Talk:Manisha Ganguly

Feedback from New Page Review process

I left the following feedback for the creator/future reviewers while reviewing this article: Good start.

North8000 (talk) 11:20, 6 June 2022 (UTC)

Article issues

Hello Jwslubbock. Please see the tags in this revision for specific details about the issues with the version that you restored. Regards, MrsSnoozyTurtle 07:56, 5 August 2022 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for taking this to the talk page. I understand the concern about the awards section sounding promotional but I have tried to take out some unnecessary words that potentially sounded NPoV. But I think that the references to awards are part of the subject's notability and should remain for the time being. Sourcing seems generally ok to me, there's no self published stuff. If there are other issues you think should be improved, I'm happy to look at them. Jwslubbock (talk) 10:18, 5 August 2022 (UTC)

Hello Jwslubbock, you're welcome. Your edit did improve some of the NPOV issues, however the sourcing issues are still present. Regards, MrsSnoozyTurtle 00:36, 6 August 2022 (UTC)

Hi, please stop removing credible citations from the page and then stating that sourcing criteria has not been fulfilled -- that is vandalism. 2A00:23C5:E114:2C01:C575:DD9C:133:E934 (talk) 11:01, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

I see you deleted all the sources again @MrsSnoozyTurtle. Can you please raise here on the talk page what you believe is the issue with the sources you are deleting before you just delete them? Without a discussion, it looks like edit warring, and on top of that it looks like you are deleting the awards and achievements of a woman from an underrepresented group. The awards a journalist wins are central to their WP:N, so I really don't understand why you are repeatedly coming to this page to remove the entire reason why a person of colour passes the Notability criteria. Women and people of colour are underrepresented on Wikipedia, and if you are coming to a page like this to delete all the references, you should have a good reason why you are doing this. If you keep doing this without explaining why, I will ask an admin to protect the page. Jwslubbock (talk) 11:30, 4 September 2022 (UTC)

I hope that the last sentence of yours isn't meant to be a threat?

It is very frustrating that I try to improve the NPOV and reduce the unsourced text, only to be accused of vandalism and have the edits reverted without regard for WP:ROWN.

Regarding your request to raise the issues here, that is what I have done in the messages above. In fact it was me who started this Talk Page discussion. Regards, MrsSnoozyTurtle 11:51, 8 September 2022 (UTC)

What unsourced text are you referring to? You deleted, repeatedly, the entire section on Ganguly's awards, which are a core part of her WP:N. You provided no explanation for why you did this, and you seem to be claiming that the sources used are unreliable, without saying why you believe any of the references are unreliable. This is not how we edit Wikipedia, and you need to be more aware of the challenges Wikipedia faces with regard to the diminishing of achievements of women and people of colour. If you're going to delete all the achievements of a female person of colour, you need to explain why, otherwise it looks bad. So, if you are contesting here that all the sources used in the section on Ganguly's awards are unreliable, I would like you to explicitly identify which sources you believe are unreliable and why. If you can make a good case for this, then we can delete the sources and the facts they cite, but if you can't, we need to leave them there. So, over to you, which of the sources on this page are you contesting? Jwslubbock (talk) 15:16, 13 September 2022 (UTC)

Please refer to the tags, they are in the revision I posted a link to above when I started this discussion. Regards, MrsSnoozyTurtle 07:09, 16 September 2022 (UTC)

Protected edit request on 9 September 2022

Please delete "last=#". It causes a CS1 error and the article appears on the list at CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list. (One of the vertical lines on either side of this parameter also has to be deleted. Thanks Ira Leviton (talk) 16:53, 9 September 2022 (UTC)

 Done DatGuy^Talk_Contribs 20:11, 9 September 2022 (UTC)

Ongoing X dispute

There is an ongoing dispute on X regarding this individual’s credibility, particularly concerning some of their claims about the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Some of their reporting has faced significant criticism, notably from Al Jazeera and other reputable sources. I encourage other users to assist in investigating these claims, to help identify and verify sources that challenge their statements. Happyaroundyoubabes (talk) 08:54, 7 October 2024 (UTC) sock strike

 Comment: I have reason to suspect that the primary author, Fml657, of this article is Manisha Ganguly herself. All contributions should be thoroughly checked and any unusual activity from such accounts must be monitored concerning academic boosting and conflicts of interest. Happyaroundyoubabes (talk) 09:28, 7 October 2024 (UTC) sock strike

The image added by user Fml657 at 11:21, 15 April 2022 says "Added image taken by me", yet on this website ( https://camri.ac.uk/blog/2021/04/13/manisha-ganguly-named-on-the-forbes-30-under-30-list-for-media-and-marketing-in-europe/) that same image says "Image provided by Manisha Ganguly". This shows that user Fml657 who has done the bulk of the contributions to the article is the subject of the article, indicating conflict of interest editing. sock strike

Likewise, the other major contributor to the page, Jwslubbock, is credited as the photographer (see filename/URL) on (https://blog.westminster.ac.uk/graduateschoolfestival/wp-content/uploads/sites/34/2022/03/Manisha-Ganguly-photo-credit-John-Lubbock-150x150.jpg), suggesting that a close connection is editing the page, again showing conflict of interest editing. Schwebebahn (talk) 11:48, 8 October 2024 (UTC) sock strike

• — Happyaroundyoubabes (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
• — Schwebebahn (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.
• The claim that Fml657 is the subject of the article is, based on the above, entirely without foundation, and illogical. The quote is "Image provided by Manisha Ganguly", not "Image taken by Manisha Ganguly". Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 12:39, 8 October 2024 (UTC)

@Happyaroundyoubabes, if you believe that an editor has a COI with this article you should take the discussion to WP:COIN. Making wild accusations is not helpful. TarnishedPath^talk 12:45, 8 October 2024 (UTC)

@Pigsonthewing and TarnishedPath: the raised concerns about Fml657's edits are not entirely without merit:

• In this edit, Fml657 states that the picture was taken by them.
• The image, as well as others of Manisha Ganguly, was upload to Commons by Fml22 (notice the similarity of the usernames). M.Bitton (talk) 13:17, 8 October 2024 (UTC)

None of which contradicts what I wrote. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 13:37, 8 October 2024 (UTC)

That's true, and perhaps, I should have phrased it better as I was only referring to the COI issue of Fml657 (a major contributor to the article). M.Bitton (talk) 13:41, 8 October 2024 (UTC)

Hi @M.Bitton, perhaps this would be best discussed at WP:COIN if there are concerns. TarnishedPath^talk 23:59, 8 October 2024 (UTC)

@TarnishedPath: you're right, but I will leave that to whomever thinks it's worth pursuing. M.Bitton (talk) 01:15, 9 October 2024 (UTC)

Questions about the article's claims

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

It seems there have been attempts by various accounts to modify significant portions of the article without consensus, potentially resulting in a flame war. Before proceeding with any edits, I would like to clarify a few points and invite other editors to contribute to this discussion. Let's begin:

1. "Ganguly was recruited into journalism when she was in high school by the national newspaper The Times of India after winning a writing competition."
   • The original source suggests she was simply invited to contribute to a publication, rather than being recruited following a competition win. The secondary source, Marie Claire Greece, appears to be based on an interview, but there is no independent verification that she won a competition. This discrepancy needs to be addressed to avoid unsubstantiated claims.
2. "After the 2012 Delhi gang rape and murder, Ganguly began reporting on violence against women and was subject to rape and death threats online."
   • This too is based on an interview and cannot be independently verified, making it original research. A more reliable source is necessary to corroborate these claims.
3. "The website was central to documenting the campus rape which sparked the 2014 Jadavpur University protests."
   • Again, this is from the same interview and cannot be independently confirmed. Without further evidence, it remains another instance of original research.
4. "Its investigation into subsequent riot police assault against students sparked mass protests and shut down the city."
   • This is yet another claim from the same interview without independent verification. A reliable source is needed to substantiate such a significant claim.
5. "And resulted in more than 100,000 readers in one month for the website. The webzine also came under attack from the state for reporting on human rights abuses in the Kashmir conflict."
   • These statements are based on the same interview and lack independent sources. They, too, fall under original research and should be approached cautiously until verifiable sources are found.
6. "For the BBC, her investigative documentaries exposed double-tap attacks by Russian planes in Syria and war crimes by Turkish-backed forces in the Syrian civil war, foreign meddling, violations of the UN arms embargo, desecration of the bodies of prisoners of war and civilians in Libya, use of cluster munitions in Ukraine, human trafficking in the Middle East, uncovered the training of the killers of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, discovered China's most famous MeToo activist who had been missing. In 2022, Ganguly's investigation documented the torture of Russian anti-war prisoners in a Moscow police station and the identities of the officers, which resulted in the officers being sanctioned by the EU."
   • These claims appear exaggerated. Ganguly’s name does not surface in connection with most of these investigations. She is mentioned in "Death of a Peacemaker" as a producer, but there is no evidence linking her directly to all of the investigative efforts mentioned. These are unsubstantiated claims and should be addressed accordingly.
7. "Ganguly exposed the US and Germany training of Saudi border forces accused of mass killing migrants on the Yemen border."
   • This was clearly a team effort, and the use of the term "exposed" needs to be reconsidered to reflect the collaborative nature of the work and avoid bias.
8. The academic section currently lacks any verifiable academic output or work, other than her PhD. Statements regarding her comments on Elon Musk, disinformation on X, or PTSD research are unsupported by any formal publications or research. Only a SoundCloud podcast is mentioned, which has since been removed.
9. Many of the awards require further examination to determine which were part of team efforts and which might not be notable enough to include in the article.

I will be adding both the Conflict of Interest and Original Research labels to ensure these issues are addressed. Please refrain from removing these tags until there is consensus. 2.97.125.4 (talk) 17:14, 22 October 2024 (UTC) sock strike

Re 1: The Times of India article we cite makes it clear she was one of ten winners of a competition: About 200 students went through a two-stage qualifying process etc, to make up a "Junior Editorial Board", which concurs with her talking about winning a competition to intern. She says the same thing in a University of Westminster public interview: https://www.westminster.ac.uk/news/manisha-ganguly-named-journalist-of-the-year-2022 I don't see a problem here BobFromBrockley (talk) 19:29, 22 October 2024 (UTC)

Re 3: This is also discussed in this academic piece: https://muse.jhu.edu/pub/258/oa_edited_volume/chapter/2739297 BobFromBrockley (talk) 20:10, 22 October 2024 (UTC)

Thank you for your response, BobFromBrockley. First, the article mentions a qualifying process rather than a competition, which shifts the narrative. She claims to have won a competition both in her interview with Marie Claire Greece and in her interview with the University of Westminster. However, beyond the original piece, many of these claims appear to be heavily exaggerated.

The academic piece also reiterates her own claims: "Manisha Ganguly looks back at their collective work and accomplishments: sStarting from a “small room in Calcutta” dedicated to “truth-telling of hyperlocal issues […] ignored by mainstream media”, the feminist collective employed “citizen journalism” and relied on “crowdfunding” and “the goodwill of readers” (Ganguly). In their first year they “grew to a team of 30” reporting on “feminist counter culture” and “mass civil disobedience” (Ganguli). The collaborative journalism team reported on “human rights abuses in Kashmir, from the white papers to mass graves; followed the conflict in Bastar; interviewed people like Nobel Peace Prize nominee Parveena Ahangar and A Softer World; and broke the story on illegal land grabs in Kanha National Park” (Ganguli). They commented on “antifascism in the era of Trump and Modi” and the “acid attacks on Soni Sori” (Ganguli). As they continued their brave attacks through speaking out and reporting, they had to learn to survive this kind of investigative journalism as it was met by increasing violence. And they also suffered from the emotional duress their work caused them. They were “tortured by the trauma of reporting on gender violence as a mostly female team entirely composed of sexual violence survivors” (autistici). One of their early stories was on “hokkolorob, where the West Bengal police denied sending riot police to detain 80 students, hospitalised 37, and sexually assaulted women at a peaceful protest against sexual assault; a story which gave us 100,000 readers in a month” (Ganguli). This solidarity and support of readers led its being possible to organize “India’s first of its kind national feminist convention Hysteria, at the Goethe-Institute in Kolkata” in 2015 (Ganguli)."

None of this can be independently verified by other sources, so the original research and self-references may not be reliable. Unless, of course, I have missed something? 2.96.196.75 (talk) 20:49, 22 October 2024 (UTC) sock strike

I think maybe you misunderstand what “original research” means. The only thing that your complaints might be imply is that we could attribute stuff to Ganguly. I don’t think any sources contest any of this so don’t see a reason to assume it’s wrong. BobFromBrockley (talk) 02:13, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

Let me clarify my point. There is strong evidence to suggest that many of the claims and analyses of achievements presented are either exaggerated or misrepresented, including those related to accomplishments, investigations, and other discussed works. Take, for example, the Marie Claire interview. It contains assertions that cannot be verified outside of interviews given by the subject in question. How does an encyclopaedia verify those? Much of the information is new and doesn’t exist elsewhere, including claims of impact or specific outcomes, which are not substantiated and appear to be original research, wouldn't you agree? On the same week the the interview was published in Marie Claire, a single-purpose account (that's an SPA, right) added even more claims to the article. There’s some evidence that the person editing the article could be the subject themselves, as suggested by the sockpuppet allegations and the suspicions raised by the admin. Considering these factors, how would you assess the current state of the article? 2.96.196.75 (talk) 08:54, 23 October 2024 (UTC) sock strike

I've removed the connected contributer notice. It's not for random IPs to adding such tags. Please take any evidence you have to WP:COIN and obtain consensus for the tag. TarnishedPath^talk 01:11, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

Agree with that. Nothing here says COI anyway. These are questions of whether BLP interviews can be taken at face value, a totally different issue. BobFromBrockley (talk) 02:11, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

I believe this investigation should be considered, but it's also worth noting that the user are the sole person adding new information to the piece, and each time adjustments are made, they return to either remove labels or accuse others of distortion. So I ask, how can there be no conflict of interest in this situation? I think that the template must return, but I'll wait to hear back from you, before making any final decisions on this. 2.96.196.75 (talk) 09:00, 23 October 2024 (UTC) sock strike

I would suggest waiting for the COIN discussion to develop some kind of consensus. At present it's not there. I've made the mistake of adding COI tags to an article before and it turned out that my interpterion was outside community consensus. That's the reason I insistented on going to COIN first. I'd be of a different mind if the editor added a COI notice to their user page or if they straight up said "yes I'm Manisha Ganguly". The discussion above didn't demonstrate to me that the editor definitely was Manisha Ganguly. TarnishedPath^talk 09:37, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

After some research, I found this photo, which was edited on her page by another (!) user. Interestingly, it was uploaded on Commons by an SPA account named Fml22. The same user uploaded another photo of Ganguly here, which is labelled as their own work as well. Right below the photo, it states that it is Ganguly's own work! It's worth noting that Fml22 and Fml657 seem rather similar, don't they? Additionally, there are eight distinct accounts in total, all SPAs, that have been created to exclusively edit this page and upload photos of her without giving proper attribution or claiming their contributions as original work: Lorde23, Sjjmaddocks, Amaa1987, Janedoe31, Gamma325, Wmph23 and Fml657. In some cases, these accounts have been indefinitely banned for using similar rhetoric. They have also reverted the same person - identical edits here and here, particularly for "making attacks on women of colour". Same things applies to Lorde23 - claiming the exact same things about women of colour, every time a revert took place. These are the only accounts to have contributed/added information to the Manisha Ganguly article and all of them are SPAs. Don't you think that this suggests a clear pattern that the article is being edited exclusively by individuals either directly linked to the subject or with some affiliation to them? It’s unclear what further evidence would be required to demonstrate this connection, especially as those involved are unlikely to ever admit their involvement in these accounts. 2.96.196.75 (talk) 09:58, 23 October 2024 (UTC) sock strike

These are questions for a COI/sock investigation, but don’t justify the edits you’ve made to the page, including removing sources and then saying there’s no source. BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:05, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

Question: when a source does not state the name of the BLP, can it actually stay in the article? 2.96.196.75 (talk) 10:08, 23 October 2024 (UTC) sock strike

Yes it can stay, but it might not be doing the work it needs to do, e.g. if it is WP:SYNTH. It's better to add verify or better source tags. It was correct to raise these issues on this page, but not to remove sources from the article. As you are an IP editor acting as a WP:SPA coming to this BLP after an off-wiki harassment campaign against its subject, you need to act carefully for your allegations to have credibility. BobFromBrockley (talk) 10:34, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

I have made some edits to address some of the issues here. The awards do all need to be checked and clarified. Might also be good to clarify role in the named investigations. Once that’s done I think all these issues are dealt with. BobFromBrockley (talk) 02:57, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

I think all of these issues are now addressed, see my edits today. BobFromBrockley (talk) 11:25, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

WP:ARBECR

@2.96.196.75, you have been making edits to the article on sections covering the Palestinian/Israeli conflicts and the Russo Ukrainian war. As you are not logged in with an account and have the extended-confirmed permission you are prohibited from making these edits. Please cease. I suggest you not edit this article altogether given that large portions of the article deal with those contentions topics. TarnishedPath^talk 10:16, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

Sounds good. Can you inspect the sources? You will be the judge. BBC does not mention her name in the credits or the pieces that have been provided. You can easily verify that. 2.96.196.75 (talk) 10:21, 23 October 2024 (UTC) sock strike

I never came to this article to discuss the content. I only ever came to this article to try and put a stop to disruption because of it coming up at WP:ANI. If it didn't appear that you were engaging in block evasion I'd suggest you make edit requests in the format suggested at WP:ER but I suspect you will soon be blocked. TarnishedPath^talk 10:30, 23 October 2024 (UTC)