Wikipedia talk:Noticeboard for India-related topics

This page is a notice board for things particularly relevant to Wikipedians working on articles on India.

Click here to add a new section

Wikipedia Meetups edit Upcoming none Recent Outside India Past meetups

Chola dynasty

Chola dynasty is nominated for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DrKiernan (talk • contribs) 15:55, 13 November 2012‎ (UTC)

Peer-review

Hello there, Wikipedia:WikiProject India/Peer review page is mentioned at WP:INB's Announcements section! While the "WP:WikiProject India/Peer review" is inactive since 2009 with a {{historical}}. So I think it should be removed from WP:INB page. There are several new requests by Users lately and those are pending since, except couple of have reviewed by Redtigerxyz and others. Thanks! -- ɑηsuмaη ^{ʈ ᶏ ɭ Ϟ} 10:05, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

Removing from INB's announcements sounds right. But with Wikipedia:Peer review present do we even need our separate peer review page? §§Dharmadhyaksha§§ {T/C} 10:34, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

The page-link should exist in WP:INB, so that people who are interested to join the department, can do so by enlisting themselves. However, the list of requests from this page should be archived. Editors who want to raise peer-review requests from members of WP:IN can do so by adding peer-review=yes, in the WP India's banner in the talk page of the article. Once that is done, it creates a link of a subpage under Wikipedia:WikiProject India/Peer review, where the reviewers can add their review comments. The fact that a request has been raised gets listed in Wikipedia:WikiProject_India/Article_alerts page.--GDibyendu (talk) 18:04, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

I was wrong; the alerts page is now showing only the peer-review requests which are raised at Wikipedia:Peer review.--GDibyendu (talk) 18:32, 26 December 2012 (UTC)

Spider Girls

Hi. I'm looking for the India Wikipedia version of this article. Can someone please help? Thanks. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 03:37, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Greetings and new year wishes behalf of Noticeboard for India-related topics. India Wikipedia version? Did you mean articles in Indian languages (most probably we don't have any)! --Tito Dutta (talk) 01:00, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

Hello. Thanks and greetings to you too. I meant Hindi or some of the other language wikipedias. The girls are pretty famous I think. I'm surprised that they probably don't have an article. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 10:07, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

Gibberish requires fixing

Uruthikottai Vattagai Nagarathar seems mostly to be gibberish and has been multiply tagged for many months. I rather think that it is intended to be an article about a social group who are an offshoot of Nagarathar but its only category is as a village article. Can it be fixed or should it be redirected to the (presumed) main article? - Sitush (talk) 15:13, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Gibberish doesn't belong here, I can't understand what the article is supposed to be about, so prodded Crusoe8181 (talk) 05:25, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

Caste identification

My apologies to everyone for raising this point again, but after looking at policy more carefully, I realize that I and others have made fundamental mistakes regarding policy and that I think we need to seriously consider relaxing our current rules. This has been discussed in a number of places; for two from this board, see this one and this. In those discussions, people generally looked to WP:BLPCAT to draw a parallel, and argued that caste is equivalent to ethnicity, and thus require for living people evidence that the caste is connected to the person's notability along with evidence that the person self-identifies as being in that caste. Unfortunately, this parallel is fundamentally flawed, because WP:BLPCAT only places restrictions on religion and sexual preference, not on ethnicity. And while it places restrictions on categories, lists, navboxes, etc., it certainly places no restrictions on article text themselves. This has to do with the fact that article text can cover details, caveats, and the like, while cats, etc., cannot (they "factually" "state" that such and such a person is religion X).

If we look at the parallel of ethnicity, we will see across Wikipedia that we list people's ethnicity explicitly in articles, usually in an "Early history" or "Personal life" section. Often we do this by stating things like "X's father came from Country X" or "She was born to Jewish parents". Of course, we still must have a WP:BLP compliant source (high quality RS, but we don't need a self-identification, nor do we need some connection to notability. Note that for people related to Judaism, we do this even when the person has explicitly rejected the religion, under the grounds that Jewish-ness is still an ethnic identity (though, of course, we would also provide a sourced statement saying that the person has rejected that identity).

I have to say that upon reflection, I was wrong to attempt to apply the stricter religion/sexual preference requirements to caste, and think that we should instead apply the ethnicity rules. That is, for living people, we still require a source, but we do not require either self-identification or connection to notability within article texts. Finally, of course, WP:MOSLEAD still applies, so we would not mention the caste in the lead. Qwyrxian (talk) 07:16, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Thank you! Now if others also don't mind this or mind this, lets discuss it here and later on add some text in WP:BLP or other appropriate place. §§Dharmadhyaksha§§ {T/C} 09:46, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

We should not be assigning a caste to someone who has not self-identified because it is a hot potato socially & they should have the right to choose. In the south of India it is often deliberately avoided - people there are reluctant to mention it and we should respect their reluctance, regardless of WP:CENSORED. Contradictions arise; people actually disclaim caste (notable Bachchan); and despite endogamy, there are inter-caste marriages that cause problems with defining it. Furthermore, it is rarely relevant to anything that makes these people notable, with occasional exceptions such as B. R. Ambedkar. - Sitush (talk) 11:57, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

I agree that if there are cases where a person has explicitly declaimed it, we have to make an editorial decision, either omitting or explicitly stating the objection. But, in my opinion, the "rarely relevant to anything that makes these people notable" is a red herring. The exact same thing is true for ethnicity (including, in many places the "hot potato socially"), yet our articles on living people from other parts of the world regularly include the info when we can reliably source it. As has been pointed out on a number of article talk pages, often people don't state it because they don't have to. Furthermore, aren't we demanding something that the vast majority of notable but not super famous will never meet? What I mean is, for example, if a notable professor happens to say in an interview that his parents came from Elbonia, it's pretty unlikely that the writer is going to pick that as something worth quoting, though the writer may still include the ethnicity in the article. In that case, the person did self-identify, but it just didn't get reported that way. Sure, for people from first world countries who are super-famous (especially who are entertainers) may get interviewed on camera, in which case we do see the whole interview verbatim...but that's not the case with many other people who are nonetheless notable.

Just to clarify, of course, I'm not suggesting that we relax our sourcing requirements, nor am I suggesting that we use the "last name = caste" false argument. But I think that if an Indian newspaper writes and article about Bollywood Actress #17812 and says "She comes from an X family", that that meets all of the requirements we would have for any other piece of BLP info except for sexual preference and religion. To me, unless someone can somehow show evidence that caste is more like preference and religion than it is like ethnicity, than I think we have to go with the rules governing the latter. Qwyrxian (talk) 12:40, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

Is sexual preference considered to be a choice rather than how one is "made" (poor choice of word)? - Sitush (talk) 12:44, 29 December 2012 (UTC)

I would assume that, as a matter of policy, Wikipedia takes no stance, though I also wondered if that's the connection. I actually don't know the history of the division of those characteristics at BLP. One possibility is that it's a very American/Western European distinction, in that religion and sexual preference are often intentionally hidden, while ethnicity is, in the sense that it often matters in that context, "written on the body". That is, in the US, one is visibly "white" or "black" or "Asian" or "Latina" or "Middle Eastern", and that distinction itself drives much of the prejudicial behavior (thus, one cannot effectively hide their ethnicity)...in other parts of the world, however, one's exact clan/tribe/caste identification is actually more important, and there may not be strictly observable physical differences. That is, the distinction itself may be a form of systemic bias...but unless we are going to change WP:BLP, we have to abide by it here. Qwyrxian (talk) 00:28, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Regarding 'caste', I'd have thought it was more or less self-evident that the stricter rules regarding self-identification ought to apply, given that it is a contested religious and political concept as much as an 'ethnic' one, given the obvious risks of mislabelling, given the fact that it is an individual's choice as to whether to recognise the validity of the caste system at all, and given the simple fact that it is very rarely of any encyclopaedic note anyway. WP:BLP policy in general is to write "conservatively and with regard for the subject's privacy" - and shoehorning people into categories they may well not recognise the validity of, just to suit the objectives of Wikipedia contributors, is neither 'conservative' nor showing much concern for the individual concerned at all. AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:12, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Andy, I think I finally see where you are coming from (probably why many Westerners have problems understanding the 'caste' issue.) In India, there are two words, both of which are translated into 'caste' in English, but mean very different things. The first word is 'jati'. Jati is from the Sanskrit word 'Jat', means birth or origin. Jati, therefore, simply means your origin, or as used commonly, it can be translated into 'tribe'. For example, Ezhava is a Jati. It denotes the people of the Ezham (country) - probably referring to the old Tamil kingdom (Ezham) of Cheras. Then there are Nair, Nambudiri etc., which are all Jatis. A jati, in other words, is very similar to the concept of 'Jewish'. Except in the big cities, Indians tend to be largely (95%?) endogamous, preferring to marry within the tribe (due to various factors including compatibility of social customs, morals etc.) Jati is not a modern concept, anymore than 'tribe' is. It is reminiscent of people's history. In case of Ezhavas, for example, it reminds them that they were part of the Ezham in the old days. However, there is no shame attached to belonging to any particular tribe by most people in it. There is yet another concept, which is also converted into 'caste', which in India is called Varna (literally, colour). This is a five-fold division of the society (actually the Jatis) into Brahman (self-appointed intellectuals), Kshatriya (protectors or warriors), Vaishya (economically productive people - tradesmen, cultivators), Shudra (slaves) and Avarna (literally 'those without a Varna.) Different Jatis (tribes) are put into one or the other Varna by Brahmins, who probably created the Varna system. So, in the above example, the Ezhavas are avarna (without varna), the Nambudiris are Brahmins and the Nairs are Shudras. Not surprisingly, except for the Brahmin Jatis (and to some extent the Kshatriya and Vaishya), most other Jatis don't like this classification system. And 95% of people whose Jatis have been tagged 'shudra' may not like to call themselves shoodra. In this sense, Sitush's concern is not misplaced. As far as this concept of varna is concerned, AndyTheGrump opinion that "it is a contested religious and political concept" is valid. It is indeed contested. And so is his contention that "it is an individual's choice as to whether to recognise the validity of the caste system at all." As such, perhaps, it may not be appropriate to call someone a 'slave' (shudra) varna (caste) in his biography without being prejudicial. However, we can still include his Jati, which is actually just the name of his or her tribe -- like Maratha, Rajput, Ezhava, Vokkaliga Rajput etc.. These are all tribe-names, Jatis, and not Varna, and are not to be confused with the 'caste system', by which, most Westerners mean the 'Varna' system. These can be left out, if you insist. However, it may be noted that even here, there is a political movement Reappropriation that is going on to reclaim these words as non-pejorative, and make them a rallying and unifying identity. See Shudra:_The_Rising, for example. In short, I suggest that Jati or tribe, which is an ethnic identity, may be ascribed without self-identification and Varna or caste need not be. And thank you to Qwyrxian for showing openness of mind.

Specifically with regard to Ezhava, I think that you will find many more sources refer to them as a caste than as a jati. Certainly, that is so from my reading and although Google Books is not a great way to prove things one way or the other, a simple search on "Ezhava caste" here returns > 20,000 hits whereas "Ezhava jati" returns 259. More generally, regarding this distinction please see page 244 of Bates, Crispin (1995). "Race, Caste and Tribe in Central India: the early origins of Indian anthropometry". In Robb, Peter (ed.). The Concept of Race in South Asia. Delhi: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-563767-0. and pages 45-46 of Béteille, André (1965). Caste, Class & Power: Changing Patterns of Stratification in a Tanjore Village. University of California Press. ISBN 9780520020535. I think that the entire caste versus jati issue in relation to BLPs is pretty much irrelevant to the core issues. - Sitush (talk) 09:26, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Yeah sure, if you search for English language results, caste will return more results (after all, that is the English word that is used in place of Jati). Try searching for malayalam language results, and jati will return 100 times more results than caste. I don't really know what that proves, though. When you say 'Caste vs Jati' issue, what do you mean? Thanks to the Englishmen, the English word for Jati is also Caste. So when you say Caste vs Jati, it just means Caste vs Caste. I think what you mean is Varna vs Jati. If you search for 'Ezhava Varna OR Jati' in Google, you are unlikely to find even one result that calls Ezhava a Varna (caste in the shameful/individual choice sense..) Anyway, I do support Qwyrxian's opinion that caste, in the sense of Varna is a matter of individual faith, as a majority of South Indians do not accept the validity of the Varna system (for the simple reason that 90% or more of them in states like Tamil Nadu and Kerala are classified as shoodras or avarnas (outcastes)). So, to impose the Varna system on them would probably be unfair. But the majority of people have no issues with identifying with their Jati, even if they are so-called shoodras like Nair. I think this compromise/resolution can be reached and settled? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sreejiraj (talk • contribs) 18:44, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

We do not negotiate 'compromises' that go against WP:BLP policy. Furthermore, you have provided no sources whatsoever to back up your arguments. Unless and until you do, there is nothing more to discuss here - we are not going to assign living individuals to subjective and controversial categories without (a) evidence of self-identification, and (b) evidence that it is of relevance to their notability. AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:54, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

AndyTheGrump Animeshkulkarni I think we are just going around in circles and there is a real risk of wasting everybody's time if we do that. So let's reduce the issues to the core. The Wikipedia policy on Ethnicity,_gender,_religion_and_sexuality does not overtly say anything about how Caste (Jati or Varna) identities should be treated. But it speaks only of ethnic origin, gender, religion and sexuality. I think it can be reasonably assumed that Jati does not refer to gender or sexual orientation. Therefore it has to be one of either ethnicity or religion. Both ethnicity and religion have different policies regard self-declaration. One requires it and the other does not. My question to you is simply this - which policy should apply to Jati and Varna - that of ethnicity or religion?Sreejiraj (talk) 19:41, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @Sreejiraj. This is the English language Wikipedia. We have other Wikipedias for Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam etc. Béteille touches on the confusion that you refer to but, really, whether you call it caste or jati makes little practical difference here. We are asserting something about a living person that they not accept themselves etc, per the various arguments raised above and in past discussions. If people have no problem identifying with their jati, as you suggest, then we should have no problem finding sources where they do so.

The WP:BLPCAT issue is also something of a sideshow and although it certainly was mentioned in earlier discussions concerning this problematic issue, it was one among many arguments. You will notice that I do not mention it in my standard advisory explanation at User:Sitush/Common#Castelists. BTW, your comment concerning varna in South India is something that I and others involved in cleaning up caste articles have been working on for some time; oddly, it is usually people from the South who object to the claims that you mention (notably, at Nair ... except when it suits them, of course! - Sitush (talk) 18:59, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

@ Sitush. First of all it needs to be clarified that caste is some thing that is not the choice of a person. A person's caste is the caste in which he is born into . Ie, is caste is something like a ethnic community . So, unlike religion where one can make choice whether he belongs to or not at any point of time in his life , one can not change his caste. This basic understanding is required to discuss this topic. So, when you realize that caste of a person is not his own making , but only relate to his lineage and ethnicity it is no more personal choice .That being case, the requirement for one to declare his caste is uncalled for and do not make sense. The argument however though is valid for one's religion as it is matter of persons choice. To make it clear , caste is not a belief system or some thing that can be accepted and rejected during one's life. Requiring that a person self declare his caste is like requiring a red haired person to declare him self red haired before he is described as red haired in Wikipedia by someone else. So, in short, there is no logical requirement for one to declare his caste for him to be listed here.Sanjeer (talk) 19:15, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Exactly, someone who is born into the Ezhava tribe cannot change it and become a Nair if he or she feels like it. This is not something that the person keeps changing. This is his background, ethnic origin. Would you insist that anyone who has to be referred to as a Human being has to self-identify as a human being? I mean, going by your logic, if people have no problem identifying as a human being, then we should have no problem finding sources where they do so?Sreejiraj (talk) 19:19, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I don't want to put a dampener on this discussion but I would encourage any new contributors to Wikipedia to read WP:SOCK and WP:MEAT. There have been some slightly odd goings-on, here and elsewhere, and it would not be the first time that, for example, an Indian community has organised itself on Orkut or similar in order to attempt to change consensus. If you're not socking or meating then, obviously, there is no problem. My apologies if this sounds accusatory: it is not my intent. - Sitush (talk) 19:22, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Regarding your "human being" example, please see WP:V. We do not need citations for the blindingly obvious, such as that water is wet. - Sitush (talk) 19:23, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Can I ask you a simple question? Is 'caste' or Jati more like religion or more like ethnic background?Sreejiraj (talk) 19:30, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

My opinion is that there is no easy answer to that: it is in the eye of the beholder and, as such, we must treat it conservatively in the case of BLPs. I refer you once more to Amitabh Bachchan and also, for example, to Sree Narayana Guru (a now-dead alleged Ezhava who specifically disassociated himself from caste/jati). And, the more I think about it, the more I wonder whether it would not be easier generally to follow the precedents established for categories, which have long held that we simply do not assign caste to anyone, dead or alive. Of course, that does have a few pitfalls, of which Ambedkar and Narayana Guru are classic examples because they are among the exceptions to the rule: their caste origins are intrinsic to their notability. - Sitush (talk) 19:39, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

If someone dissociates himself or herself from his or her ethnic background, we should mention that, and say that although this person was born in a Jewish family or Ezhava family, he dissociated himself or herself etc.. A good example is Mark_Zuckerberg. The fact that he was born into a Jewish family is mentioned in his biography, along with the words "although he has since described himself as an atheist." If you leave out Jewish from the article, it is a less complete article. If you mention that he was born into a Jewish family, his atheism is not going to lose its lustre, nor is he going to sue you for it. Here, we are talking about people who have not even dissociated themselves from their ethnic groups, and we should mention their ethnic background just like we do for Larry_Page and countless others. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sreejiraj (talk • contribs) 19:55, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

I've never really got involved in the mess that is Jewish identity on Wikipedia. However, as someone who lives in one of the most densely-populated Jewish areas in the UK, I'll pass on my local, unsourced opinion: there is and has for a long time being a huge debate concerning whether being Jewish means being a member of a race or of a religion. For that reason, I do not think that Zuckerberg etc are going to be terribly helpful as examples here. - Sitush (talk) 20:00, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Are you doubting that Jews form an ethnic community? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sreejiraj (talk • contribs) 20:04, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Like I said, I've never really got involved in how Jewishness is treated on Wikipedia. I've seen from a distance that it can be messy, as can caste. If you want me to take a guess, I'd say that they are an ethnic-religious community, defined by both common origin and common belief. But don't take my word for it. I think we should let others have a chance to comment here, don't you? - Sitush (talk) 20:09, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

I don't think I am blocking anyone from commenting here. But I do sense double standards here -- when it comes to Western Ethnic groups, there is no need for self-identification, but when it comes to Indian Ethnic groups, you need them to self identify. I reiterate what I said before, if you apply this yardstick, 95% of the items in all caste lists will have to be deleted, including the much eviscerated List_of_Ezhavas. So if that is the policy, you should apply it for all the items, and not just be keen to delete only the ones that I added.Sreejiraj (talk) 20:14, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

I have been cleaning up caste articles and lists for 18 months or more now. It takes time. - Sitush (talk) 20:25, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Let me help you out there, of the dozen or so people on the list, reference for self-declaration has not been provided for even a single person. That would leave you with a grand total of 0 people in the list of Ezhavas. Sreejiraj (talk) 20:32, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

That is really an issue for discussion at Talk:List of Ezhavas but I note that some of those entries are for people who are dead and for whom, therefore, WP:BLP does not apply. OTOH, there have been examples where lists have ended up blank and have been redirected to the main article; there have also been examples where lists have become so short that they have been merged with the main article and redirected. - Sitush (talk) 20:37, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

I am sorry, but WP:BLP doesn't say that ethnic identities have to be self-declared. As for lists turning empty, that is only to be expected if you don't stick to the guidelines. Sreejiraj (talk) 20:45, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

And I am sorry also, Sreejiraj, because you are going round in circles here and not advancing much at all: BLP says treat things conservatively and you are not addressing this. I really do think it would be better to wait for input from some other people. I am pretty sure it will come. Let's give it 24 hours, hey? In many parts of the world, people will be partying etc. - Sitush (talk) 20:50, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

Yup - WP:BLP says that "Biographies of living persons ("BLP"s) must be written conservatively and with regard for the subject's privacy" - including living individuals in such controversial categories as caste without self-identification looks like a clear breach of policy to me. And as yet, I've seen no argument whatsoever as to why such irrelevances are encyclopaedic at all. If caste matters to these individuals, fine, they can say which caste they think they belong to, and if it seems noteworthy possibly include it in articles. Wikipedia is not a database of ethnicity, and such lists seem to me to be entirely unwarranted, and a breach of individuals privacy. Maybe it is about time we settled this once an for all, and deleted the lot of them, as the colonial relic they are... AndyTheGrump (talk) 20:55, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

I'll agree that they are retrograde and the result of mutual suspicion and possibly hatred that prevented people from marrying others who looked/spoke/acted/lived differently from themselves. But it's also a fact that the such tribal affiliations are extremely important in today's India -- most political parties are based on them (even if overtly they are based on ideologies etc..) Or to put it more mildly, most political parties cater to such identities. If you apply for any government job or admission into any government-owned educational institution, you have to specify which tribe you belong to.. and based on that, you get special treatments, or you fail to get special treatment. And it's seriously not got anything to do with any colonial power. What happened was that people simply distrusted each other, and as newer and newer groups of people immigrated into each other's territories, they just wouldn't mingle genetically (marry each other.) Some did mingle - for example, the Ezhava identity is more of a shared past identity (from having been the subjects in a Kingdom) rather than a genetic one, but they too now don't marry much outside the group. And over time, from a cultural identity, it's morphed into a genetic one. No one is trying to legitimize these things - but the fact is, they are there whether we like it or not. People think in those tribal ways, they look at which candidate in the election belongs to their tribe and sometimes vote for him.. They want to know which of the big film stars belong to their community, and sometimes quietly feel proud about it. In other words, it's as important as race is in the US.. In fact, India has rules that give special benefits to offsprings of mixed marriages, but still these communal groupings have survived. They do get dissolved in the big cities, but even now, on a guesstimate, I'd say 90-93% of the total marriages happening in India would be endogamic with respect to these tribal identities. Now, the question is, does Wikipedia have a policy against such identities and does it actively try to dissuade people from searching or identifying with them? I don't think so. I think Wikipedia just needs to reflect the ground realities, instead of patching over stuff. I mean, I know that the government of India frequently rubs out portions of Indian history that it deems inimical to "communal harmony" and school kids are taught a very sanitized version of history. Many kids grow up and read real history books and go 'oh, shuck, no one told me that was what happened.' The question is, does Wikipedia have a stand on this? Is Wikipedia a missionary? Does Wikipedia Judge? If it does, what is the pedestal from which it judges? Does it judge from the pedestal of Western, Christian values? Is that the right attitude for a collaborative website to take? What will happen if Indian editors of the Wikipedia delete all mention of homosexuality, and say "Oh, it's not something that should be encouraged.. it's the decadence of a civilization in decline?" How would you feel if your culture was judged according to our cultural norms? Sreejiraj (talk) 22:27, 31 December 2012 (UTC)

@ Sitush : Since you have not addressed the point and conveniently skipped it I present the case again. I expect there are people capable of logical reasoning amongst Wikipedia moderators who address the issue . My case presented here :" First of all it needs to be clarified that caste is some thing that is not the choice of a person. A person's caste is the caste in which he is born into . Ie, is caste is something like a ethnic community . So, unlike religion where one can make choice whether he belongs to or not at any point of time in his life , one can not change his caste. This basic understanding is required to discuss this topic. So, when you realize that caste of a person is not his own making , but only relate to his lineage and ethnicity it is no more personal choice .That being case, the requirement for one to declare his caste is uncalled for and do not make sense. The argument however though is valid for one's religion as it is matter of persons choice. To make it clear , caste is not a belief system or some thing that can be accepted and rejected during one's life. Requiring that a person self declare his caste is like requiring a red haired person to declare him self red haired before he is described as red haired in Wikipedia by someone else. So, in short, there is no logical requirement for one to declare his caste for him to be listed hereSanjeer (talk) 02:50, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

And yet again, you fail to cite sources for your arguments - and as for "caste is not a belief system", that is utterly nonsensical. Of course it is - it is almost an archetype for a social construct. Anyway, unless you are going to provide the evidence from reliable sources to back up your repetitive arguments, I think that we can assume that they don't actually exist, and consider the case closed. Or if you prefer, you could start a WP:RfC - though note that general policy (i.e. WP:BLP, and the need to respect privacy) cannot be overturned by an RfC on a particular subject, so any decision made would have to comply with existing policies. AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:26, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

AndyTheGrump do you know the difference between a jati and a varna? You are confusing the two and it seems plain that you don't know the difference between them. I suggest your read the Wikipedia articles on Jati and Varna. Jati is a person's ethnic origin or tribe. It is certainly not a "belief system", unless you say that African_American is also a belief system. Members of the same Jati, such as Rajput and Chitpavan tend to share similar genes that give them a distinct genetic profile. This is not a belief system. Hope you will at least learn the basics of Indian social organization before commenting on these things. Sreejiraj (talk) 08:08, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

Sreejiraj, I happen to have a first-class honours degree in anthropology from a leading UK university. I don't need clueless repetitive bullshit from you to know that in spite of your assertions to the contrary, both "ethnic origin" and "tribe" are social constructs - and yes, 'African American' is a social construct too - I've never suggested otherwise. And as for your waffle about 'genes' you cite no sources whatsoever - unsurprisingly, since they don't exist. Take your nonsense elsewhere. AndyTheGrump (talk) 09:02, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

AndyTheGrump I don't want to get into name calling, because I don't have a degree in Anthropology from "a leading University in the UK." But your degree doesn't seemed to have helped you figure out that Jati and Varna are two different things. Secondly, your argument is a bit of a straw man because I did not say they were not "social constructs" (whatever that means), I said "It is certainly not a "belief system"". Now, would you say that ethnic origin is a "belief system" that people change when their opinion changes?Sreejiraj (talk) 12:27, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

If you don't know what 'social construct' means, how can you possibly say my argument is a straw man? And yes, people change their ethnic self-identification (not 'ethnic origin' - a dubious weasel-worded phrase best avoided) all the time, as those conducting censuses on the question often discover. I suggest that rather than engaging in discussion, you do a little research. AndyTheGrump (talk) 00:34, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

I also support the argument that self-identification is *not* needed for caste. Caste is by birth and cannot be changed and in India there is reservation based on caste for jobs and Government websites publish the names

of candidates who qualify for different castes. See for reference. If there is a reliable source then that would be more than enough. Bobgali (talk) 09:51, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

Sreejiraj, you say that people cannot change their caste. Please then explain why there were 1646 identified communities in 1901, 4147 in 1931 and 4635 in the 1990s, although the latter figure was self-admitted to be on the conservative side. It is impossible to correlate these identifications because communities in India come and go as a consequence of both fusion and fission, often at a very localised level, and the methodology of classification is variable - Bhagat, R. B. "Caste Census: Looking Back, Looking Forward". Economic and Political Weekly. 42 (21): 1902–1905. Please also explain why 2011 census enumerators were under instructions to accept what they were told (pages 24-26) rather like the Jedi census phenomenon. Please explain hypergamy among the Namubidiris & Nairs, exogamy in Indian cities and rejection of caste by people already named above. - Sitush (talk) 10:05, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

What you are citing is the number of castes is legally recognized by the government, that keeps increasing. It's like saying there were only 10000 identified species of plans in 1800 and now there are 1,000,000 - therefore there has been an exponential growth in biodiversity :-) Or that because there are now 100,000 known galaxies, compared to 100 galaxies 50 years ago, the universe has grown 1000 times in 50 years. The fact that the government takes time to enumerate and identify castes for legal use does not mean that people who are born into a Jati can change their Jati later. I don't really know why something as basic as this has to be explained to you. It's plain common sense. Sreejiraj (talk) 12:25, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

Sitush, it isn't necessary to ask for explanations here - it is for those who wish to argue against WP:BLP policy to provide the necessary arguments in the appropriate place for such policy to be revised. It has already been shown that 'caste' is as subject to BLP policy as any other subjective and controversial categorisation, and none of the arguments here are remotely sufficient to suggest that WP:BLP policy doesn't apply. Unless and until WP:BLP policy is revised, any assertion that a living individual is a member of a particular 'caste' may be deleted on sight, unless at minimum based on verifiable self-identification, as a violation of multiple Wikipedia policies - not least as a violation of privacy. None of the 'pro-caste' bullshitters here have the guts to raise this issue in a broader context. Ignore them. Revert there violations of existing policy. Let them then argue that policy is on their side. It isn't... AndyTheGrump (talk) 10:25, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

AndyTheGrump, calling names doesn't help. WP:BLP need not be modified for mentioning the caste of a person in an article, because it doesn't mandate that ethnicity be self-identified. Bobgali (talk) 10:38, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

Besides, no one is calling for changes to WP:BLP policy at all. All I, and Qwyrxian and others have requested is that the policy be implemented. The policy does not require self-declaration for ethnic identity, and no self-declaration is insisted on for identifying a person's ethnicity when that person is a non-Indian. The only request is that this 'privilege' be extended to Indians as well, and people like Sitush stop vandalizing Wikipedia articles in the name of a mistaken reading of official policy. Sreejiraj (talk) 13:00, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

And Sitush, cross ethnic marriages happen in other cases also, like say b/w Tamil and Kannada. If we don't have a problem categorizing in such cases, hypergamy etc won't cause any problem for caste also. Or may be when there is confusion like in such cases, we can demand self-identification. Indian cricketer Sreesanth has identified himself as a Brahmin (his father is a Nair and mother is a Brahmin). But self identification is not needed by default, when father and mother both belong to the same caste. And it's a no-brainer that caste is by birth. You can't claim to belong to a caste other than that of your father or mother. Of course, you can disclaim also, and can be treated similar to the the case of the facebook founder. Bobgali (talk) 10:46, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

If someone disclaims then it is easily dealt with but more often than not probably irrelevant. If someone doesn't claim, then we should not mention it at all because of the numerous reasons given above. So far, I've not seen a valid argument to the contrary, let alone one supported by some sort of source or policy. - Sitush (talk) 11:02, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

Sitush, what about the Wikipedia policy on citing ethnic origins? Isn't that valid enough policy for you? Or are you saying Jati is not ethnic origin?Sreejiraj (talk) 12:25, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia doesn't categorise anyone by 'ethnic origin' - 'ethnicity' is the phrase used, for very good reasons. AndyTheGrump (talk) 00:54, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

The only one solution to this problem is to explicitly include 'Jati' (caste) under the title of "ethnic identity" in Wikipedia policy on Ethnicity,_gender,_religion_and_sexuality

Please sign your posts - and no that isn't the 'only solution' - there are several others, including making it policy that caste can only be assigned to living individuals in cases of self-identification. If there is a proposal to change policy, I shall argue for precisely that, on the basis that caste/jati categorisations are potentially an invasion of privacy, of little encyclopaedic merit, often derived from questionable sources, often rejected on principal by the individuals so categorised, as much a political/economic/religious category as an 'ethnic' one, and thus in violation of multiple WP:BLP core policies. AndyTheGrump (talk) 00:44, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

I saw a note at WP:ANI about this discussion. I think that adding a caste-related hard "fact" in the form of a category or infobox statement should not be allowed for BLPs unless the person self-identifies with the caste, including both jati and varna definitions of caste. In the article body it is a different story, with possibilities of explanation and context supplied from reliable sources, all described in the article's prose. In the article body, the normal rules requiring high quality sources for BLPs will suffice to determine whether caste can be discussed. Binksternet (talk) 00:52, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

I'm doing my best to get on top of the categorisation issue and, yes, as noted earlier in this thread, it seems to fail WP:BLPCAT. But it goes further with categories: there have also been numerous WP:CFD discussions about this and things are being resolved "in reverse" from that end. Indeed, there is currently one that is ongoing - see Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2012_December_19#Category:Ezhava_People. - Sitush (talk) 01:01, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

Adding statements of fact in Wikipedia's voice such as "person X has property Y" should not occur unless the claim is very reliably sourced, and of demonstrable encyclopedic value. A case for including such information in a particular article could be made if there were reliable evidence that property Y had influenced the life or work of person X. The only thing definitely known about this topic is that it has been accompanied with severe disruption, and that proves the topic is not a simple matter of looking up who has property Y in a chart somewhere. Accordingly, claims about castes are not suitable for the encyclopedia that anyone can edit (with rare exceptions). Johnuniq (talk) 02:41, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

what if some person has claimed the benifit of reservations provided by the government in Jobs and education? The reservations are based upon a person's caste (actually a group of caste) also there are reserved assembly constituencies in general and local elections so for example this person is a elected representative from this constituency which is reserved. Can we assume that this person has identified himself with a particular caste?--sarvajna (talk) 03:14, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

Interesting point but, as far as I know, there is no requirement in India that the person elected to an assembly from any given constituency has to come from that constituency (eg: have been born or be living there etc). I'm pretty sure that I've seen examples of people being given a ticket for a constituency other than that in which they were born or reside. Is this correct? - Sitush (talk) 09:38, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

You're right, there is no geographical restriction on where a person can contest from. However, certain seats are reserved for SC/ST candidates where candidates from different political parties and independents can only contest if they belong to these groups. I think this is what sarvajna is alluding to. IMO, contesting elections from reserved seats can be safely considered to be public self-identification with a group of castes/tribes. This argument can be extended to reservation in jobs and educational institutions though there could be WP:BLPPRIVACY issues and finding reliable sources for those will be harder. Correct Knowledge^«৳alk» 10:17, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

Sure. If a person is elected from a reserved seat then they have effectively self-identified as being a member of a SC/ST. Are seats reserved for only one SC/ST? That is, could there be competing candidates from more than one scheduled community in a given seat? If so, we'd still need self-identification that they consider themselves members of community A or community B, etc. - Sitush (talk) 10:24, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

AFAIK, seats are not reserved for specific castes. So candidates from different Scheduled communities can compete with each other. Yes, we would still need self-identification with a particular caste. Correct Knowledge^«৳alk» 10:36, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

I am surprised to see that a qualified person on anthropology talks about "social constructs" which actually falls in the boundary of sociology and not anthropology . Btw, the caste in India is not a social construct at all .Any Indologist who studies about the society and culture in India would agree to that easily. It is surprising to see some of the Moderators stooping to the level of name calling and using abusive and repulsive language (<quote> "bullshitters" <Unquote>) . Does Wkipedia has a policy of how to engage in civilized debates..?Sanjeer (talk) 09:53, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

Caste by no means is a dynamic social construct . If that being the case parent-hood also is a dynamic social construct . What one should understand is that caste is tightly and irrevocably coupled with the parenthood. The caste of a person is (1) NOT his choice (2) NOT a title society gives him/her (3) NOT something an authority decides. Caste of a person is the caste of his parents , which further derives from the caste of their parents and the chain go on backwards. Essentially caste is indicative is directly related to the family lineage. Now if it is understood properly one can failure out that caste of a person is decided even before he is born. For example an ezhava marries another ezhava then their children in future will be of ezhava caste irrespective of what ideology they carry. It is politely requested that moderators who lack in the basic knowledge may not attempt to conclude on a matter on which they have very poor understanding irrespective of their claims.Sanjeer (talk) 10:03, 2 January 2013 (UTC)

That's ironic, I was about to ask you not to tell others what topics are studied and used in anthropology. I'd be amazed if any anthropologist wasn't very familiar with the concept. And I would politely request you to begin using reliable sources. Like "Caste is a social construct rooted in endogamy"[1]. Then there is [2] which described how the British developed the caste system through the use of the census.(This lead me to our interesting article on Denzil Ibbetson which discusses the issue. It looks as though caste is indeed a dynamic social construct if by that we mean a social construct that has changed over time. I'd argue that self-identification is necessary. An aside - there are no moderators here. Dougweller (talk) 12:21, 2 January 2013 (UTC)