Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2006 September 22

Full reviews may be found in this page history. For a summary, see Wikipedia:Deletion review/Recently concluded (2006 September)

22 September 2006

Nandini Rajendran

Discussion: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Nandini Rajendran

Votes were 2-2. But the consensus, including the comments, was to keep the article not to delete it.

I only stumbled upon the AfD now. Nobody from the Coimbatore area (including myself) seems to have seen or participated in this AfD. Hence I am listing this article here.

I am from the Coimbatore region and can vouch for the validity of this article. The person discussed here is indeed a social worker known for her work related to women's issues. And she was the Chairperson of the TamilNadu Social Welfare Board. Her work has been well covered in the local media and television (I have seen at least two of her interviews on the Doordarshan - the state-run television network.) In fact she was so well-known that when PepsiCola made its debut in Coimbatore, she and G.K.Moopanar (who was known all over India as one of the most senior Congress leaders - please see G. K. Vasan) were the dignitaries that were asked to inaugurate the release of Pepsi and 7-Up. I don't see any reason to delete this article.

Let me also quote User:Hornplease who commented on the AfD since he/she has come up with some interesting information that I did not know previously:

"It's not as if we totally lack the ability to verify anything. We can at least verify that the body she is supposed to have headed, the Tamil Nadu Social Welfare Board, definitely exists, and in 2003 had a budget of Rs. 5,58,17,90,000, or US$119,946,653.07[1], which is a non-trivial amount in India. They also are well-known as the progenitors of the wildly successful Mid-day meal scheme that's been discussed ad nauseum in NGO circles. Some notability there, perhaps."

Also, I urge members to be considerate of the differences when in comes to judging pages related to India. For instance, many big Indian institutions (such as the Social Welfare Board under question), in spite of their actual social footprints, may not even have a homepage. That should not be misconstrued as "insignificant" or "unverifiable." Likewise many big Indian personalities cannot be googled. Try, for instance, googling any past Union minister - you typical won't get any hits. If verifiability only means "google-able" then more than half the pages on India would be questionable.

Thanks for all your time. And hope this page is restored.

My vote is to

• Overturn the original decision and to undelete the page. — Preceding unsigned comment added by TriColor (talk • contribs) 19:41, September 22, 2006 (UTC)

• Endorse Per the admin the page had WP:V problems. WP:V is one of the main pillars here at Wikipedia. If you want to write a page that passes WP:V have at it. Whispering^(talk/c) 00:16, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

*Endorse closure, keep deleted. As the closing admin said, WP:V is nonnegotiable. And given that this is the English-language Wikipedia, it is preferable that those sources be in English. In any case, regardless of the language, WP:V is clear: "The obligation to provide a reputable source lies with the editors wishing to include the material, not on those seeking to remove it." Also, looking at one of the remaining copies of the article [1], I must say that it was a WP:NPOV-violating mess ("renowned and popular"? "fondly referred to"? Says who?) that arguably wouldn't have survived AfD even if every single sentence had a separate reference. Finally, I will note that being named an honorary chairperson of the Tamil Nadu Social Welfare Board is just that, an honor. It does not mean she heads that board, or controls one single rupee of its budget. --Aaron 01:32, 23 September 2006 (UTC) Changing vote based on new information; see below. --Aaron 03:25, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn and Undelete Seems like a fairly innocuous article was deleted without reaching consensus to delete. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pallasathena (talk • contribs) 22:51, September 22, 2006 (UTC)

• overturn and undelete The afd shows 2 votes for keep, 2 votes for delete, all the 3 comments leaning towards keep. Consensus should have been to keep rather than delete. HorseShoe 04:16, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

• Endorse deletion without prejudice against creating a properly sourced article. I will userfy this if anyone wants to work on it. AFD is not a vote, and Sam's closure is precisely correct per policy and therefore per process. Claims like "renowned and popular" are always hard to verify, and individual social workers rarely have sufficient coverage in reliable secondary sources to be verifiably neutral, so this may well prove challenging. I suspect that if the subject had been of more obvious significance, with sources therefore more likely to be available, Sam may well have closed it differently. Here the fact that none are cited may be taken as a reasonable indication that none exist. Maybe this should be covered at Tamil Nadu Social Welfare Board, which is probably sufficiently verifiable. Guy 08:46, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

• I note that sources for her being the head of the Tamil Nadu Social Welfare Board have now been presented. Whoopee-doo. I still think that (a) the article as deleted was not properly sourced, and I will userfy it if anyone wants to work on it to fix that; (b) that the article contained egregious editorialising and (c) her notability seems to be entirely bound to the Tamil Nadu Social Welfare Board, which I note is still redlinked. So, as I say, I am happy to userfy if someone wants to take the few worthwhile bits of the old article, but I suggest that any new article is on the organisation, not the person, in the first instance. Guy 07:45, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

• Endorse closure and uphold deletion I'm with JzG- if something is unverifiable, it doesn't matter if there are 100 "votes" to keep it. I would have no problem with recreation, but if and only if proper sourcing exists. -- Kicking222 16:01, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

• Endorse closure WP:V is non-negotiable. Borisblue 16:33, 23 September 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn and Undelete. WP:V is non-negotiable, but too many people believe that the internet is the only source of citations. In this case in particular, I think the claims to notability are high enough that the article should be given time to stand while people attempt to locate offline verification. The closure was only doubtfully correct, in my opinion: the question of online verifiability was raised and, in my opinion, insufficiently answered. "More obvious significance" is a little hard to understand - please google "Mid-day meal scheme", ideally in g-scholar. None are cited is not a "reasonable indication" that none exist in all cases. That statement is precisely what WP:Bias discusses. Further, 'honorary chairpersons' have different levels of responsibility in India, depending on the board in question. What is strictly means is that they are not paid for their effort; it is sometimes useful to not be seen to be holding an 'office of profit'. (Google that if you dont believe me.) Hornplease 00:59, 24 September 2006 (UTC)
• Overturn and Undelete per Horseshoe. It should have been closed as NO Consensus. See here for example http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Currier_House The article was closed as No Consensus. Another example of No Consensus was http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Cabot_House I agree that Verifiability is an (the most) important issue. See here for making sure that she was the former chairperson of the Tamil Nadu Social Welfare Board [2] [3] [4]

(3rd Link is subscription site) The problem was very simple. THe search on her name had been conducted with "Nandini" Rajendran, where as she has been covered by the media as Nandhini Rajendran. This is the problem in Indian Language names. Please note that Google (or Web) does not in any way ascertain notability. This should be undeleted for the simple reason (the reason it was deleted) that the article has been now verified  Doctor Bruno Talk 02:35, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

• Comment: Since all the sources list her name in english as "Nandhini" then it the article should be moved to Nandhini Rajendran. Borisblue 02:52, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

• Relist. The DRV instructions above are quite clear: The presentation of new information about the content should be prefaced by Relist, rather than Overturn and (action). This information can then be more fully evaluated in its proper deletion discussion forum. As Hornplease and Doctorbruno have presented us with new information, the only logical thing to do at this point is to temporarily restore the article (under her properly spelled name) and rerun the AfD. If, during the AfD, the article is properly cleaned up (e.g. the WP:NPOV issues would still remain), then it will survive the AfD and that will be the end of it. --Aaron 03:25, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

• Comment: To Doctorbruno: While I realize that English is not your native language, I must say that I found your note on my user talk page to be somewhat offensive. First, it is clear from my first vote above that WP:V was not my only contention about this article. Second, you do not have the right to "expect" any particular vote from any Wikipedia editor on any matter whatsoever. I will consider the evidence and I will vote as my conscience guides me to vote. --Aaron 03:25, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

My remarks above were interpreting the original information that I provided at AfD, not new information. Please do not misrepresent my comments. I merely suggested that when citations are thin on the ground (a) people should understand why they might be and (b) make a little effort to check up on other things, such as the definition of honorary., (Which, essentially, means without payment), and the importance of the schemes undertaken by the Board in question.

Finally, while I didnt make the point here, anyone who reads AfDs on a regular basis must know that Arabic, Persian, and Sanskrit names are rendered into the roman script with little or no consistency. About Aaron's vote above, he pointed to Wp:V, NPOV - which, as has been established a million times, should not affect a subject's notability - and the definition of 'honorary', addressed above.

And, since we're doing dictionaries, someone look up 'expects', please - it can be to "look forward to the probable occurrence of", "to consider reasonable", or "to require". Isnt it a violation of WP:AGF to choose the worst of those options? Hornplease 04:52, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

• Comment:I'll be more than happy to change my vote back to Endorse closure, keep deleted if my explanation does not meet with your approval, Hornplase. --Aaron 17:01, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

You miss my point. I was objecting to your misrepresentation of my remarks. I did not claim that others may not have brought new information to the table. And it's Hornplease. Spelling can sometimes be important. (grin) Hornplease 06:09, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

The AFD was closed properly; people voting Afd have no obligation to hunt for obscure sources. The burden of sourcing lies with those who created the article- and no sources were provided at the close of the Afd. Now we have sources, and so the main objection of the original AFd has been met. As for the script asserion, it is not unreasonable for an AFD voter to expect that at least one source, if sources exist spells the name in English the way is it spelled in the article. As it is, the article was simply mispelled- so I see no negligence in the part of the original opposers of the AFD. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Borisblue (talk • contribs) 09:43, September 24, 2006 (UTC)

About your second point: perhaps. However, what you call 'simple mis-spelling' is endemic to the romanisation of names from certain languages, so I urge AfD voters to keep this in mind be a little cautious when nominating articles that claim notability but with no sources. About your first point, you say "people voting AfD have no obligation to hunt for obscure sources". You are correct. However, to believe that obscure sources do not exist when the strong supposition is made by established editors that they do is vaguely insulting.

Hornplease 06:09, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

Why exactly should encyclopedia articles be based on hearsay? The AFD was up for 8 days and not a single person could come up with the source. "Strong supposition" isn't enough, everything in WP needs to be sourced. Just take note of this when creating new articles. No insult was meant by the voters or the closing admin. Borisblue 14:41, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

• Endorse per Whispering above. Tom Harrison ^Talk 21:55, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

• Overturn and Undelete Per Doctorbruno and Hornplease

Vadamalayon 02:16, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Finger Lakes Christian School

See Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2006 September 22/Finger Lakes Christian School