Talk:2008 attacks on Christians in southern Karnataka

Name change

I would suggest that the name of the article be changed. The attacks were not only confined to Mangalore. It occurred in other parts of the Dakshina Kannada district, Udupi district and Chikkamagaluru district. Perhaps, September 2008 attacks on Christians in Southern Karnataka. Joyson Noel ^{Holla at me!} 14:07, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Suggestion

A map showing the districts affected by the attacks would be great! Joyson Noel ^{Holla at me!} 14:09, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Good idea, I will look at making one.♦ Dr. Blofeld 14:49, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Can you list for me all of the districts affected by it then?♦ Dr. Blofeld 14:51, 23 October 2011 (UTC) The areas affected by the attacks, to my knowledge:

Dakshina Kannada district – Sub-districts are Mangalore, Bantwal, Puttur, Sullia and Belthangady.

Udupi district – Sub-districts are Udupi, Karkala and Kundapur

Chikkamagaluru district - Sub-districts are Chikmagalur, Kadur, Mudigere, Shringeri, Narasimharajapura

Hassan district (not certain) – Sub-districts are Hassan, Holenarsipur, Arkalgud, Channarayanapatana, Sakleshpur, Belur, Alur, Arasikere.

I am not sure about how many sub-districts were affected in Chikkamagaluru or if at all in Hassan. You will have to verify that. Joyson Noel ^{Holla at me!} 15:23, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Nice work! Would you please mark Mangalore and the districts in the image, and remove the heading on the image? Joyson Noel ^{Holla at me!} 10:35, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Mahendra Kumar image

I have obtained OTRS permission from Mangalorean.com to use the following image, and it has been confirmed that they have sent permission today. An OTRS ticket should be issued soon. This image is of former Bajrang Dal convenor Mahendra Kumar at his arrest on 19 September 2008. He admitted to having ordered attacks on New Life prayer halls. Please feel free to use it in the article.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mahendra_Kumar.jpg

Joyson Noel ^{Holla at me!} 09:23, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Daijiworld videos

I have uploaded the Daijiworld videos here:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Videos_of_2008_attacks_on_Christians_in_southern_Karnataka

Joyson Noel ^{Holla at me!} 19:59, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:2008 attacks on Christians in southern Karnataka/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Grapple X (talk · contribs) 20:35, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

---

This is quite a long one so Ii'm going to break it down a bit in the review, I'll make it clear when I've looked over everything.

1. Is it reasonably well written?

   A. Prose quality:

   B. MoS compliance for lead, layout, words to watch, fiction, and lists:

   Lead

   "and also because the New Life Fellowship Trust (NLFT), a non-denominational Christian Church, was alleged by Bajrang Dal to be indulging in forced conversions of Hindus to Christianity" -> I'm not sure "indulged" is the best word here, perhaps "was responsible for" or "was party to".

   Reworded.♦ Dr. Blofeld 17:43, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "Several isolated incidents against Christians were reported from 17 August 2008 onwards" -> Could probably ditch "2008" as the year is already made clear.

   Fixed.♦ Dr. Blofeld 17:43, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government under B. S. Yeddyurappa" -> is there a way to phrase this to concisely mention that this is the Mangalore government and not the wider Indian government?

   State government of Karnataka, reworded♦ Dr. Blofeld 17:43, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "3-month deadline" -> might be better as "three-month deadline"

   Reworded as numbers under 9 should be worded.♦ Dr. Blofeld 17:43, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   Background and cause

   "per cent" -> bit archaic. Just "percent" would be better. There's a couple of instances of this.

   I changed the spelling to make it consistent with British English spellings used in this article. Joyson Prabhu ^{Holla at me!} 22:13, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

   "Many Christians believe that the attacks were a direct response from right-wing Hindu organisations who were targeting the people of Mangalore and the surrounding area because they had been outspoken about persecution of Christians in Orissa." -> might be worth noting where Orissa is in relation to Karnataka. I see they're about opposite ends of the county, but is there any relation or connection here beyond both being Indian states?

   I was a student of St. Aloysius College, Mangalore at the time. During the second-half of 2008, there was a wave of anti-Christian mob attacks in Orissa. Christians were being lynched, murdered, forcibly converted or ethnically cleansed from their homes there. Some women, including a Catholic nun, were gang-raped. The Christians in southern Karnataka were outraged at what was going on, and there were protests against this prior to the attacks. This, of course, was not appreciated by right-wing Hindus. Joyson Prabhu ^{Holla at me!} 22:13, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

   I was really just meaning if there was a geographical connection or shared history, which is probably not important now that I think about it. GRAPPLE X 02:15, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   I don't know the intricate details of what went on, but I do know that Orissa was directly linked to what wnt on in Karnataka. I think the article clarifies this.♦ Dr. Blofeld 17:59, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "St. Aloysius College, a Jesuit institution in Mangalore, and some other 2000 Christian schools in Karnataka, went on strike for varying periods between 29 August and the 5 September prior to the attacks, protesting against anti-Christian persecution in Orissa, contrary to the orders of the government who stated that it was to be a regular work day." -> was the whole period meant to be regular working days? The strike period is about a week, rather than one day, so these should be kept in line. If the government mandated the whole time was to be normal working days then this should be plural.

   Fixed, plural, well spotted.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:07, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   Attacks

   Perhaps note that a dharna is a protest fast or hunger strike.

   Would that be necessary, given that it is linked once in the article? Joyson Prabhu ^{Holla at me!} 22:13, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

   noted in brackets.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:22, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "vandalising it and burning the Bibles" -> Bible isn't italicised as book titles usually would be.

   I don't think the non-English words (I assume Hindi?) like dharna or lathi need to be in italics either. I'll defer to your judgement though.

   In my opinion, these should be in italics as these are not English terms. Joyson Prabhu ^{Holla at me!} 22:13, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

   I had a look at Makuuchi, Chetniks and Berlin Wall as examples to see how loanwords were handled there, and they're italicised, so I'm happy to leave these italicised too. GRAPPLE X 02:15, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   Personally I've always thought it strange to italicize bibles and had never seen that before in writing so I've changed it.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:22, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "monstrance" could probably do with a wikilink; I'm a Catholic and I had no idea what one was...

   Done.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:31, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "15 foot high" -> {{convert}} would be a good addition here to provide an automatic conversion to metres.

   Done.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:31, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "30 to 35 persons" -> "people" might be better here. I've always hated "persons", there's something very Crimewatch-y about a group of persons.

   Done.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:31, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "CSI Church" -> there's redundancy here given that CSI is already Church of South India. Maybe "CSI chapel" might work better.

   "Later, in the early hours of the 15 September" -> lose the "the" before 15

   Fixed.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:41, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   Quite a few instances of "miscreants", maybe these could be varied a bit more?

   I looked to address this but I see a fairly equal use of "vandals" and "individuals" as miscreants and appears to be fine.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:41, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   Christian protests

   "The protests involved over 2,500 people and among those present were incumbent parish priest Fr. John Barboza, Fr. Valerian Fernandes, Ajekar parish priest Fr. Valerian Fernandes, Attur parish priest Fr. Arthur Pereira, Miyar parish priest Fr. Ronald Miranda, Fr. Paschal Menezes, Parappady parish priest Fr. Alex Aranha, Fr. Michael D'Silva, Hirgan parish priest Fr. Michael Lobo, Kanajar parish priest Fr. Alwyn D'Cunha and many other priests and nuns in the area." -> given that these are all priests, I think we could lose all the "Fr."s to make it flow a little easier, they're already identified as priests in the passage anyway.

   Fixed.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:52, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   Reports of state and police misconduct

   "Phelix D’Souza, a resident of Permannur, alleged that the police took him into custody and tortured him and opened a fake case against him, sending him to jail for 11 days." -> "fake" seems to me to imply it was a bluff or a smokescreen, perhaps "and opened a baseless case" or "and opened a case against him on false pretences" would work better.

   Changed.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:52, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   Political response

   "Yeddyurappa allocated 50 crores for Christian development projects" -> Link crore and specify the currency

   Linked but I don't know what you mean about specifying currency. Crores is a unit of currency, Indian crores? ♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:52, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   Crore is a unit of measurement, the same as ten million (so seven crores is 70,000,000). I assume the amount is in rupees, so "₹50 crores" would be best. GRAPPLE X 20:07, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   I've added this myself. It's a bit strange that the rupee sign seems not be recognised as text and needs a template, hopefully that'll be seen to one of these days. Ah well. GRAPPLE X 21:33, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   Religious response

   The block quote from Joseph Dias contains a few instances where {{sic}} should be added, as there are mistakes in the grammar which are present in the source ("since in believes in Joseph Goebbel's principle" for example).

   In was a typo, it. No idea what you mean by sic, sorry.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:52, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "Sic" is a notation used to indicate that a mistake has been made by the source being quoted, not by the article—it stops someone fixing the error and creating a misquote by pointing out that the mistake is known but deliberately retained. GRAPPLE X 20:07, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   Have amended it myself. GRAPPLE X 21:33, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "In response to the alleged forcible conversions" -> use "forced" instead of "forcible".

   Fixed all.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:52, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   Investigations

   "B. K. Somasekhara, head of the one-man commission initiated by Yeddyurappa's BJP-led state government into the attacks" -> If it's a one-man commission, then why is he head?

   Well he was given sole responsibility by the government so that would make him the head of the commission. Reworded to led. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:58, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "The report, which costed around 3 crores" -> Again, specify currency; also replace "costed" with "cost"

   Fixed. I'm not sure what you mean about the currency again though.♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:58, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "800 recorded evidences" -> "800 pieces of recorded evidence"

   Fixed♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:58, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   "He demanded that the state government launch a CBI probe into the attacks" -> I wouldn't abbreviate Central Bank of India here.

   Changed♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:58, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

2. Is it factually accurate and verifiable?

   A. References to sources:

   Grand. I'm seeing a few instances of the same citation repeated consecutively but given that this seems to be a controversial topic it's probably wise to retain citations at every turn and not collapse them.

   B. Citation of reliable sources where necessary:

   Looks good to me. Always nice to see a wide range of news outlets used for this kind of thing as it gives a broader balance.

   C. No original research:

   Seems in order to me.

3. Is it broad in its coverage?

   A. Major aspects:

   B. Focused:

   The scope seems grand to me. It's very detached from the actual violence itself, which actually seems like a good thing as it doesn't get bogged down in listing exactly what was damaged or who was hurt in every instance.

4. Is it neutral?

   Fair representation without bias:

   Because this seems to be a controversial enough issue, I'm going to have another read over it tomorrow just to be sure this one's met; however, nothing has jumped out at me to suggest it hasn't.

   I believe I've looked through the vast majority of sources which exist on this. The problem was that the police and indeed the state government were widely criticized in the Indian mainstream media during the attacks. Even the state government initially blamed the police for misconduct, although the official report stated that they conducted themselves appropriately. Where possible I have tried to provide a counterargument that the government strongly denied being implicated and indeed did do several things to improve the situation and some incidents of Christians acting inappropriately, but its difficult to provide a strong counter argument because few if any articles appear to exist which defend the police and they appear to be widely believed to have acted inappropriately in the Indian media. The official investigation into the attacks eventually sparked a protest and mass outrage amongst the Christian community. Its difficult to ignore that! We can only highlights the events and issues which became apparent in the aftermath I guess and are documented in the media. I tried at least to make the article written from a neutral perspective though which fairly covers the issues brought up by it.♦ Dr. Blofeld 17:25, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

   I've had another read through it bearing this criterion in mind and I don't see anything wrong with its neutrality. I just wanted to take the time to be certain sure, and I am. GRAPPLE X 21:33, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

5. Is it stable?

   No edit wars, etc:

   Will be double-checking this while I'm reviewing the above point. Perfectly fine, article history is entirely constructive.

6. Does it contain images to illustrate the topic?

   A. Images are copyright tagged, and non-free images have fair use rationales:

   B. Images are provided where possible and appropriate, with suitable captions:

   Illustration is quite astounding, large amount of commons images and videos, all relevant and well-used. Very nice.

7. Overall:

   Pass or Fail:

   I'm happy enough to pass this one now. Well done to both of you on such an informative article. GRAPPLE X 21:33, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

• Thanks for the review, and picking up on some minor things I missed. Thanks for addressing the rupee thing..♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:35, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
• Thanks for the constructive review, Grapple X! Joyson Prabhu ^{Holla at me!} 11:06, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

Tone/ POV Hindu "activists" and Catholic "violence"

@Suneye1: I don't quite understand the reason "WP:Lead" for the reverts you made

Is it against WP:Lead to ask for WP:Verification? Special:Diff/1053336119

You have claimed my edits are unsourced Special:Diff/1053486019, but the current revision of the leade has no sources for peaceful Bajrang Dal "activists" and Catholics being violent, except the first few lines.

My contribs Special:Diff/1053336119 brought the article closer to WP:MOS, there was repetitive content in the lead that i had removed. Your reverts have made the lead WP:Verbose. My edits brought the article closer to WP:Lead and MOS as far I can see.

Your revision has also brought the unsourced "Bajarang dal activists" and Catholic violence WP:POV back into the article. The lead gives the false impression that Christian minority are the violent ones, while making ideologues of Hindu fascism look like the victims or "activists". Do activists indulge in violence vandalism arson and threats against freedom of religion/ conversion? It is fascists who do it.

It is interesting to note that you did not revert sockpuppetry Special:Diff/1053396630 for weeks until i made attempts improve the article, probably because the article still had the Bajrang Dal "activists" and "Catholics ever resorted to violence" WP:Tone. Are my contribs so much worse than sockpuppetry?

Only after i made contributions that you found a reason to erase all my contribs on the flimsy grounds of "unsourced" when much of the lead is poorly sourced.

I reiterate, the current revision Special:Diff/1053396630 contains a WP:POV that is sympathetic to and has soft tone to the Hindu "activists" who threatened NLFT with more violence in order to stop conversions/ freedom of religion. Nolicmahr (talk) 12:11, 5 November 2021 (UTC)

@Nolicmahr:It is not against WP:LEAD to ask for verification. This is a GA article, the lead should summarize the article and lead does not necessarily need sources and the sources are in the body per WP:LEADCITE. I see no reason to tag the article asking for more sources while the article has 120 sources. You are free to add to the lead if you believe it does not adequately summarize the article but you can't use words like 'fascism', 'Sanghi' etc. if they are not in the article's body and make sure you write it without WP:OR. I never claimed "unsourced" in my revert, please check it again. WP:VERBOSE is an essay about talk pages not articles.

The article's body states that Christians pelted stones on the police during their protests and that is violence not civil disobedience. How is

The lead does not "... gives the false impression that Christian minority are the violent ones, while making ideologues of Hindu fascism look like the victims or "activists"" in my view. The entire article passed GA criteria and is neutral. If the sources called them "activists" then we are supposed to write the same not "fascists", Wikipedia published what reliable sources say.- SUN EYE 1 16:41, 5 November 2021 (UTC)

I've went ahead and restored the lead from the GA version. I agree the "Catholics ever resorted to violence" sentence is not what the article body says so I added the stone pelting incidents briefly.- SUN EYE 1 16:41, 5 November 2021 (UTC)

GA review happened in 2012 and we can see that lots of edits have happened since then. That's how the Catholic "violence" and Hindu "activism" narrative has crept in. You yourself didn't see the sockpuppetry for weeks.

It is certainly in the realm of possibility to WP:Cherrypick sources and disguise Hindu fascists/ ultranationalists as the victimised law abiding "activists" who were being "forcibly converted" by catholic "violence", in spite of being in the ruling majority BJP Karnataka at the time.

Activists do not indulge in arson, vandalism& threatening with rape and burning as Bajrang Dal has done, this is 21st century WP:Commonsense for someone who is acquainted with basic human rights.

The stone pelting was in done in self defence against police brutality and supression of civil disobedience/ protests by Catholics. Calling acts of self defence as violence, dressing up fascist violence and rape threats as "activism" is certainly WP:POV stemming Hindu fascist far right politics. Nolicmahr (talk) 03:58, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

Nothing much has happened except a few content removals. The article clearly says it was Bajrang Dal who claimed about forcible conversion. If you have sources saying for stone pelting was self-defense or anything you are claiming, you can update it but you cannot add content which is not sourced. - SUN EYE 1 05:36, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

The lead for Holocaust does not include insane claims by Nazis that the Holocaust was caused by the Jews being responsible for the German defeat in WWI, not even with attribution. This article shouldn't summarize the views of Fascists in its lead either, at least not without explicitly refuting them. Brusquedandelion (talk) 16:34, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

Okay WP:Verbose may not be a Wiki guideline but WP:MOSLEAD certainly is. The lead needs to be trimmed and it certainly does not have to WP:Whitewash fascists who issued rape and burning threats as peaceful law-abiding "activists". Nolicmahr (talk) 04:26, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

"Sanghi" is not "OR" uncited info does not automatically become "OR". If you want citations for it you can make use of the citation tag, there no need to revert everything to "GA Review", that is WP:Disruptive. Nolicmahr (talk) 04:41, 16 November 2021 (UTC)

What? see WP:VERIFYOR. Uncited info can be removed by anyone at sight and you can't write your own personal analysis and use a citation tag. I don't see any reasons for it to be trimmed. The sources say activists and it will be mirrored here, see WP:STICKTOSOURCE. If they issued threats, you are free to add them with WP:RS - SUN EYE 1 05:24, 16 November 2021 (UTC)