Some of my contributions

I use Wikipedia a lot as a reference tool in my work and tend to edit whenever I find an article with a factual mistake or a grammatical mistake. I do more substantial edits when I get the time.

I have particular interest in the article on Anglo-Indians and related articles like Anglo-Indian cuisine.

I also tend to edit articles relating to the Andhra Pradesh area of India.

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Poweroid I have been unable to insert comments back to you regarding some notes I added to the item re Anglo-Indian definition. These notes were extracted from my own published work on the origins of the British Anglo-Indians (originally termed East Indians)

The Honourable East India Company's policy to pay a sum of money to encourage marriages between their men and the Indian women of Fort St George is well known, however you can find it mentioned in Stark's "Hostages to India" ; Hawes "Poor Relations" and in Eyre Chattertons "History of the Church of England in India". I also have the reference code to the original document held in the Oriental & India Office if that is of interest to you.

I founded the "East Indies Telegraph" after the Anglo-Indian Reunion in London to encourage people interested in tracing their Anglo-Indian roots.Subsequently I became one of the founding trustee's of the Families In British India Society.

I have published articles on Anglo-Indian Genealogy and also lecture on the subject.

I gave a paper at the Anglo-Indian Conference in Melbourne (2002)entitled "The Children of John Company - The Anglo Indians"  I also gave a paper on "The East India Company for Family Historians" at the National Maritime Museum's East India Company seminars.

In my lectures and articles I include the different terms/ definitions for people of mixed ancestry. I also cover the restrictions levied against the east Indians under Cornwallis's governorship in the 18th century.

I am a little taken aback that you feel I am not qualified to comment either on the pan-European back ground of Anglo-Indians - many of them have Portuguese, Dutch or French ancestry mingling with the Britsh ancestral line (if you take the trouble to research distaff lines). In my own family we have the surnames Helion and Delang appearing in the early 19th century.

Please note the schedule 366 definition refers to people of European not just British descent. If you would like a transcription I have a copy of the Constituion. I would point out that this specific definition relates to the use of the term within the Constitution of India itself. I have recently found a very interesting definition in Stark's preface to his book on John Rickett's and the east Indian Petition which I can send you as it includes ancestral lines from the other dominions as well as Europe.

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Gee, Mr. Charles, thanks for dropping in. :)

I'm no expert on editing but this page on how to edit should help: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:How_to_edit_a_page

You can also use four tildes ~ ~ ~ ~ (without the spaces) to sign your name and date.

I have no issue with any claim that the EIC encouraged "marriages between their men and Indian women".

I'm Anglo-India, in Britain, but regret I have never heard of the "East Indies Telegraph" etc that you refer to. However, the issue is not one of credibility. You can claim to know whatever you want. You can claim to be whomever you want. But, in Wikipedia, any ignorant fool who thinks Anglo-Indian is Hindi spoken in an English accent has as much right as you or I to alter an article. Yes, it's true, your expertise, if any, doesn't really make your opinion more valuable here. Sorry. The fact that you lecture on the subject doesn't make YOUR definitions more acceptable than that of, say, the Indian Constitution.

I commend you on your achievements, your publications, your passion for the subject, on becoming "one of the founding trustee's (sic) of the Families In British India Society" etc. As with anyone else you are free to comment on the "pan-European back ground" of people in India - I have no doubt that my own family has a French connection somewhere on my mother's side - but that's a far cry from the claims being made in the article. There are clear definitions in the UN, the Indian Constitution and framed by Frank Anthony as requirements for admissions into the All India Anglo-Indian Association. The children of a Dutchman who married an Indian woman post independence wouldn't automatically be considered as Anglo-Indians, would they? You need to make that distinction if you wish to proceed with explaining possible other European blood in the AI community today. And get a proportion on it. There's as much Dutch blood in Anglo-Indians today as there probably is British blood in people who think they are 100% Indian ;)

Poweroid 16:00, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

By the way its Miss! I am also a British Anglo-Indian but born in India. If you get a chance have a look at website http://members.ozemail.com.au/~clday/ in particular you might find http://members.ozemail.com.au/~clday/mailing.htm interesting, thats the interactive bit and every so often they get bogged down in what Anglo-Indian means

My own definition for Anglo-Indian is: "If you know what Kul Kuls are (without having to look the word up, you have eaten a Country Captain, you use a spoon and fork for curry and you head for the shade in the hot weather, then you are probably Anglo-Indian!"

If I get the hang of editing will try and put some comments in right place next time.

Geraldine

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>>its Miss

Geraldine, my apologies :)

What if I like sitting in the sun, dipping my Kul Kuls (during the EASTER holidays) in Country Captain, scraping the icing off the Kul Kuls (you DO ice them where you come from, don't you?) with my spoon, and using the fork only for MAKING the Kuls Kuls, not eating them? Do I qualify? ;)

On a more serious note I do appreciate that it's difficult to define some things accurately - what happens if an AI mum and dad adopt a Sikh baby? - but the AIs have always had to guard the definition from many "native" Indian minorities who fancied getting on what they saw as a bandwagon offering political privileges. So, I'll have to resist any attempts at taking the definition away from what has worked for several generations. Poweroid 16:46, 18 July 2006 (UTC)