Wikipedia:Peer review/Indian independence movement/archive1

Indian independence movement

Hi All - let's make this a featured article. We need the help and advice of as many people as possible in this effort. Rama's Arrow 14:04, 26 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure I can be terribly valuable in this stage for this one, as I don't know too much about the topic.Gandhi slept with my mom The key will be to prioritize the coverage of subtopics by their importance and to obtain and utilize the best possible references to cite and verify the material. That will help in reducing the POV, because as anyone can see there is some questionable wording in there currently. It's probably also going to have to be shortened a bit, just covering the most important facets and being in proper summary style. It's not to far off there, but as prioritization is done, there may be some topics that need to be included and room will have to be made for that while still shortening the article overall. But it's a good core to work with, and if research is done and the coverage is balanced out it will be very good. - Taxman ^Talk 14:54, 26 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I did have a specific thought. If the article is about the independence movement, much less space should be given to what happens after. In fact it should be quickly summarized and even just simply stated what happens later and left to other articles. So that means almost the whole last section can go. Also there should be an added impact and importance overview section. The current article focuses on events, that shouldn't be the only thing in the article. Context on how this fits into the bigger picture and how it affected other topics needs to be covered. How did this movement differ from or relate to other independence efforts. - Taxman ^Talk 15:30, 26 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Well, it's a real tough task Rama's Arrow has drawn our attention to. First of all, I think, we should decide about references. Some good books, and web references. References on independence movements are scattered throughout the web, but many of them very POV.

The article itself is not sufficient in sectioning. For example, the section "1857: The First War of Independence" is unnecessarily large.I have not gone through the wuole article yet. Perhaps more thoughts will pop up. My suggestion is, to follow some reputed works regarding sectioning. Sectioning is going to be vital, Shall we follow the present format, or shall we convert to a chronological format? Very difficult questions. At present, for example, "The revolutionary movement" is such that it may appear to a new reader as if it was an altogether different movement from the meinstream independence movement (i.e. Congress). While probably it is partially true (I do not know, some historians may throw some light), many movements were interwoven.

We may follow a chronological format where inter-related and independent movements/happenings will be discussed in same/separate paragraphs.The problems in chronological format would be how to divide. We may divide on the basis of important landmarks (eg "prior to 1857", "1857 mutiny", "1857 to 1870s", "1885-INC", "1890s-1905", "1905-1920s (including WW1)", "1930s", 1940s etc. please comment. Herculean task ahead.--Dwaipayanc 18:00, 26 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I completely agree with the views of both user:Taxman and user:Dwaipayanc. First of all, this article reads like a summary of the history of India from the 19th century. It contains a lot of material naturally belonging to British Raj, History of the Republic of India, Pakistan movement. While some of it is necessary to include as summaries, especially the reasons for the demand for independence, we need to give an IIM-only article, which stresses as much quality info about the diverse movement. This is why I've considerably compressed the "Independence, 1947-50" section as per Taxman's idea. I think, as Dwaipayanc suggests, there is a need for complete re-writing of all the sections and re-organizing sections as such. Rama's Arrow 04:16, 27 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

There is so much, often contradictory, literature available on the subject that it will be good if inline referencing is used liberally. Tintin (talk) 04:17, 27 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Also, as per naming conventions we need to re-title the article "Indian independence movement." Rama's Arrow 04:18, 27 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

As other reviewers have pointed out, we need a complete rewrite. Section titles should not be dramatic (e.g., climax), lone subsections should be avoided, and the article should use summary style. -- Sundar ^{\talk \contribs} 06:29, 27 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Comment1: I'll take a deeper look later, but as for now, I think significant changes are needed in the "Parition of Bengal" section, especially in the sentences: An ill-conceived and hastily implemented action, the partition outraged Bengalis. Not only had the government failed to consult Indian public opinion, but the action appeared to reflect the British resolve to divide and rule. The section only provides a segmented view, for it claims that the partition was wholeheartedly opposed by Bengalis. That is not correct; the partition was wholeheartedly opposed by the intellectuals and leaders from the Western part of Bengal, i.e. Kolkata. The East Bengal actually benefitted from the partition, with Dhaka becoming a major seat of regional government as a result of the partition. In fact, the All India Muslim League established in 1906 supported the partition. The first session of Muslim League in Dacca (current Dhaka) had the resolution that said That this meeting in view of the clear interest of the Muhammadans of Eastern Bengal consider that Partition is sure to prove beneficial to the Muhammadan community which constitute the vast majority of the populations of the new province and that all such methods of agitation such as boycotting should be strongly condemned and discouraged [1]. Most view and analyses from Bangladesh consider the partition of Bengal as a beneficial event that sought to improve the problems in the neglected East Bengal area. Rather, the annulment of the paritition alienated the Muslims of East Bengal, and made them more anti-British (see previous link from Banglapedia article). So, I guess the section can do some copyediting to reflect these views rather than terming it a totally anti-Indian act by the British. I'll take a look at the rest of the page later. Thanks. --Ragib 17:50, 27 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Comment2: My next comment is about the focus of the article itself. Is it about the modern (post 1947) nation "Republic of India", or the greater region known as India , that is now divided into Bangladesh, India, and Pakistan? Most of the article looks like the latter (whole region), but the last section (1947 to 1950) is focused completely on the modern nation of India. There is a big difference between this, because "Indian independence movement" is in reality the independence movement of the whole region, rather than one of the 3 countries emerging from it. So, I'd request dropping the last section, stopping at August 15, 1947, and ending the paragraph with something like "India and Pakistan became independent from British rule". Thanks. --Ragib 17:55, 27 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Note: The [edit] link needs to be fixed. =Nichalp «Talk»= 13:57, 29 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

This article needs a lot of work before it can be featured. Summarise content to begin with. Gandhi's work can also be summarised. Lot's of missing events. I'll talk about that only after a heavy summary is undertaken. Regards, =Nichalp «Talk»= 13:57, 29 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Comment -- Looks good overall. Agree with above, but some points on writing style:
1. There's too much use of "would" constructs everywhere — "Congress would become the mainstream ..." and many more examples. They can be converted to read like "Congress became the mainstream ..."
2. Should condense roundabout and ill-flowing constructs; e.g. "Congress became the mainstream leadership of the movement" to "Congress took charge of the movement".
3. "Regional movements prior to 1857" should either be expanded or merged into the 1857 Mutiny section; it's a general rule-of-thumb at FAC that if a section is only one paragraph long, than that section probably is not needed or too specific.
4. Under "European rule", many examples given in the final paragraph are about abuses by specific people rather than wider systematic oppression. Would be nice if more examples of the latter were included to round out that info. Hope this helps. Saravask 19:49, 30 April 2006 (UTC)[reply]