Hello, Ravi Chaudhary, and welcome to Wikipedia! Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:
I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Where to ask a question, ask me on my talk page, or place {{helpme}} on your talk page and someone will show up shortly to answer your questions. Again, welcome! DaGizzaChat(c)07:00, 29 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
You can edit it, maybe all that happened was a Wikipedia error. It is being updated at the moment so sometimes after you click "Save Page" it says "This page can not be viewed" or somthing similar. It that happens, click back on the internet screen, then click "save page" again. It generally works the second time. DaGizzaChat(c)05:43, 3 November 2005 (UTC)[reply]
You have started liking wikipedia. You have good knowledge of History. We need to improve some sections in Indian history. I have provided some photos in Jat article. Hope you like them. burdak15:53, 24 May 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I'm good, just make sure you can give a good citation for your material. Can you also try to match up the loose references with their parts in the article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lbmixpro (talk • contribs)
Lbmixpro;
Thanks
we have good citations. the problem is that some people who are writing on Shekhawati article, seek to see the material removed, using 'good'citations as the excuse. Their idea of 'good' citations seems to be Western published citations, an dthat by default seek to portray the Indian citations in Indian languages as less than "good".
This is not and should not be an acceptable paradigm
There is reference in publication from the University of Chicago. Should that supersede or be superior or more acceptable than the works of Indian historians published in India?
One would think not!
We will patient with Shekavati and other articles, where the only scholarship that shows up, is the abilty to remain anonymous and the abilty to revert and re-revert.
You are making all Rajputs, gujjars, yadavs and other ancient kings Jats. Have u any logic behind it,
Just by providing some linkages of jat history pages u are proving your point.The pages ceated by you yourself on yahoo groups.
The First jat king was Surajmal. And Tomars ruled far before him in history.
Just because few jats have common Rajput surnames, u think u are right.
I am only correcting what is wrongly witten, and it doesnt amount to vandalism.
Rishab Singh Solanki
Response>>
This is better.
First you must stop these mindless reverts.
they will do you no good.
The Jathistory group is an archive for material that is relevant to Jat history. The forum is academically oriented. The sources and references are given.
There is also considerable pro and con discussion.
I suggest you join the group, read the material, and then let us see if you can keep your current views.
You may wish to read R S joon's book , whihc is on line in the files section.If you can read Hindi also read Desraj's book, also online
For that membership is needed, that is only a click away!
You are suggesting books and articles written by Jats. Which will alos have same reasoning as you. This way I can also suggest books written by Rajput authors or promoted by them.
Why dont u see a logical reasoning to the situation. I clearly said no Jats were ruling when Tomars ruled. And present day Haryana at the period of time was not a Jat stronghold like today.
Historians say that Surajmal was the forst Jat king, and sinsinwars is the ruling clan of Jats. The Jats are primarly farmers and used to till land.
When Rajput powers were weak and Mughal power was also declining, jats under Surajmal revolted agaisnt mughals and started their expansion. They captured forts of Bharatpur, Dholpur and also Alwar. Naruka Rajputs ousted them from Alwar and checked their expansion. Most of Jats migrated to Haryana and West Up, which were mostly ruled by muslim Nawabs.
You say that Jagir of Bairath were given to Deshwal Jats. Now my mother is a Chauhan Rajput and her ancestoral village is Bairath. And her forefathers were having jagirdari of number of villages there. This the most real and pratical example of how grossly u have mispalced history.
The meaning of the word jat is Zammen Jotne wale i.e. one who tills lands.
Now since when in Ancient history jats become rulers?
Give me logical refrences and discuss with logic not with books written by jats with a biased view.
Response>
You are upset at Jats writing their history, from their perspective?
You should not expect, that the Jats will write their History from the perspective from Islamic/British invaders and their allies.
I do suggest that you go through the extensive material, and then discuss the matter.
I am sure that the authors will be happy to correct themselves!
I was wondering what you found so controversial about adding an infobox which basically gave an introduction to the caste and notified the reader that this article is about the Indian caste system? Is it the Kshatriya/Rajput part that people will dispute or is it the Rajasthani origin? I will not re-add it until you reply of course, I'm simply curious as I have seen similar disputes on pages like Khatri which have turned into chaos full of personal attacks etc. Nobleeagle (Talk)05:46, 17 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Response>
Dear Noble Eagle,
The Hindu system is a complex affair, and it is certainly mot reduced to the 4 fold caste/varna system- Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya, Shudra, a hierarchical system where by one’s birth one will fall into the above four categories, with the most desirable the first.
There are many communities/groups who do not agree with this hype, which is being pushed in Texts/books/net by interested groups.
We also find a lot of rhetorical abuse, with the abuse of groups who do not accept the above hierarchy. The rhetoric, not unsurprisingly, comes from the groups who wish to main such distinctions.
Among the Jats, these hierarchies do not apply and are rejected, yet the Jats would largely say they are Hindus, and trace their philosophies and traditions right back to Vedic times.
It is just that they do not accept the Hierarchy Hype.
The Jat produce people who fall into all these categories- priests, warriors, traders, and providers of manual labour.
Chauhan, Solanki, etc are Jat clans, in the vernacular; these are called Goths (Hindi modern Hindi- Gotra/Got/Goth).
Many of these clans overlap other social groups- Gujars, Rajputs etc.
A Rajput Solanki will tout that he/she is a Kshatriya, because the ‘rajput’ accepted and follow the Brahministic(Hindu) orthodox hierarcy, the Jats do not.
So where would you, unambiguously, correctly place these clans?
I hope you see the difficulty.
Hence putting a caste box- is simplistic and gives an incorrect, unbalanced, picture
I hope this helps. If you need further clarification, please do ask!
Hi, the portion of the article was poorly written, and by WP guidelines, I thought it would be best to revert it. It appears that another user has reverted it now. Please include appropriate sources/references and format as per WP guidelines.
BTW, I've been in IISc since 2003 Aug
OK do you know any Cheema Hindus? you're just trying to imply that the Cheema clan also followed Hinduism when this is far form the truth, infact they were opposed to Hindus. This is an encyclopedia its supposed to document historical facts. We know there are Cheema Sikhs, and Cheema Muslims. We haven't and don't know about any Cheema Hindus and its pretty obvious why. Until you can provide evidence of Cheema Hindus the article is staying as it is. The Cheemas before Islam followed Buddhism, and then some converted to Islam, when they helped Muhammad bin Qasim conquer Hindu strong holds, and the main reason was the Cheema were being oppressed by the Hindu's and always opposed them and when the Arabs came they had the perfect opportunity to make strong alliances with the Muslim Arabs. Infact Jatt (Buddhist) a physician treated the prophet Mohammed's wife Aisha when she was not well, its documented by early Arab chroniclers. So the Jatts knew about Islam way before c. 695, many even settled in Madina as that was the center of trade at the time. So the Jatts were familiar with Islam, Arabs and their great conquest they were impressed and and converted to Islam out of free will, because they loved the concept of Islamic Jihad and how Muslims beat army's 3 times (Battle of Badr) their size so much.
Are you suggesting the Cheema clan came to India with the Arabs?
If they were Buddhists before, do you have any evidence for the same?
There are plenty of similarities between Buddhist concepts and Vedic/Hindu concepts. Along with Jainism, they have always existed side by side, and intertwined with each other.
Have you studied any aspects of Buddhism?
Does your clan have any follow any Buddhist norms today?
Sindh where the first Muslim Arab/Indan wars occured, was a mix of Jats and non jats. They all followed various beliefs- Buddhism, Vedic, Jain, Hindu.
If your clan joined Mir Qasim( of free will or not) to fight the Indians( circa 700 CE) they were fighting fellow Jats, - who were Buddhists too, destroying their universities, and vihars( monasteries)- Vallabhipur, and Taxila( Takshashila) being two good exampples.
Is your Islamic identity getting the better of you?
You do need to sort your concepts out.
Let us keep this discussion on your page, I have put your page on watch.
If you wish to go deeper, I suggest you discuss this on the Jathistory group. That is what that forum is for, for serious discussion of Jat history.
Regards
Ravi Chaudhary 14:00, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
This response and the rest of the discussion is on the page:
Namaste, Chaudhary Sahib. There is this worrying development that I wanted to tell you about.
A number of pages related to Jat clans have come under the scanner. Why? because, they are usually of a single line and thus are in line with the deletion policy of Wikipedia.
I would urge both, yourself and Mr. burdak to look into the matter. Agreed, the pages are of one line. But they can be expanded overtime.
I saw you at the AfD, and just dropped to say you hello. Please try to expand those tubs if you have information. --Bhadani16:56, 16 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]
I am getting even more concerned about some of the claims made in this article about historical figures such as Ashoka and Kanishka being claimed to be Jats. First of all, I wish to make it crystal clear that I have no proof or even evidence that they were NOT Jats. Alos, I am in no way trying to be difficult or argumentative. What I am uneasy about is that I have yet to see any credible evidence that they WERE Jats and, until credible evidence is presented I don't believe this claim should be made as established "fact" in a Wikipedia article.
I have been waiting for a reply to my query above (see previous note in the Jat Discussion page) to Shree Burdak for the source of the reference he gave which he said was from the Mahavamsa, and which, if correct, would indeed seem to imply that the Mauryas (or at least some of them) were Jats.
Today I happened to spot a note from Ravi Chaudary, dated 14 November (see above), which says:
"There is plenty of evidence from the Jat historical traditions pointing out the Kaniska is a Jat and recent historical research confirms, not negate that.
It you wish to counter that, then you must provide solid evidence to the contrary."
As far as I know, the ethnicity of Kanishka and, for that matter, all the Kushans, remains in doubt. Some scholars assert that they were of Yuezhi stock originally from the region of Gansu and the Tarim Basin (basing their case on the rather unclear evidence of the Chinese histories). Others suggest that they may have been descendants of the indigenous rulers of Guishuang or Badhakshan and others again, suggest they may have been a mixture of both (and even, perhaps, part Bactrian Greek), and that the later Kushans may have been part Indian.
Probably, when they invaded and conquered much of northern India they would have been accorded Kshatriya caste status - like many later foreign conquerors. However, I am sure you will agree with me that not all Kshatriyas are Jats.
I am sorry, Ravi, but I think the "burden of proof" is, rather, on you to present the evidence that Kanishka was a Jat, rather than for me to try to disprove this assertion (which would, of course, be impossible for me to do). "Jat historical traditions" are just that, "historical traditions" - not established historical information. Please also give the references to the "recent historical research" you mention, so that it can be accessed by other scholars.
Until this information is available for examination in peer-reviewed journals or the like, I suggest that the statements that Ashoka, Kanishka, or other early monarchs were Jats should be prefaced with a statement such as "Jat historical traditions assert that . . . "
John Hill02:53, 15 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]
John
This is getting repetitive
You need a deeper understanding of Jat History and culture
There is no point in your simply repeating the standard refrain. Your assertations do not hold water.
If you claim the are part Greek, then prove it!
Since you cannot prove that Kaniska was not a Jat,( based on your knowledge) then on what basis do you seek to disregard the Jat historical tradition????
Equally why should the Jats of that era not be considered as Indian, when the cultural contect of "Indianess"
extended into the Oxus valley?
The Jats do not claim Kshatriyahood. That is a late hindu term, for those who accepted the varna paradigm.
That is not to say that some jats did not accept the orthodox Hindu system.
We have evidence that some families of some clans did.
As for Kaniska and co, they were worshipping Shiva, and Nandi his bull is very much on their coins, as is the moon, the Aulikara symbol.
Besides if you claim that they accepted kshatriya staus, then please provide the evidence.
I can on on,. I suggest you visit the Yahoo Jahistory group, and re read the material
Just this morning I discovered you had written the above note on your Discussion Page on the same day as another (rather different one) on the Jat Discussion Page which I have already replied to. We obviously we have very different ideas as to what constitutes a "tradition" and what constitutes "history" and how these should be handled in the Wikipedia.
I agree with you that this discussion seems to be becoming very repetitive and I would like to make this my final comment unless you raise something new. Before I leave it, though, I would like to set the record straight by including here the comments you made to the Jat Discussion Page and my reply to them:
Response>>
Dear John
You are obfuscating the subject.
We are also students of history.
History does include Historical Traditions, not exclude them as you would assert.
Do try and stay with the topic
Nothing you have posted so far, shows that you have any information that would convince anyone that Kaniska and the Kushans were not Jats.
Simply casting doubt, does not a rational argument make.
As a side note, you are using late chinese terminology for a much earlier non chinese people.
This causes considerable confusion.
Hence it becomes even more important to examine the " Kushan' question from a non chinese view.
I will suggest you shift this discussion to the Jathistory group.
Best regards
Ravi Chaudhary 15:50, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Reply to Ravi Chaudhary
Dear Ravi:
You are misrepresenting my statements and I would ask you to please stop doing so. I have never said or even implied that history cannot include historical traditions - but I have said that historical traditions are not necessarily history.
I am only asking you to clearly state when you are dealing with an historical tradition and not a matter of established and widely-accepted fact. So, if indeed there is a tradition that Ashoka and Kanishka (and/or other early famous monarchs) were Jats, there is nothing wrong in presenting them as being Jats according to Jat traditions and, wherever possible, giving the references for this. However, I do strongly object to them being presented as established historical facts - even if some Jats accept them as such - unless you are able to present convincing evidence.
Often there is more than a grain of truth in historical traditions. However, historical traditions on their own are not usually considered to be "history" - as I am sure you are well aware. They need to be checked against as much reliable data as can be gathered and, even then, they are often unable to substantiated thoroughly enough to be generally considered as historical "facts."
A case in point - many Christians literally believe that Jesus was the only son of God, was born of a virgin, was crucified and died on a cross, rose again from the dead, and will be present at a Judgement Day when the righteous will be bodily elevated to heaven. Now, non-Christians (and, indeed, many Christians) do not believe this is literally true (which, by the way, is not necessarily saying there is absolutely no truth in it).
So, in a work like the Wikipedia one would expect a balanced approach to this account and to preface it with something like: "Christian traditions state that . . . ." Or: "The new Testament says that . . . .."
And, of course, this exactly kind of qualification you will find if you go to the Wikipedia article on Christianity, which opens with the passage: "Christianity is a monotheistic[1] religion centered on Jesus of Nazareth, and on his life and teachings as presented in the New Testament.[2] Christians believe Jesus is the Son of God and the awaited Messiah prophesied in the Old Testament, therefore they call him the Christ."
All I am asking for is a similar regard for presenting an accurate, balanced, well-referenced account on Jats and their history.
Now, to a couple more minor points which you raised. You state:
"Nothing you have posted so far, shows that you have any information that would convince anyone that Kaniska and the Kushans were not Jats.
Simply casting doubt, does not a rational argument make."
I have never tried to convince anyone that Kanishka and the Kushans were not Jats - only that I have yet to be shown any convincing evidence that this was the case. It is, indeed, quite possible they were Jats, I just don't think a convincing enough case has been made to assert this as fact.
I might also add, as a reply to your comment that - simply because someone states that something is true does not mean others should necessarily accept that it is true.
You then say:
"As a side note, you are using late chinese terminology for a much earlier non chinese people."
Please remember that I was primarily discussing Kanishka and the Chinese names I was using are based on a document which is specifically stated to have been presented to the Chinese Emperor by one of his senior generals in the early 2nd century CE - precisely the period in which it is thought Kanishka was alive.
Other names which have been commonly associated with the Kushans (such as "Tokhara") are still being hotly debated by historians and are not as well attested as the Chinese names.
Finally, you suggest we move this discussion to the "Jathistory" group. Unfortunately, I have been unable to locate this group - would you please give me the directions to find it?
Sincerely, John Hill 01:29, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
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WikiProject India Newsletter: Volume I, Issue 3 - December 2006
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Thank you for your recent invitation to join your Jat History Yahoo group (at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/JatHistory/) to present my “arguments” regarding my comments on articles relating to Jats on the Wikipedia. Regretfully, I must decline as I am already over-committed to a number of on-line groups as well as working on Wikipedia articles and preparing three books for publication. I really cannot take on more at this time.
What I would like to say to your readers, and readers of the Wikipedia, is that I am more than happy to discuss the reasons for any suggestions or changes I make to Wikipedia articles on the appropriate “Talk” or “discussion” pages in the Wikipedia itself.
I should also add that any comments I have made in the past or may make in the future have been and will always be signed by me, with my real name, John Hill. You can be assured that any remarks or changes made in the Wikipedia without my name attached were not made by me.
Now, I would like to reply to the comments you have posted today (3rd March, 2007) on your group’s discussion page about me and my work which I think are unfair and offensive.
Someone wrote in to your group suggesting that I am “basically a good scholar” and that I have posted a [draft] translation from the Hou Hanshu on the internet. You have replied: “Unfortunately, he has become so enamored with those manuscripts that he has started to believe them to be the gospel truth. There is a difference between making a translation and then reinterpreting \ the translation. . . .”
I am at a loss as to what could possibly have led you to make this false accusation. If anyone would like to go back over my discussions on the Jat “Talk” page (and the archives) they will find that I have only once made a very brief reference to the texts I have been translating (and never even mentioned them by name). All my other remarks are based on, or refer to, other sources. And to say that I “have started to believe them to be the gospel truth” is a most unfair and unwarranted attack on my integrity as a scholar and, indeed, as a person.
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There are clearly two quite separate meanings here. There are "the Ganas", who are Shiva's attendants and there are "Ganas" which are assemblies for discussion. The problem with the article is that it mixes them together. I have tried to separate them out, but it might be more useful to create two separate articles, one for the mythological beings and one for the assemblies. Paul B17:49, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Also adding assertions like "this is open to question" without explaining why is not helpful. Since the Ganas are mythological beings it is obviously impossible to prove anything about their existence. It is surely not open to question that they appear in stories, and that's as much as can be said for any mythical being. Paul B18:00, 11 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Mr Burdak asks you a relevant question.- How old is Brahma?.
If you can answer that, you can go to the the next step.
Any other answer, as you have given above, only clouds the issue. That continuous 'clouding' of issues by you, is exactly what one of the complaints against you is.
My answer is, Mr. Chaudhary, that this is not a relevant question - just a silly, childish attempt to annoy me. Mr. Burdak has not established that the age of Brahma has anything to do with Jats - so there is no point in taking the discussion any further. John Hill23:08, 19 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Mr. Hill
Why is it that you refuse to read what is written?
I asked you ( on your page) to keep all discussion on your user page, and not post here.
I don't know the intricate details but you appear to be misguided in the fundamental rules of wikipedia. First you don't need "academic qualifications and credentials" to be a great editor on wikipedia this is one of our core belief systems - this is how the project has developed to extreme success. Second you have no right to tell people to stop editing wikipedia or to write in a way that appeals to you. While consensus is always very useful how dare you suggest JOhn Hill take several months off from editing wikipedia. Wikipedia needs as many contributors as possible and you should never discourage people from being a part of the project. PLease refrain from personal attacks on other users. While you may disagree with developments badgering other users e.g asking them questions to "test their legitimacy" is about as deluded from what wikipedia is about as you can get. I'm sure you have done some good work on wikipedia - please keep this up but please try to discuss any conflict over an issue (Jats) professionally in a way to attempt to improve the article rather than badgering other users to stop their work. I wish you no ill feelings at all but hope you will seriously listen to my words. All the best ♦ Sir Blofeld ♦"Expecting you"Contribs09:37, 20 June 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Response> All we are asking is for Mr. Hill to study the subject, before diving in to make edits and changes!
Is that too much to ask?
If he takes some time (a few months) off, to study the subject, and there is a lot to study, what harm will be done?
I am not an expert on the subject. I merely reacted to what I saw, which was basically a persuasive essay and not a neutral encyclopedic entry. It's fine for you to firmly believe in something. You just need to pose it in a neutral way. For example, you can firmly believe that Islamic terrorists are evil, but it would not be appropriate to make an article called Evil actions of Islamic terrorists. A more neutral title would be Actions of Islamic terrorists, and then the article would list the evil actions of terrorists (which are many) along with the good (which are few), and the reader can make his own opinion. Another example is the Adolf Hitler article, which never states "Adolf Hitler was a bad man." It records the facts that 1) he caused the deaths of millions of people and 2) he was a vegetarian and a firm believer in animal rights. Then the reader decides whether he was good or bad. This is not the case with the Origin of Jats article. It states that Jats were Indo-Aryan instead of letting the reader decide. That is what I mean by POV. Isaac Pankonin04:33, 13 September 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Issac,
No disagreement from me.
The subject is however , only as to Title of the Article, that it should be the original Title" Indo Aryan Origin of Jats" which is a sub article to the main article Jats. There are also other theories listed in that article.
Tag & Assess 2008, an assessment drive initiated by the assessment department began on June 7, 2008 and will be running until July 2008. Many Wikipedians have started contributing to this mammoth task. This housekeeping activity will help manage articles in better way. You can also get involved!
Bot Assisted Assessment was successfully done using Bot0612 in May 2008. 1744 articles (18.5%) of all India unassessed articles were marked if they had been assessed by some other project.
IPL was hot on Wikipedia too!!! During the tournament, the article was among the most frequently edited articles. It is currently the only Indian article in top 100, occupying 58th spot.
Do you know of an article that is currently underrated? If so, please nominate the article at the Assessment Department's request for assessment. This will allow our project to get a better idea of the quality of our articles.
Article statistics and to-do lists
Article Statistics
Make visible or invisible by clicking Show or Hide, respectively.
Is India the largest democracy? A request has been made to the Mediation Cabal for mediation on India article. There is currently an ongoing edit war if India be called the largest democracy of world.
This is your newsletter and you can be involved in the creation of the next issue (Issue 2 – July 2008). Any and all contributions are welcome. Simply let yourself be known to any of the undersigned, or just start editing!
The last newsletter was more than a year ago and after feeling the pinch, we got together in working towards in renewing this feature for our members. Fresh pair of legs we are, and hence can greatly improve with your suggestions and ideas. Please feel free to let us know of your thoughts. We hope to release the newsletter on a monthly/bi-monthly basis as per our initial thoughts.
Iravan, the son of Arjuna, is now our 85thgood article. How do we know this? Since last year, more processes have been automated, increasing productivity. Article alerts update the project with what's happening to India-related articles, from copyright violations to featured article candidates.
Currently, 11,091 Indian articles need images. Please improve these pages, especially if you enjoy photography! We look forward to more contributions from you. To get started, go to the noticeboard. »
From the editors…
The last newsletter was written a year ago. In June 2008, Indian Premier League was "hot" on Wikipedia, but the article about this year's IPL has attracted 477 editors, or 53% more than the previous year! Even the number of articles in the scope of our project jumped by a whopping 18,500+ articles in an year. The 3.2-year-old India quiz continues to attract old and new Wikipedians, so join in the fun!
Wikipedians are organizing a meetup in Bangalore on July 4 or 5. If you are interested, head over to the page and add your name! Topics of discussion include Indian language editions of Wikipedia and Wikimedia India.
"While this issue has been resolved, one asks the question – what happens when there is a conflict of opinions? What about a Wikipedia entry on India and Pakistan, or the LTTE and the Tamils? Who can edit? Will the information be true?" writes B. Narasimhan of MiD DAY as deeper implications of the Scientology arbitration case,1 reminding us of the core principles of verifiability and the neutral point of view.
This is your newsletter and you can be involved in the creation of the next issue. Any and all contributions are welcome. Simply let yourself be known to any of the undersigned, or just start editing!
To stop receiving this newsletter, or to receive it in a different format, please list yourself in the appropriate section here. This newsletter is automatically delivered by -- TinuCherian BOT - 11:34, 12 June 2009 (UTC)[reply]
WikiProject India Newsletter, Volume IV, Issue 2 – July 2009
A prolific editor and administrator, Bhadani is among the top ten Wikipedians by number of edits across the English Wikipedia. Congratulations to Bhadani for also making the most number of edits among Indian Wikipedians!
Wikipedia's India quiz remains a hotspot of the community by continuing to attract old and new Wikipedians. You are invited to join in and have fun!
This is your newsletter, and you can be involved in the creation of the next issue. Any and all contributions are welcome – so feel free to join in! Simply let yourself be known to any of the undersigned, or just start editing!
To stop receiving this newsletter, or to receive it in a different format, please list yourself in the appropriate section here. Delivered automatically by -- TinuCherian BOT - 15:25, 18 July 2009 (UTC)[reply]
WP:IND Newsletter is back! It's been nearly a year since the last edition, but we hope to bring out issues on a more regular basis now. The India Wikiproject was set up to increasing coverage of India-related topics on Wikipedia, and over the past few months the focus has been on improving article quality. A number of the project's featured articles underwent featured article reviews over the past year. Of these, Darjeeling and Flag of India survived the review process, while the rest were demoted. During the same period, Gangtok, Harbhajan Singh, Darjeeling and Mysore were featured on the main page respectively on August 20, September 17, November 6 and December 29, 2009. Meanwhile, articles on topics as diverse as Political history of Mysore and Coorg (1565–1760), Marwari horse and Iravan were promoted as featured articles, and respectively appeared on the main page on March 25, May 17 and May 28, 2010. Consequently, the number of FA-class articles under the project's scope dropped from 67 in August 2009 to 63 in June 2010. The number of good articles, however, saw a more than 40% increase, from 91 to 130 during the same period, while the number of featured lists saw a 33% increase from 12 to 16.
Due to the recent policy changes regarding unreferenced Biographies of Living People (BLPs), an effort was started in January 2010 to source all unreferenced BLPs coming under Wikiproject India. 1200 such articles were identified initially and more were added to the list later. Due to the sourcing effort, the number of Indian unreferenced BLPs is down to 565 currently. During February-April 2010, There was a large scale disruption of Kerala related articles by a Thrissur based IP vandal. Editing from a dynamic IP BSNL connection, the vandal changed dates of birth, death and ages of a number of Malayalam and Tamil film actors. Later he added a few international biographies to his list. He also marked some living people like Arvind Swamy as dead. A month long range block was imposed on his IP range two times and each time he came back to vandalise dates once the block expired. Currently the range has been blocked for three months till September 11, 2010.
This picture, shot in India, won the Commons:Picture of the Year contest 2009. Translations of the description in Indian languages are solicited.
Wikipedians in Bangalore have been organising periodic meetups over the past year, in collaboration with the Centre for Internet and Society. The next meetup is scheduled for July 18, 2010. Indian and other Wikipedians from all Wikipedias in various languages are welcome to attend.
A discussion is underway here to reach a consensus regarding the use of Indian number names (lakh, crore etc.) in Wikipedia articles. Please participate and add your comments.
Some unintended vandalism is going on at the Assamese Wikipedia by the sole active editor. This is a request for Assamese-conversant Wikipedians to help resolve the issue.
A discussion is in progress here in order to determine whether non-Western (including Indian) forms of classical music should be referred to by the nomenclature of art music instead of classical music. Please participate and add your comments.
Watchlist the Articles for Deletions page for India related discussions. Opinions from more Indian Wikipedians are required in many of the discussions.
If you've just joined, add your name to the Members section of WikiProject India. You'll get a mention in the next issue of the Newsletter and get it delivered as desired. Also, please include your own promotions and awards in future issues. Don't be shy!
Lastly, this is your newsletter and you can be involved in the creation of the next issue (Issue 2 – (July 2010)). Any and all contributions are welcome. Simply let yourself be known to any of the undersigned, or just start editing!
Looking forward toward more contributions from you!
Although having the newsletter appear on everyone's userpage is desired, this may not be ideal for everyone. If, in the future, you wish to receive a link to the newsletter, rather than the newsletter itself, you may mention it at WikiProject India Outreach Department
After a missed issue, the WP:IND newsletter is back on track to being a regular bimonthly feature. The Indian WikiProject has seen plenty of online and off-line action, both in English as well as other Indian languages, and we now have a bigger, better format that intends to feature content and news from the English as well as other Indian language Wikipedias.
Reaching out to Indians has been the theme of the Indian Wikiproject over the past couple of months, aiming to involve a greater number of Indians in editing both the English and Indian language Wikipedias. To this end, efforts to set up the Indian chapter of Wikimedia have moved into their final stages, and registration of the society is currently pending. An effort is underway to push for "WikiMarathons" at meetups, where attendees will be encouraged to edit the English and/or Indian language Wikipedias. This is intended to popularise Wikipedia editing among the general public. In addition, a bot to post DYK's from the Indian Wikiproject to Twitter was created and launched by User:Logicwiki.
What's New?
Regrettably, the number of Featured Articles has dropped from 63 in June to 58 at the end of October 2010. Several FAs came up for review and were delisted, while Fundamental Rights, Directive Principles and Fundamental Duties of India was saved. Meanwhile, Chalukya Dynasty appeared on the main page on July 9, 2010. Hearteningly, the number of Good Articles increased from 130 to 136 during the same period, while the number of Featured Lists remained constant at 16.
The date change vandal mentioned briefly in the previous issue made a reappearance when the range block on his IP range expired in September. Consequently the block was extended till September 2011.
In October there was a heated discussion in the India project noticeboard regarding the copyright status of the Indian party symbols. The discussion was triggered by the deletion of Wiki San Roze's party symbol images by Hammersoft as copyright violations. No resolution was reached, partly because of our inability to explain to Hammersoft how election symbols in India differ from party logos. Comments are requested from anyone with a background in Indian copyright law to clarify this issue.
The Bengali Wikisource, which contains the literary works of many prominent writers of Bengali language including Rabindranath Tagore, has crossed the 5,000 pages milestone. According to List of Wikisource page, Bengali Wikisource is now at rank 21 among 56 Wikisource based on number of content pages.
The uploading of Tamil technical words donated by Tamil Virtual University to the Tamil Wiktionary was completed in October. The words were donated by the Government of Tamil Nadu due to lobbying efforts by Tamil Wikipedians during the runup to the World Classical Tamil Conference 2010 (WCTC) in June. Nearly 70,000 words were uploaded increasing the word count in Tamil Wiktionary from 1,20,000+ to 1,90,000+. This has brought Tamil to the 10th place (from 17) in the list of largest wiktionaries and has earned it a place in the Wiktionary front page logo. In addition, Tamil Wikipedians set up a stall at the WCTC and introduced Tamil Wiki projects to people from all walks of life.
The Hindi Wikipedia and its sister wiki projects migrated to the new vector interface on September 1, 2010. In addition, Hindi is the first (and so far the only) Indian language to be incorporated into the WikiBhasha translation and contribution toolkit developed by Microsoft Research.
Mumbai and Delhi held their first meetups in September, where Wikimedia Board members Barry Newstead and Bishakha Datta met up with Wikipedians and other interested members of the public in these cities. A month later, Hyderabad also held its first meetup.
Arun Ram, Shiju Alex and Barry Newstead releasing the Wikimedia India community newsletter at the nineteenth Bangalore meetup on 24 September 2010.
Wikipedians in Bangalore continued their tradition of meeting up regularly at the Centre for Internet and Society, with the nineteenth meetup in September featuring Barry and Bishaka as attendees, and marking the release of the community newsletter. Along with Delhi and Mumbai, Bangalore is reported to be one of the three cities in contention for the Indian office of the Wikipedia Foundation.
The first Wikimarathon, where Wikipedians and members of the public were encouraged to contribute to Wikimedia projects onsite, was held simultaneously at the meetups in Bangalore and Chennai on November 14, 2010. Wikipedians in Delhi also held a meetup the same day.
The Malayalam Wikipedia held several academies in different parts of Kerala over the past few months.
This interesting discussion on the quality of editing in India-related articles has been underway for on the noticeboard a few days. Feel free to join in and express your opinion.
If you've just joined, add your name to the Members section of Wikipedia:WikiProject India. You'll get a mention in the next issue of the Newsletter and get it delivered as desired. Also, please include your own promotions and awards in future issues. Don't be shy!
Lastly, this is your newsletter and you can be involved in the creation of the next issue. Any and all contributions are welcome. Simply let yourself be known to any of the undersigned, or just start editing!
This newsletter incorporates content from the WikiMedia India Community Newsletter, September 2010.
Looking forward to more contributions from you!
Although having the newsletter appear on everyone's userpage is desired, this may not be ideal for everyone. If, in the future, you wish to receive a link to the newsletter, rather than the newsletter itself, you may mention it at WikiProject India Outreach Department
Hello friends, we are a number of editors from WikiProject India have got together to assess the many thousands of articles under the stewardship of the project, and we'd love to have you, a fellow member, join us. These articles require assessment, that is, the addition of a WikiProject template to the talk page of an article, assessing it for quality and importance and adding a few extra parameters to it.
As of March 11, 2012, 07:00 UTC, WikiProject India has 95,998 articles under its stewardship. Of these 13,980 articles are completely unassessed (both for class and importance) and another 42,415 articles are unassessed for importance only. Accordingly, a Tag & Assess 2012 drive-cum-contest has begun from March 01, 2012 to last till May 31, 2012.
If you are new to assessment, you can learn the minimum about how to evaluate from Part One of the Assessment Guide.
Part Two of the Guide will help you learn to employ the full functionality of the talk page template, should you choose to do so.
You can sign up on the Tag & Assess page. There are a number of awards to be given in recognition of your efforts. Come & join us to take part in this exciting new venture. You'll learn more about India in this way.
Links for Wikipedians interested in India-related content 
WikiProject India Newsletter: Volume I, Issue 3 - December 2006
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