon (talk) 03:53, 5 May 2019 (UTC)

Korakkar

Anyone familiar with Korakkar? There have been some contributions since my last edit there that have been going back and forth a bit and I'm not sure what is verified and what is not. - Sitush (talk) 11:13, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

What is the Indian English term for what powers a lamp at home?

Mains electricity describes what this is called in the US, UK, and Canada, but not India. It would be nice if folks more familiar with Indian English could add a note explaining that. I'm also interested to know if there's a single term that would be intelligible globally, as "mains electricity" is apparently unfamiliar to many Americans. So if it's known by more than one term in Indian English, that would be very helpful to know. Thanks! -- Beland (talk) 01:11, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Not sure how many Americans will know "mains electricity." Most, however, will understand "power supply." They will likely know "electric mains," but as the connection (now mostly underground) that brings the power supply to their home. Indian English, I'll have to look into it. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:39, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
OR: 'Mains electricity' (sometimes shortened to 'mains') is a recognized term in India (eg, [6], [7]) although most people colloquially refer to it as just 'electricity', 'electricity supply' or even 'light'. Abecedare (talk) 14:10, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
(edit conflict)::I see the problem. Power supply on WP has a different meaning. (I note parenthetically, though, its absence on WP is called power outage.) Yes, most Americans will know Electric grid but will suspect that something more complicated is meant. One option for a single term might be "Main power supply." A cursory look at some Indian sites yields a familiarity with that term among them, as it does on the NY Times, the Washington Post, The Guardian, Sydney Morning Herald, but there is the danger of "main" being interpreted as an adjective, as in this report from the Toronto Star: "The airport's main power supply comes from the city's electrical grid, though backup electricity is produced on site." "Mains electricity," in that order, however, seems to have little currency in Indian English. Sorry, I don't have much more. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:23, 6 May 2019 (UTC) Sorry Abecedare don't know why my posts with later time stamp are appearing first. Maybe because they were begun earlier by this slowpoke? Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:37, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
The OED gives: "power supply n. a supply of power; spec. (a) a mains electricity supply; (b) a device or arrangement for converting a supply from the mains into a low-voltage direct-current form suitable for a valve or transistor. 1887 Science 28 Oct. 209/1 This valuable property..is really managed by the department of physics in all except its power-supply. 1996 Independent 13 Mar. 1/4 The solar mower uses no fossil fuels and no mains power supply." The second example suggests the term, "mains power supply," but I found only British (and some Australian) newspaper sites using them. It drew blanks on the New York Times and the Toronto Star. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:48, 6 May 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Newar for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Newar is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Newar until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 10:15, 8 May 2019 (UTC)

Request for protecting Guha (surname) from persistent vandalism

Would request any admin active here to check the article on Guha (surname), and protect the same. This article has been a subject of persistent vandalism by a particular user, as evident from its Revision History, and that too in spite of discussions on the article's talk page as well as issuing warning on the user's talk page. Thanks. Ekdalian (talk) 06:51, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

It is one user and they've had all the warnings etc. Solution is to block Amicus autem populus (talk · contribs). I'll see if I can find someone willing to do so. - Sitush (talk) 07:35, 10 May 2019 (UTC)
Thanks Sitush. Ekdalian (talk) 08:31, 10 May 2019 (UTC)

Good-Article Reassesment

Parkala Massacre, an article that you or your project may be interested in, has been nominated for a community good article reassessment. If you are interested in the discussion, please participate by adding your comments to the reassessment page. If concerns are not addressed during the review period, the good article status may be removed from the article. ∯WBGconverse 06:17, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

Wikimedia Education SAARC conference application is now open

Apologies for writing in English, please consider translating

Greetings from CIS-A2K,

The Wikimedia Education SAARC conference will take place on 20-22 June 2019. Wikimedians from Indian, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Afghanistan can apply for the scholarship. This event will take place at Christ University, Bangalore.

Who should apply?

  • Any active contributor to a Wikimedia project, or Wikimedia volunteer in any other capacity, from the South Asian subcontinent is eligible to apply
  • An editor must have 1000+ edits before 1 May 2019.
  • Anyone who has the interest to conduct offline/real-life Wikimedia Education events.
  • Activity within the Wikimedia movement will be the main criteria for evaluation. Participation in non-Wikimedia free knowledge, free software, collaborative or educational initiatives, working with institutions is a plus.

Please know more about this program and apply to participate or encourage the deserving candidates from your community to do so. Regards.Ananth (CIS-A2K) using MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 13:54, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2011-11-07/Special report....... Titodutta, do you remember this? :-( But, glad to see that we are progressing from a renewed perspective. ∯WBGconverse 14:45, 11 May 2019 (UTC)
Also, I find some of the questions in the form to be weird. Wikimedia Education programs don't run in these regions, to the best of my knowledge.
So, what shall be one's involvement in Education programs or collaborations related to Wikimedia Education, assuming our target demographics is from the listed countries? ∯WBGconverse 14:57, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

Can someone translate Maduraikkanchi, the Tamil Sangam Poem?

Hi,

Can someone help render the accurate translation for the following line from Maduraikkanchi (line 144) ?

தென் பரதவர் போ ரேறே

The context is:

நற் கொற்கை யோர்நசைப் பொருந
செற்ற தெவ்வர் கலங்கத் தலைச்சென்று
அஞ்சுவரத் தட்கும் அணங்குடைத் துப்பிற் . . .140
கோழூ உன்குறைக் கொழு வல்சிப்
புலவு விற் பொலி கூவை
ஒன்று மொழி ஒலி யிருப்பில்
தென் பரதவர் போ ரேறே

The full poem can be accessed at https://www.projectmadurai.org/pm_etexts/utf8/pmuni0071.html

Thanks, Nittawinoda (talk) 20:04, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

Capitalizing Indian subdivision terms (tehsil/taluk/taluka/mandal) when part of a name?

Hi,

I posted a question about capitalization in the names of Indian subdivisions at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (geographic names) that may be of interest to people in this project. Regards, Tdslk (talk) 21:18, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Karnataka for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Karnataka is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Karnataka until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 04:31, 14 May 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Goa for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Goa is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Goa until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 04:34, 14 May 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Urdu for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Urdu is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Urdu until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 06:42, 14 May 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Ayyavazhi for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Ayyavazhi is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Ayyavazhi until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 06:24, 16 May 2019 (UTC)

About the "myneta.info" website

Hi all. With my sysop spectacles on, I can see that no article myneta, myneta.in or myneta.info has ever been created. It nevertheless is extensively used as a reference in Indian politics articles. Is this website a reliable source for biographies of Indian politicians? Pete AU aka --Shirt58 (talk) 13:28, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

Shirt58, it seems to me that the website just aggregates the election affidavits, i.e., information of their assets, liabilities, criminal charges against them, submitted by politicians who are parliamentary or state legislative candidates to the Election Commission of India. So, in that sense, it's a reliable, but, primary source. Any other information sourced from it, though, would need to be thoroughly vetted. Regards, SshibumXZ (talk · contribs). 13:33, 11 May 2019 (UTC)
I have started Draft:Myneta.info. It would appear to me that it may fail the WP:WEBSITE test for notability. Your thoughts about this? Pete AU aka --Shirt58 (talk) 13:36, 12 May 2019 (UTC)
Shirt58, hi! First and foremost, apologies for the late reply! And yeah, having a look at it, myneta.info certainly does not seem to meet WP:NWEBSITE; I think the case of myneta.info is similar to that cricket website which is heavily-cited on Wikipedia but on its own is not notable, although, of course, myneta.info does not seem to be as reliable as that cricket website. Regards, SshibumXZ (talk · contribs). 17:19, 14 May 2019 (UTC)
Thank you again for your replies. This would appear to raise a problem: if "Myneta.info" fails the Wikipedia:NWEBSITE test, should it so not be used as a reliable reference anywhere on Wikipedia? Pete AU aka --Shirt58 (talk) 14:26, 16 May 2019 (UTC)

Purje Song

Another editor has created the article Purje Song. Would someone familiar with Punjabi music please look at the article and consider whether the article should be kept. Eastmain (talk • contribs) 03:30, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

Peint State

I would appreciate some thoughts at Talk:Peint State. - Sitush (talk) 05:25, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

Greater India

This bull-shitty POV page is apparently linked from hundreds, if not thousands, of articles [8]. Please watch list it and help clean it up. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 10:33, 19 May 2019 (UTC)

Please see my post of 2007 with collapsed NPOV version, written as a dab: Talk:Greater_India#CITEREFBayly2005 (or if someone has fixed my refs links, the collapsed text at the bottom of Talk:Greater_India#Precedence_in_Historiography?). It was my view then that there was nothing more to this concept than what is in that collapsed box. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:38, 19 May 2019 (UTC)
730 articles, to be precise. A lot of that article can be straight-away culled. ∯WBGconverse 15:37, 19 May 2019 (UTC)

Discussion of Osianama on the reliable sources noticeboard

There is a discussion on the reliability of Osianama (osianama.com) on the reliable sources noticeboard. If you're interested, please participate at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard § Kalpana Mohan Page. — Newslinger talk 08:53, 22 May 2019 (UTC)

Discussion of PTC Punjabi on the reliable sources noticeboard

There is a discussion on the reliability of PTC Punjabi on the reliable sources noticeboard. If you're interested, please participate at Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard § PTCPunjabi. — Newslinger talk 08:58, 22 May 2019 (UTC)

Sarpanch

Does each village really have an elected sarpanch? I'm seeing it in every village article that I edit, it is rarely sourced and my mind boggles sometimes, eg: one such village has 3 houses and 16 people. - Sitush (talk) 16:20, 19 May 2019 (UTC)

@Sitush: most villages do not have an elected sarpanch, but it is possible in some cases. To be technically correct, Indian villages do not have sarpanches at all, it is gram panchayats that have sarpanches. A single village may constitute a panchayat, but typically a panchayat is a cluster of villages. For example, in Udaipur district of Rajasthan, there are 2479 villages but only 458 panchayat, so a sarpanch would be shared (on average) between 5.4 villages (see pg 13 of the district census).
With that said, note that the institutions of each state are governed by the state's Panchayati Raj laws, which are fundamentally similar but vary in detail. So the only way to verify the articles you mention is to pull up the latest district census handbook for the district that the village is a part of.
On a related note, WP material on Panchayat Raj institutions needs a LOT of work. I have it on my radar for improvements.Deccantrap (talk) 17:19, 19 May 2019 (UTC)
Thanks. That is roughly how I had worked it out in my mind but it isn't what a lot of articles seem to say. I suspect a lot of them have been created using AWB and then other people have copy/pasted as a framework for another article etc. I'll bear it in mind as I trawl through inappropriate uses of census2011.co.in. - Sitush (talk) 17:27, 19 May 2019 (UTC)
@Sitush: A Revenue Village is a village with definite boundaries and may include one or more hamlets. A village is divided into wards and is headed by a sarpanch.--Vin09 (talk) 03:02, 20 May 2019 (UTC)

So, a village might be un-inhabited and covered under a major gram panchayat may not have a sarpanch.--Vin09 (talk) 03:04, 20 May 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, Vin09. Your explanation seems to be slightly different from that of Deccantrap, which means that perhaps I am no clearer now than at the start. And Deccantrap, you say So the only way to verify the articles you mention is to pull up the latest district census handbook for the district that the village is a part of but in the Udaipur example you gave I cannot see where the information lies. Sure, I can see p 13 and its summary but, for example, Mavli has 42 Gram Panchayat covering 179 villages, and the pages around pp 85 list the villages (I presume these are Revenue Villages) in Mavli CD Block but I can't see any grouping by Gram Panchayat anywhere. I'm doing something wrong, obviously. Sorry for being a pain: this has always confused me. - Sitush (talk) 05:20, 20 May 2019 (UTC)
Let's try it another way with a worked example. I'm currently looking at articles for places in Mawal taluka using the pages 402, 408, 414 and 420 in this DCHB. Will each place named on those pages (below the heading rows) have a sarpanch? Even the one with only 3 houses and 16 people?
I found this site and entered Maharashtra / Pune / Maval in the dropdown lists, which seemed to give me a list corresponding to the DHCB on the pages I mentioned. But when I clicked to go further I got a warning in Firefox that the site is dodgy, probably because it has not been correctly configured. I do know from some random searches of it that it contains lots of maps of panchayats. - Sitush (talk) 05:39, 20 May 2019 (UTC)
@Sitush: you are absolutely right that DCHB alone will not lead you to panchayat listings; it will need to be supplemented with another source. Sorry, I did not think this through. Will each place named on those pages (below the heading rows) have a sarpanch? No, it will not. In the case of the earlier example of Mavli tehsil, one would first verify the village name in DCHB (say, the first village under Mavli, 'Neta ka Gurha'), then go to a source like the district's official website which shows that Neta ka Gurha is NOT a panchayat. Therefore, Neta ka Gurha would NOT have a sarpanch.Deccantrap (talk) 05:50, 20 May 2019 (UTC)
Unfortunately, at this time I cannot speak to Pune district (in which Maval taluka lies) as to where that supplementary source would be. A quick look at Pune district's website doesn't show a listing of panchayats, unlike Udaipur district's website.Deccantrap (talk) 05:52, 20 May 2019 (UTC)

There are a few villages, which are not in census doc, I think they are not census villages, might be a part of revenue village or a small hamlet. Gram panchayats will have a sarpanch. As User:Deccantrap said, need to check other sources for example: villages (Guntur district, AP) and gram panchayat sarpanchs (Guntur district, AP). --Vin09 (talk) 05:54, 20 May 2019 (UTC)

@Sitush: I think I figured out a work-flow for Maval taluka as well. Let's take the first village under Maval on page 402 of the DCH-B, 'Sawale'. Go to this directory of local bodies, and filter your way down to Maval taluka (Maharashtra > Zila Parishad... > Village Panchayat > Pune > Maval), which tells you there are 103 panchayats in Maval. Compare that number with page 40 of DCH-A which states that Maval has 181 villages. Thus, clearly every village in Maval is NOT a panchayat. But in the case of Sawale, the directory shows that it is indeed a panchayat. Therefore, Sawale WILL have a panchayat and a sarpanch. By contrast, the village of Rakaswadi which has a population of 20, is predicatably NOT in the directory of panchayats, which means it is probably clubbed with at least one another village to form a panchayat.Deccantrap (talk) 06:24, 20 May 2019 (UTC)
Is Panchayt codes of any help?--Vin09 (talk) 06:27, 20 May 2019 (UTC)
@Vin09: Definitely so. While it is less easy-to-use than the directory cited above, it can perform the same function. I.e., if a village is not listed in this countrywide list of panchayats, then it is likely not a panchayat in itself, but is clubbed with other village/s to form a panchayat.Deccantrap (talk) 06:32, 20 May 2019 (UTC)
Those suggestions give me something to think about, thanks. I've also found this but I'm wary of using spreadsheet data. I'm also a bit concerned I might be getting into the realms of WP:OR here but I've searched the Pune district website and cannot find a list below ZP level. What a nightmare this is! - Sitush (talk) 07:04, 20 May 2019 (UTC)
It looks like that database could be used for the entire country, if it is complete. It's a shame that it doesn't enable us to discover which GP a village falls under if it isn't itself a GP. Also, that it seems to be impossible to link directly to the query. Vin09's list concerns me slightly in that the source website doesn't seem to be working now and the archived list is from some years ago, so things may have changed. But I guess in any case we would need to be saying "As of YYYY, the village was/was not listed as a gram panchayat" - something along those lines. - Sitush (talk) 07:34, 20 May 2019 (UTC)
@Sitush: Dating such data sounds like a good workaround. It is unfortunate that governments at different levels in India care little about the goodness of data online. Recently discovered that the official website of Udaipur district, Rajasthan prominently declares that the district has 13 tehsils, when it actually has had 14 since 2017 and 15 since 2018. I did run a significant risk of WP:OR when building the articles for the 2 new tehsils, but fortunately was able to find state government notifications tucked away in the armit of the state govt's website, thus ensuring WP:RS and avoiding WP:OR.Deccantrap (talk) 13:13, 20 May 2019 (UTC)

Woah, I've found the gram panchayat listing in the 2001 census - p 1296 here - showing which villages are under which GP. Of course, that may have changed by 2011 but it does imply that the info probably exists somewhere in the 2011 documents also. - Sitush (talk) 06:52, 22 May 2019 (UTC)

@Sitush: Nice find. A quick look at the corresponding place in 2011 DCH-A for Pune district reveals that it does indeed contain a similar listing! List starts page 1181, and page 1198 for Maval taluka. I randomly sampled some other district handbooks across the country and, sadly, some lists are empty ("N/A") but great to know this is available for at least some districts.Deccantrap (talk) 14:12, 22 May 2019 (UTC)
Oh, that's a shame but thanks for sampling. I'm wondering if we should set up a FAQ for handling this type of thing. - Sitush (talk) 16:43, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
@Sitush: Sounds like a great idea. Some of the resources discussed in this thread would be very valuable to editors of articles on Indian villages. I don't have any idea where/how to build a WP FAQ, but would love to contribute if you start one and can kindly draw my attention to it.Deccantrap (talk) 17:53, 23 May 2019 (UTC)

Kamarupi discussions

In an effort to resolve years-long content disputes, there are currently a few requests for comments active at Kamarupi Prakrit and Kamrupi dialect. It would be helpful if some fresh eyes could take a look and comment. Editors who are knowledgeable about or interested in linguistics and/or history of Assam may be particularly well-positioned to contribute. Here is the current list of discussions:

Thanks. Abecedare (talk) 21:14, 20 May 2019 (UTC)

Thanks Abecedare for posting the issue here for more attention, some material on the subject will helpful for those new to subject, here is the link. Please help us to resolve this seven year old dispute.भास्कर् Bhagawati Speak 10:26, 24 May 2019 (UTC)

ILM Academy needs a rewrite to avoid advertising focus

ILM Academy needs a rewrite. Supposedly there are enough reliable sources for an article as The Hindu covered it, but it needs to be written in the Wikipedia style. WhisperToMe (talk) 02:00, 25 May 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Malayalam cinema for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Malayalam cinema is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Malayalam cinema until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 12:02, 25 May 2019 (UTC)

How to deal with villages in same taluka sharing similar names

Any thoughts on how to title articles for villages in Mawal taluka that share similar names? We've got Brahman Wadi and Brahmanwadi but it turns out that there are two villages in Mawal with the latter name, per the 2011 census. I know how we distinguish when villages share the same name but are in different talukas but this situation is a new one for me. - Sitush (talk) 12:06, 23 May 2019 (UTC)

And they have the same PIN code too? This looks fishy. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 12:32, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
Different census number, and different populations/areas etc. Not sure it the PIN code is the same or not, regardless of what our article may say about it. Fitindia did a batch create of many of these articles about three years ago and I think there may have been some confusion. That's why I have just removed the coordinates from the two that exist. Originally, they had only created one anyway, which is one reason why their list did not tally with the official total number of villages in the taluka. - Sitush (talk) 12:41, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
I have no idea where the PIN codes, coordinates etc came from - they were not sourced. - Sitush (talk) 12:42, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
While I don't have anything to contribute on the primary question on how to title articles for villages with same names (same taluka), I will add an observation on the discussion about coordinates. A great source for geo-locating villages is Bhuvan which allows one to drill down to the village level. The site, maintained by India's well-funded space research organisation, has been very reliable and stable since it went up about 8 years ago. In case of Brahmanwadi, I assumed this article was for the village with census code 555995 since the population matched this code. The map on pg 413 shows the location of each village by representing the last three digits (995). It is then relatively easy to find that village on Bhuvan and grab its coordinates. Using this method, I added coordinates for this village, with sources.Deccantrap (talk) 14:37, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
That could be handy, thanks. The other two places are codes 555897 (Brahman Wadi) and 555916 (no article yet as I need to sort out a title). - Sitush (talk) 16:10, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
I can find the places on Bhuvan, but I don't know how to get their coordinates. (I fixed the coordinates for Brahmanwadi by cross-comparing with Google satellite.) -- Kautilya3 (talk) 19:18, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
@Kautilya3:In Bhuvan, one can get coordinates simply by hovering the cursor over the location of interest. The coordinates show up in the bottom-right corner. However, Bhuvan only shows 2 places after the decimal, so I typically take those coordinates and fine-tune them by comparing with Google satellite. It looks like you got to the same result anyway.Deccantrap (talk) 20:39, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
Geolocation has moved on a bit since I started out. Back then it was along the lines of "find the tall tree, take 10 steps north and then three steps west" :) - Sitush (talk) 20:52, 23 May 2019 (UTC)
Sorry @Winged Blades of Godric: my edit was meant to be a joke. But I should have known better:p Deccantrap (talk) 04:58, 24 May 2019 (UTC)
I failed to get the humor in your strikeout and thought that you were being too serious, as to Sitush's comment. LOL:-( ∯WBGconverse 05:01, 24 May 2019 (UTC)
The two villages spelled Brahmanwadi (555916 and 555995) are both a part of Karanjgaon gram panchayat, per p 1199 of this. - Sitush (talk) 04:17, 24 May 2019 (UTC)

<village name>, <mandal/tehsil/taluka name>--Vin09 (talk) 06:04, 24 May 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, thanks, but they're in the same taluka, at least according to the census. - Sitush (talk) 06:16, 24 May 2019 (UTC)
  • Different topic but plugging my question here because those participating in this discussion are likely to have some thoughts. What is the convention for naming articles of towns/cities in India? E.g., The article for town of Bhinder in Udaipur district is "Bhinder, Udaipur" but the neighbouring town of Mavli is only "Mavli". Neither name has any known risk of ambiguation since the names are relatively uncommon. Should the article name be "Town" or "Town, District"? Couldn't find relevant guidance on Wikipedia:Naming conventions (geographic names), it may be there and I am missing it.Deccantrap (talk) 19:37, 26 May 2019 (UTC)
I moved it to Bhinder. If a name is qualified, then the unqualified name should be a disambiguation page. Otherwise, people won't find what they want. About how to disambiguate a given name, there are no hard rules. Whatever makes sense in the context. I would generally choose the state/province unless it is still ambiguous; then I go down to the district, taluka etc. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 22:23, 26 May 2019 (UTC)
Yes, that seems right to me. As an aside to the aside, there are also naming inconsistences involving parentheses for the district/taluka rather than separating by using a comma. I've never understood the need for parentheses but it seems to be reasonably common in my limited forays into editing Indian village articles. - Sitush (talk) 10:25, 27 May 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Thiruvananthapuram for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Thiruvananthapuram is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Thiruvananthapuram until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 02:45, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Kollam for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Kollam is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Kollam until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 02:47, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Udaipur for deletion

A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Udaipur is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Udaipur until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 02:50, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Unreferenced article

Hello, I would like to inform the project of an article that cites zero sources: Defence Avionics Research Establishment. starship.paint (talk) 02:52, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

It's now partially referenced thanks to Galatz. Still needs work. starship.paint (talk) 14:14, 30 May 2019 (UTC)
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