Talk:India/Archive 13

message: I found that this section contains an incorrect, literally imperfect quotation from an external reference 11. And this is a subject of conflict in terms of interpretation by the readers of Wikipedia.
Am quoting the exact text from the currently existing page under the heading Etymology:
The Constitution of India and common usage in various Indian languages also recognise Bharat (pronunciation (info), IPA: [/bʰɑːrət̪/]) as an official name of equal status. Hindustan (/hin̪d̪ust̪ɑːn/ (info)), which is the Persian word for “Land of the Hindus” and historically referred to northern India is also occasionally used as a synonym for all of India.[11]
The reference to "Land of the Hindus" to "historically referred to northern India is not entirely correct considering different interpretations readers can take, and is a deviation of the policy in use within Wikipedia, in my opinion. This is because the actual quote in reference 11 (which says refers to Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. (2007). Retrieved on 2007-06-18.) gives this : 
The name Hindustan is sometimes defined as north of the Vindhya mountains. It is also occasionally used as a synonym for all of India. 
Therefore I request concerned approvers to approve a change in the wording / phrasing of the text detailed above.
Thank you.
: —Ssenthilprabhu 04:18, 6 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Hmmm, maybe we are looking at a different page. See the linked page , which states, "... also spelled  Hindusthan  (Persian: “Land of the Hindus”), historically, northern India, in contrast to the Deccan, or southern India. This area can be defined more particularly as the basin of the five Punjab rivers and the upper Gangetic Plain.". Abecedare 04:35, 6 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Etymology 

message: The Taj Mahal is one of the seven wonders of the world now. Please change that on the page.
Also, the Taj Mahal page is having a vote on whether or not to include this new recognition [of the taj being one of the seven new wonders] (even though 100 million people voted (the most populous global decision in the history of man)). Please input your opinion. Nikkul 15:54, 8 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: "Seven wonders of the world now."  Hmm.   Unfortunately, the Seven wonders of the world which really refer to the seven wonders of the Ancient World were named long before Shahjahan met Mumtaz Mahal and impregnated her enough times (17) to eventually cause her death for which he was famously remorseful.  I don't know what Seven Wonders you are talking about, but every so often, some tourist company, or some TV channel, in a bid to drum up more business or boost their ratings, draws up a "Seven Wonders" list.  But these lists are ephemeral, which the Taj is not and best not associated with.  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:53, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

text: This current commericial exercise does not in any way affect the original seven wonders of the world, and is definitely less notable. It is clearly not notable enough to deserve any mention on this article. deeptrivia (talk) 00:52, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: We don't want this article to suffer from WP:RECENT. A sentence is already mentioned on the Taj article. The Taj itself shouldn't get too much coverage on this page since there is so much other important information to be told. GizzaDiscuss © 06:36, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Okay then, I'll use a policy to support my point. We will be giving WP:UNDUE weight to a recent fad that will die away in a couple of years. GizzaDiscuss © 22:44, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

text: Not just people with internet, but people who knew about it. Unlike a national election where it may not be compulsory but at least everyone is notified about it, people must have known about this poll only through advertising. It is not universal. GizzaDiscuss © 23:59, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Taj Mahal 

message: The Indic tag is very disruptive. I think it should be moved somewhere else so that its not at the top. I have not seen one site with a tag and an info box under it. I definately think the info box should be at the top since it relates more to india than the tag which relates to the article (the wiki page) not its subject. Nikkul 17:24, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I have seen it attached to the bottom of the infobox in language infoboxes. Can you try that somehow then I don't have a problem. --KnowledgeHegemony 09:01, 14 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Indic Tag 

message: The section is unsourced, POV and a list of quotes. Wikipedia is WP:NOT Wikiquote. I'll remove it. GizzaDiscuss © 10:10, 15 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Influence of India on the world" 

message: I'm really surprised at such quick action taken by the admin Blnguyen in protecting this article. Was there vandalism or extended edit warring? I didn't see any. There were precisely three reverts, of those two were by the Kannada tag team. Can the esteemed admin please explain here in the talk page the reasons behind his action?
Parthi talk/contribs 05:46, 17 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I left a post on his page explaining the situation.  I can't imagine the protection will last for too long.  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:35, 17 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hair trigger protection 

message: Some good news related to the India page: I have gotten the India article in the Simple English Wikipedia to "Very Good Article" status (which is their equivalent of FA status). The article itself can be seen here and the VGA candidacy review here. I just thought that the editors of this article would be interested in some good news after the weeks of edit warring and talk page conflicts. Universe=atomTalk•Contributions 11:04, 17 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Very nice work.  Congratulations!  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:13, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

text: I have to say that in many ways this article is more representative of India than the one here.  Good job.--Blacksun 09:51, 18 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Good News (perhaps) 

message: Dear Universe=atom, In my version of the last sentence of the lead ("A pluralistic, multilingual, multi-ethnic society, India is also home to a ..."), the appositive "A pluralistic, multilingual, multi-ethnic society" precedes the subject "India."  That is OK.  Here is an example from the New Oxford Guide to Writing: 
Besides in your version there is redundancy in "In addition" and "also."  Regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 17:36, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Actually the appositive doesn't agree with the subject.  The appositive relates to the Indian society (pluralistic, multilingual and multi-enthnic) while the subject is India, the country.  I would suggest rewording the sentence to something simpler, perhaps even breaking up the sentence into two, since the first half(which discusses the Indian society) has little to do with the second half of the sentence (which talks about India's wildlife and protected habitats). AreJay 23:13, 22 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: No, the appositive doesn't relate to Indian society.  Had the subject been "Indian society" it would have read, "Pluralistic, multilingual, and multi-ethnic, Indian society is ...."  The sentence has exactly the same structure as the "Bishop Andrewes" example.  The reason why the "also" (a subject of much previous discussion on this talk page) has been added, is that it de-emphasizes the main clause a little in contrast to the appositive phrase.  Note that the sentence is similar to the sentence: "India, a pluralistic, multilingual, and multi-ethnic society, is also home to a diversity of wildlife ...," but in its current form, the two disparate elements—the society of people and the diversity of wildlife—are separated more, thereby making the transition from one to the other less jarring.  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 00:15, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Nice point. Universe=atomTalk•Contributions 13:34, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Appositive Phrases

message: Do we need this newly added demonym listed in the Infobox ? I know it is used in literary and historical context, but AFAIK the term is not used in any official documents or formal (non-literary) writing. Also the cited source is a lexical  database which groups "cognitive synonyms", and hence has grouped "Hindu, Hindoo, Hindustani (a native or inhabitant of Hindustan or India)". I could see adjectives like Bharati/Bharatiya listed instead, but even that is very rarely (if ever) used as a demonym for India in English. Thoughts? 
Also, anyone know why the "‡)" symbols appear before the lat/long coordinates of New Delhi in the infobox ? Abecedare 01:27, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think we need "Hindustani."  Were we to allow historical demonyms, the list could be very long.  As for the "‡)" symbol, it seems to be an artifact of the lat/long, a recent problem I'm guessing.  Other country pages like Pakistan, China, Nepal, ... have similar problems.  We could remove the lat/long info for New Delhi (which seems to be different anyway from that on the New Delhi page) for now.  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 02:41, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for your opinions. I added the demonym because Hindustani is used frequently by Indians themselves at the conversational level as well as in several Bollywood movies. For example see the film title, Phir Bhi Dil Hai Hindustani. In other words, the demonym is not only a historical word but is still used today. I hope this helps. With regards, AnupamTalk 03:22, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't see any reason why we should add Hindustani. "The term is used in conversation frequently" is subjective. As I have witnessed the usage of term is not so frequent. Again, "several Bollywood movies" is subjective. Even if it is used in movies, that's not a good reason to add it here. At most the term can be used in Hindi wikipedia or any other language wikipedia where the term is in use.(I haven't come across the word Hindustani in Kannada. Instead, the term widely used is "Bharatiya".) Gnanapiti 03:53, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed. I don't know about the movies, but this is the "India" page of the English Wikipedia, and Websters' main entry for India, refers to "Indian" as the demonym: "of or from the subcontinent of India : of the kind or style prevalent in the subcontinent of India : INDIAN"  Also, according to the OED, "Hindustani" is "A native of Hindustan; a Hindu or Muslim of Upper India."  That means that regardless of how Indians use "Hindustani" in conversation, in the English language  "Hindustani" still retains its historical meaning, i.e. a native of Northern India."  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 04:10, 23 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: interestingly, the OED also gives a meaning of Hindustani as equivalent to Urdu, not "Hindi+Urdu" (and adds, "By earlier writers sometimes applied to Hindi itself."). We may need to review our definition of Hindustani. "WordNet" is obviously not a "reliable source". dab (𒁳) 11:53, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

text: Hi Dab, Yes, the Hindustani language use to be the same as Urdu (or, more correctly, Urdu use to be the same as Hindustani).  The Hindustani page does say belatedly (towards the end of the lead paragraph), "In fact, before the Partition of British India, the terms Hindustani and Urdu were synonymous."  As far as I am aware, things began to change after 1947 (or perhaps starting with the poetry of Iqbal a little earlier), when Urdu, especially in Pakistan, began to acquire its highly Persianized literary vocabulary; contemporaneously, in India, modern Hindi (which had emerged in the late 19th century) began to move even more in the opposite direction, adding all kinds of Sanskrit neologisms.  The term "Hindi-Urdu" was created by linguists (I'm guessing in the 1960s) as a more descriptive and neutral (since Hindustan also meant India, which, after 1947, was a different entity) replacement for "Hindustani" (or old Urdu). Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:33, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

text: PS You might be interested in reading the excerpts from David Laitin's paper at the end of the section here.  Laitin, who says, "Gandhi also emphasized the need for an indigenous all-India language as something of grave need, and promoted Hindustani, a north Indian koine that blurred the distinction between Hindi and Urdu," is also not quite correct.  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:47, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

text: PPS And here is the entry, "Hindostanee" in Hobson-Jobson (not always completely reliable, considering it was written in 1886, but correct here). Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:55, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: that's all very well, but I am still surprised that the current (2007) OED has "Urdu" and adds that in earlier times it used to mean Hindi. --dab (𒁳) 13:03, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, my version of OED, which is the current on-line version (actually the 1989 second edition) says for entry Urdu, "A. n. Formerly, = HINDUSTANI n. 2; in recent use distinguished from Hindustani (the lingua franca) and designated as the official language of Pakistan."  For Hindustani it says, "2. The language of the Muslim conquerors of Hindustan, being a form of Hindi with a large admixture of Arabic, Persian, and other foreign elements; also called Urdu, i.e. zaban-i-urdu language of the camp, sc. of the Mogul conquerors. It later became a kind of lingua franca over all India, varying greatly in its vocabulary according to the locality and local language." You are right, the "Hindustani" definition could certainly be improved.  For one, what they mean by "Hindi" is not modern Hindi, but the "Hindi" dialect that was spoken in the Delhi area in the 16th or 17th century; and by "Urdu" they don't mean modern Urdu, but what was called Urdu in the 19th century.  Perhaps someone should write to them, but, given that it is the OED, they might have reasons for the choice of words ...  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:24, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: you are right, I suppose our Hindustani article is doing alright. dab (𒁳) 13:40, 24 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hindustani ? 

message: The first woman president will take oath.
--Florentino floro 04:54, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: As User:Abecedare has already explained in the edit summary, although the news is latest and of much importance it doesn't really fit into the main space of this article which is supposed be a high level Summary style article on India. Thanks for showing interest in the betterment of article though. Hope to see more such constructive edits from you in the future. Gnanapiti 05:07, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: First Woman President

message: The second footnote in the infobox states that "This includes only Indian-administered territory" (or something like that). That is present where it states the area of India, the reason of which is logically deductible. However, why is it present where it states the latitude and longitude of New Delhi? Is that at all related to Indian-administered territory? Universe=atomTalk•Contributions 16:32, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The ‡) symbol in the lat/long of New Delhi, is just an artifact of (or rather the result of a bug in) the lat/long program.  The same problem exists on other country pages, where other footnotes symbols appear.  I am removing the lat/long info for New Delhi for now, until the bug in lat/long has been fixed.  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 20:19, 25 July 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Footnote in Infobox 

message: If you go to the CIA's world factbook website, it says that India is somewhere over 70% Indian - Aryan & 25% (or so) Dravidian. (I dont agree with the term Dravidian) but the point is, India is not "MULTI ETHNIC" 71.119.249.104 21:04, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: nonsense. "Indo-Aryan" and "Dravidian" are huge linguistic super-groups, not single ethnicities. You might as well say they're all Homo sapiens (which is also true, of course). dab (𒁳) 21:31, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I wonder if User:71.119.249.104 is confusing ethnicity with race (whatever that is).  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 21:57, 26 July 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: yes; race used to mean "breed, type" and could apply to groups smaller than an ethnos, and has now come to mean "super-phyllum" or what. Racism and related trouble is first and foremost a semantic confusion. dab (𒁳) 22:12, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

text: You people havn't done your research. If you ask an Iranian what they are, I mean after the Persian part, they will say Aryan (at least some will). ANd the same can be said for some Afghans, Pakistanis, and Indians. I mean this is not a debate. Many people from this region say there Aryan. And this can be said for some Europeans (of course some of the Euorpeans who believe there Aryan, might have a racist version of that, similar to that of a white supremacist group)....Anyway.....the point is.....Even the CIA recognizes that most Indian people are INDO-ARYAN. Now if you want to say India is multi ethnic fine I know u people are not going to understand what im saying cuz some of u might not be Indian. But this article should at least say somewhere in the start of the article that India is said to possibly be the homeland of the Aryans. 71.107.57.134 08:22, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Ultimately, we are all from Africa, including you and me.  Our ancestors left Africa only about 50,000 years ago.  That is the big story.  After they left Africa, whether they came straight to India along the coastal route (as some ancestors of the Adivasis, India's original inhabitants, did, or as the ancestors of the native Andaman islanders did), or they migrated a little later out of Africa into the region of Western India/Pakistan/Iran along the coastal route, then migrated into Central Asia, then into Europe, and (for some) then back into Iran and India, as it apparently happened for some Indo-Aryans (according to Y-chromosome evidence), it doesn't really matter.  The DNA is more or less the same for all humans.  As for what is the homeland of the Aryans?  According to most historical linguists, it is Southern Ukraine, west of the Dneiper River, not India.  It is people in that region, who are considered by mainstream opinion in historical linguistics, to be the original speakers of PIE (Proto-Indo-European).  Sanskrit is a descendant of that language.  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:16, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Without discussing origins or Indians, there are hundred of different ethnicities in India (e.g. Bengali, Gujrati, Tamil, Assamese) etc. I believe our anon friend is utterly confused by the words Ethnicity and Race. Since it has already been pointed out to him, I believe reiterating the same thing would be pointless unless he reads the previous comments. --Ragib 19:05, 8 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why does it say India is multi ethnic? 

message: 3 Questions:
*What is India's area considering all areas under actual administration and total area as claimed by Indian government?
*Similarly, the same data for Pakistan (actual and claimed)?
*What are the CIA figures based on (their considerations)? 
Please mention the source you refer to gather your data. KH 14:46, 9 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: ...... *waiting* KH 09:12, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Total Area of India 

message: Hello, I am an editor from Britain who mainly does the law pages. I wanted to request some contributions from either experts or people who know a little about the Indian legal system for the Indian law page. I thought this would be the best place to ask. What does Indian law say on issues of contract, trusts, property, and criminal law? How many decisions of the House of Lords remain in the common law in India? Are you still burdened (like us!) with Donoghue v. Stephenson in tort law? To what extent has Indian common law followed its own path since independence, and how influential does Commonwealth jurisprudence remain? What is the constutional and administrative law balance between the state and federal levels? And so on... If people could help out at the Indian law page I would be very grateful. Wikidea 01:33, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, the resident expert on Indian Law is user:Lexmercatoria, who sadly seems to have withdrawn  from the WP enterprise.  I am hoping that this is temporary.  I have already left a post on his talk page encouraging him to return.  Perhaps you could post your message there as well.  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:49, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Help on Indian law 

message: Look at the French article on India. Beautiful. Many sections and beautiful images. Need to learn from that and if adopting the style of it, by including more sections and the beautiful images, this article can be improved a lot.
Chanakyathegreat 16:41, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: What to learn? Wikipedia is not about creating sections and adding images. That's a beautiful article, I agree, but keep in mind that this is a featured article. Gnanapiti 22:45, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Learn 

message: I feel the external links of the General reference section should be removed. They all give only information that would be present in this article (and other related articles) if it were complete, thus not respecting the first item of the list of Links normally to be avoided ("Any site that does not provide a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a Featured article"). However they could be used in references according to WP:EL#References_and_citation. Moreover Britanica requires registration, thus violating item 6 of the previously mentioned list of forbidden external links ("Links to sites that require payment or registration to view the relevant content"). BernardM 12:29, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I support retaining the General reference links (especially CIA factbook and LOC), since they do provide an independent and  reputable source for trustworthy and comprehensive information, which expands upon the content of the article. Also, as per my reading of the WP:EL guidelines, these links are not "forbidden"; their inclusion simply needs to be given careful thought, which I think has been done in this instance. Any other thoughts or suggestions ? Abecedare 15:44, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links of "General reference" 

message: Can a source be reliable when the writing is poor?  Here is an example.
Exercises for high-school students.  Please correct the following sentences inadvertently provided by Mr. S. Jain, columnist for the Business Standard, in his column India whining.  Mistakes of grammar, usage and internal consistency are indicated in italics.  Here are two examples.  The exercises follow in the compressed section.
::*Example: "A full critique of the NCEUS report will require much more space than this column affords, ..." ("A full critique of the NCEUS report will require more space than is afforded to this column, ...")
::*Example: "Since the unit records of the 2004-05 round of the National Sample Survey (NSS) were made available to the NCEUS, the chances of it having read the data wrong are low." ("chances of it reading the data wrong are small.")
::
Expand to see exercises based on writing in Mr. Jain's column:
::*Exercise: ... while the NCEUS paints a picture of Indians wilting and dying, and recommends various measures including an elaborate safety net. 
::*Exercise: "But if you look at the consumption figure thrown up by the NSS, it is usually smaller; sadly, over the years, it is getting even smaller." 
::*Exercise: To use numbers, assume India’s consumption was Rs 100 in 1993-94—using the growth thrown up by the NAS, this means 2004-05 consumption was Rs 142." 
::*"The ADB argues that inequality is resulting in a lower level of poverty reduction and is hindering growth, ..." 
::*Exercise: "When the NCEUS put out its latest report last week, not surprisingly, given its findings, the reportage was extensive." 
 
::*Exercise: "It points to poor human development indicators in countries like India, but countries with both better and worse inequality levels have better human development indicators—so, inequality in itself does not lead to worsening indicators.
  
::*Exercise: "How you should do this—add all of it only to the rich, or evenly, and so on—is a matter of debate. But if you add it evenly, and several experts accept this as kosher, you get a number very different from that suggested by the NSS/NCEUS. 
 
::*Exercise: "So, before rushing out to announce yet another welfare scheme, take a look at the data—not just on poverty, but on the employment and income growth that is being generated without the government’s assistance."
How seriously does one take such a "source" when its prose would not pass muster in a half-way decent Wikipedia article?  User Universe=atom will vouch for this I'm sure.  Such a source, in my view, can't hold a candle to peer-reviewed research in academic journals, or even well-written newspaper columns.  Contrast this now with a different column and columnist (that I found as a result of clicking on of the links above).  I don't know the columnist C. P. Chandrasekhar either (and their writing might not be perfect) but I can tell at a glance that s/he writes clearly.  The columnist  writes in order to communicate. Mr. Jain's writing, in contrast, is strained and full of attempts at literary elegance, when its simple sentences are poorly written and lack clarity.  The world of newspapers, such as it is, is full of "sources" that can lined up to support the most outlandish assertions.  Clarity in the writing is, consequently, ever more important; lack of clarity hinders the evaluation of a source's content. 
As for user:Sarvagnya's sentence, "For starters MS and MSA are not the only quotable economists on this issue ..."  I don't know which economists he has in mind, but the ones I know of who have written on this topic (including some of happy memory) like V. K. R. V. Rao, K. N. Raj, Jagdish Bhagwati, T. N. Srinivasan, Amartya Sen, Partha Dasgupta, ... are unlikely to be in Mr. Jain's camp.  They are also infinitely less quotable in grammar books.  Fowler&fowler«Talk» 00:40, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: bah! Sarvagnya 22:06, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Reliability of a source when the writing poor