Talk:Presidencies and provinces of British India/Archive 5

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Section headers

Section headers should not include links (see the MOS). Also would it not be a good idea to have section headers that reflect the introduction: "Provinces of India, earlier Presidencies of British India, still earlier, Presidency towns". --PBS (talk) 23:44, 8 March 2009 (UTC)

Will fix. I'm assuming that you're not suggesting that (like the intro) we go back in time with the section order, but only that we change the section titles to "Presidency towns," "Presidencies of British India," and "Provinces of India." Am I correct? Fowler&fowler«Talk» 00:25, 9 March 2009 (UTC)
Yes. --PBS (talk) 12:57, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Relationship with "Agencies"

The British agencies existed during the same period. It would be helpful to tie both together and explain the relationship.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Vontrotta (talk • contribs) 20:20, 25 May 2009

Merge?

With British Raj ? -Chumchum7 (talk) 15:15, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

Use of templates for major and minor provinces

User:Fowler&fowler undid my addition of templates to this article again. The reasons cited for the undoing are provided in the edit summary are mostly aesthetic. I do not see the same aesthetic problem Fowler sees and I am asking editors/readers to comment on which version they prefer:

Table version [1]
Template version [2]

Other issues like making the table collapsible can be fixed at template:Major provinces of the British in India in 1907. Zuggernaut (talk) 06:07, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

THis is article content and it should be in the body of the article, not as some template. —SpacemanSpiff 06:36, 10 February 2011 (UTC)
Not enough participation in this discussion. I will setup an RFC to attract more neutral editors. Zuggernaut (talk) 03:48, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was the consensus of the RfC was not to use the two tables -- PBS (talk) 11:25, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

I converted two tables of the provinces of British India in 1907 to templates. The templates can replace tables in at least two known articles. Neutral editors are invited to provide support or oppose the use of these templates with a brief reason explaining their position.
* Table version of the article
* Template version of the article Zuggernaut (talk) 03:48, 16 February 2011 (UTC)

  • Oppose I have nothing against templates, having made a few myself. The table shows administrative divisions of British India and related information. As such, it is an integral part of the text, not some collapsible template (on the side) which requires some input on the part of the reader to access. Consider the corresponding template in Administrative division of India. The information is there right in the text for everyone to see. What Zuggernaut calls "aesthetics," is really readability. When the window width is changed, text slides down the sides of his template, and a reader has to strain to figure out which section of text the template belongs to. Also, I'm troubled by Zuggernaut's insistence on calling the template Major provinces of the British in India instead of "Major Provinces of British India". Given his history of POV pushing on the Talk:India page, where too he is (unsuccessfully) conducting an RfC, and given his complete lack of history of contributing to this page, it is hard not to think that this is more of the same. As a major contributor to this page, I find it odd that his first edit here is the one inserting the template, and, soon thereafter he is conducting an RfC. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 04:19, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
PS Also, in this article, the provinces and presidencies for all the other historical periods (1600–1765; 1772–1857; 1858–1947) are an integral part of the text. So, why should the provinces of 1907, which have more information about governance, be in a collapsible template. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 04:29, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
There isn't really any difference between "Major provinces of the British in India in 1907" and "Major provinces of British India in 1907" since the imperialists used the latter nomenclature to mean the British nation in India. I don't care either way and both of the reasons cited by Fowler&fowler«Talk» have been addressed as can be seen in the four diffs below:
  1. Template for minor provinces moved: [3]
  2. Template for minor provinces is now expanded, not collapsed [4]
  3. Template for major provinces moved: [5]
  4. Template for major provinces is now expanded, not collapsed: [6]
And, oh, I have no interest in discussing anything other than content. Zuggernaut (talk) 06:20, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
The use of "British India" to mean the "British nation in India" is secondary usage and has a completely different meaning than the primary one (i.e. those regions of India under the sovereignty of the East India Company or the Crown). Your use of the secondary term demonstrates ingenuousness or disingenuousness (especially in conjunction with "imperialists"), I'm not sure which. The problem of the template not being centered and the text sliding down its side remains. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 06:39, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
Actually the text sliding down problem has been eliminated and the templates can be centered easily if necessary. Imperial is the normal word used to describe empires of that era. Zuggernaut (talk) 02:09, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
  • See also: Talk:British_Raj#Provinces_templates where the same template is being discussed for another article. —SpacemanSpiff 07:09, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Oppose. I'd echo all of Fowler's comments on this one. In addition, this is article content, and belongs within the article with local editorial oversight. It is impossible to assess any changes made to the template when it doesn't show up in revision histories for the article. This is a completely unnecessary template that adds no value, rather distracting from the ability to maintain the article. —SpacemanSpiff 07:11, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Support It looks better with template than with tables. Reduces size of article (easier to edit). Can be used in other articles. Easy to use. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.95.31.117 (talk) 09:46, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Weak Oppose - Curious as to whether there are policies relating to when to use templates versus tables. If I see any, I'd defer to those; however, as it stands, Fowler seems to make the more convincing argument. NickCT (talk) 18:55, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
Does weak oppose mean you are amenable to change? If so, I would like to point out that templates have been fixed to ensure that none of the problems pointed out by Fowler remain. Zuggernaut (talk) 02:09, 17 February 2011 (UTC)
  • Oppose Fowler and Spiff make convincing arguments against the use of templates in the body of the article. --rgpk (comment) 21:50, 16 February 2011 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Assam partitioned in 1947

Most of Sylhet district in Assam was included in East Pakistan as a result of its Muslim population. It was therefore 3 provinces, not 2, that were partitioned, and I've edited the article accordingly.93.113.201.93 (talk)

What does "British India" mean? Why isn't the wiki page: "Colonial Nigeria" also called: "British Nigeria" ?

is "British India" PC for "Colonial India"? is it because 'India' has had so many incoming colonial rulers? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.151.234.70 (talk) 07:35, 13 December 2014 (UTC)

I also believe British India is a poor title and it should had been better as "British Rule in India". Shekhar 05:35, 13 October 2015 (UTC)
See WP:COMMONNAME. - Sitush (talk) 06:13, 13 October 2015 (UTC)
No, "British India" refers to that part of India under direct British rule. The rest was under indirect rule. 216.8.145.227 (talk) 15:57, 26 April 2017 (UTC)
lots of RS cover "British India -- as in 16,000 citations in scholarly articles published since 2013 at https://scholar.google.com/scholar?as_ylo=2013&q=%22British+India%22&hl=en&as_sdt=1,27 Rjensen (talk) 16:07, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Maps, maps, maps, 28 maps, that's a lot!

I love maps but 28 maps splashed singly or in galleries all over the article is overwhelming, excessive, weird-looking and not user-friendly. Couldn't we manage with, say, a maximum of ten key maps spread throughout the article (avoiding galleries!) and the others included in one giant map gallery annex at the end?--Lubiesque (talk) 13:55, 12 May 2019 (UTC)

Thanks. This is really in some sense a timeline page, or a list, showing the geographical evolution of regions under British governance from the early 17th century up until 1947. Without the maps, there will be no clarity about the evolution, since it happened gradually over a long time. If you scroll through the archives, you will see that we had planned to turn it into a proper list, even shoot for a WP:FL run. Let me think about it some more. Perhaps now is the time to do it. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:36, 12 May 2019 (UTC)

Edit request on 26 April 2015

A protected redirect, British India, needs redirect category (rcat) templates added. Please modify it as follows:

  • from this...
#REDIRECT [[Presidencies and provinces of British India]]
<!--There have been two [[Wikipedia:Requested moves]] to move [[British Raj]] to here, (see [[Talk:British Raj]]), when there was not a consensus to do so. Please do not move the page, but instead follow the instructions at [[WP:RM]]. -->
  • to this...
#REDIRECT [[Presidencies and provinces of British India]]

{{Redr|from move|mentioned in hatnote|related|printworthy}}
  • WHEN YOU COPY & PASTE, PLEASE LEAVE THE SKIPPED LINE BLANK FOR READABILITY.

The invisible comment is not needed, because move protection has been applied. Template Redr is an alias for the {{This is a redirect}} template, which is used to sort redirects into one or more categories. No protection rcat is needed, and if {{pp-protected}} and/or {{pp-move}} suffice, the This is a redirect template will detect the protection level(s) and categorize the redirect automatically. (The categories will also be automatically removed when and if protection is lifted.) Thank you in advance! – Paine  22:27, 26 April 2015 (UTC)

Done --Redrose64 (talk) 07:21, 27 April 2015 (UTC)
You're the "cat's meow", Redrose64! Thank you! and Best of everything to you and yours! – Paine  08:35, 27 April 2015 (UTC)

Please move British Raj to here ASAP. In common parlance and also in modern cartography and geography British India is the a combination of both the Princely states of India and Presidencies and Provinces of India, the same is corroborated by Oxford dictionary[1] Porus D'Canara (talk) 17:19, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/british_india

Requested move 29 September 2020

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: No consensus (following post-move objections, see the original statement below). To quote RegentsPark again, "If the term is imprecise, we should have an article outlining the dimensions of that imprecision. Even if it be a sort of extended disambiguation page. It does make sense that we shouldn't redirect British India to this Presidencies and Provinces of British India while also saying that the Presidencies and Provinces are not all of British India." So, there's consensus that the current situation is confusing, with British India and {{Colonial India}} linking here, but "British India" nowhere being defined.
What is not clear, however, is that moving this particular article to British India is the best course of action: it is focused on on administrative divisions of India at the time rather than being a proper broad-concept article.
As I see it, the way forward is to write a proper overview article at British India (or a similar title such as British rule in India) outlining the entire 1612-1947 period and explaining the terminology applied then and now. Moving this one to that title has been rightfully dubbed "shoehorning". No such user (talk) 09:58, 26 November 2020 (UTC)

Original close, withdrawn

Consensus to move to British India. Apart from numerical majority for the move, I've also read through the arguments and their compliance with the relevant policies. I accept that the term "British India" is imprecise and can refer to a long period with varying ruling systems, but then WP:DABCONCEPT clearly applies: Where the primary topic of a term is a general topic that can be divided into subtopics, such as chronologically (e.g., History of France) [...] the unqualified title should contain an article about the general topic rather than a disambiguation page. This article is not a textbook broad-context article, but is good enough and we have no better one at the moment (perhaps it could be split along the British America/Thirteen Colonies lines as mentioned below). The situation that British India redirects to Presidencies and provinces of British India is against several WP:CRITERIA. There's also a strong argument that it's confusing for the readers (it was confusing for me too until I read up the article and discussion). No such user (talk) 12:01, 25 November 2020 (UTC)


Presidencies and provinces of British India → British India – I don't at all understand why this article has such a wordy title. Isn't it simply about British India? Oiyarbepsy (talk) 05:06, 29 September 2020 (UTC) —Relisting. power~enwiki (π, ν) 04:44, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

  • Support per WP:AND "Sometimes two or more closely related or complementary concepts are most sensibly covered by a single article. Where possible, use a title covering all cases". The second sentence of the article sayn in its entirety "Collectively, they were called British India." (Bold in article.) The case seems clear. 85.238.91.38 (talk) 09:52, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
  • Support. Rreagan007 (talk) 15:28, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
  • Strong Oppose. "British India" which pipes to Presidencies and provinces of British India, is both an informal term and a misunderstood one. (If it weren't, the dozens of people who post on the British Raj page every year asking that British Raj be changed to British India would not need to be disabused.) Explanation: The British Raj = British Indian Empire, consisted of regions that were directly ruled by the British, i.e. Presidencies and provinces of British India as well as Princely states (which were indirectly ruled). Most people (even the New York Times on occasion) do not know the difference between British India and British Raj—let alone when for example the Bengal Presidency became the Bengal Province. This page has remained stable for 14 years. I would imagine a page-move discussion would require an earlier discussion (or RfC) on this talk page about the appropriateness of the name. I don't see any concurrent advertisements in WT:INDIA, WT:PAK about this RfM either. Pinging @RegentsPark: for admin oversight about the appropriateness of this RfM. (Not canvassing.) Fowler&fowler«Talk» 19:15, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
    @Fowler&fowler: No reason to see this as anything other than a good faith RM. And, the proposer does not necessarily need to advertise the move (they may not even know where to advertise it). --RegentsPark (comment) 19:25, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
    "Most people (even the New York Times on occasion) do not know the difference between British India and British Raj" Gee, if only the world's largest and most-read encyclopedia had an article titled "British India" to explain the differences to the general public that doesn't already know. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 19:39, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
  • @Fowler:Those hatnotes are extremely confusing to someone who isn't already familiar with the history of British rule in India. An uneducated readers will have no clue whatsoever which of those links they should use to learn. And learning is what we're supposed to be about. Our readers expect that they can type in British India and get the history of British India - all of it, not just some of it, and they shouldn't have to know anything about it from elsewhere before they read about it here. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 19:16, 12 October 2020 (UTC)
  • British West Indies, British North America, British Guyana were British Crown colonies. India was not, (again, emphatically not). There is a reason why that Victoria's regnal name was Victoria by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and of the British Dominions Beyond the Seas, Defender of the Faith, Empress of India. Do you understand the exception? Fowler&fowler«Talk» 20:15, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
That's not correct. India was in fact considered by the British to be the jewel in crown. [7] LearnIndology (talk) 20:23, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
Huh? What does an Empress of India wear if not a Crown? But a Crown colony is something else. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 20:26, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
British India ≠ British Crown Colony of India. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 19:16, 12 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose This article is about the Presidencies and Provinces of British India, not about British India. Historically, British India has three components. Company rule in India when the East India company ruled over parts of India. Presidencies and provinces of British India, the parts of India that were directly under the suzeranity of the British government. And, Princely states in India, the nominally self-ruled kingdoms that were controlled by the British. Moving this article to British India is factually incorrect, though an overview article that explains all this may not be a bad idea. --RegentsPark (comment) 20:20, 29 September 2020 (UTC)
  • Support. The plurality of citations refer to this as "British India".[8] They do not refer to it, and no other encyclopedia including New World, Pears, World Book, Grolier, Britannica, etc., has an article on "Presidencies and provinces of British India". Where this was a crown colony or not doesn't determine the common name used, which is "British India". All of the other articles on Wikipedia like British Ceylon, British Malaya, British Honduras, and many many more are named according to this standard and this should be no exception. Zakaria1978 ښه راغلاست (talk) 05:35, 30 September 2020 (UTC)
British Malaya was more like the British Raj and not British India, as its own page says clearly in the second sentence. If we are to follow the precedent in your example, should we move British Raj to British India as well?
And New World? Is it now lifting text from Wikipedia? For it has copied my own words from the British Raj page of 13 years ago! See here. And compare with this WP edit of 2007-2008 when we were still conflating "British Raj" and "British India." And Pears Cyclopaedia? Is it still around? I thought it had died in 2017.
The conventional divisions of the British Empire were: United Kingdom, Dominions, Crown Colonies, India. (See here) India was unique. India was not British India. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:33, 30 September 2020 (UTC)
Pears had indeed kicked the bucket in 2017. What a pity. I used to like it. It was more like and almanac than enclopedia. Still, I mourn its loss. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:37, 30 September 2020 (UTC)
PS Oh, but it never did have a page on "British India." See here. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:37, 30 September 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose per RegentsPark. Rather move British India (disambiguation) to British India. --Zayeem (talk) 16:32, 1 October 2020 (UTC)
    • Making British India into a disambiguation is absolutely the worst possible solution. Readers will search for British India, wind up at the disambiguation, and will be left more confused and less informed than before they visited the page. British India is a great example of WP:DABCONCEPT, since merely stating entries is completely insufficient and instead an entire explanation is needed. There is a reason that terms like particle and football are articles, even though these terms are ambiguous. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 17:06, 1 October 2020 (UTC)
      • Agree with Oiyarbepsy. Look at British India (disambiguation). 1757–1858 (Company rule in India), 1858–1947 (officially known as the "Indian Empire") = British India, 1757–1947. There is absolutely no need to make things more confusing. It's a continuous, chronologically unbroken entity that just got renamed. Ambrosiawater (talk) 06:51, 6 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Support per nom. Title needs to be clear that what the article is really about. Shankargb (talk) 02:02, 3 October 2020 (UTC)
    Um. Nothing could be clearer than the current title. British India is actually incorrect because that's not what this article is about. --RegentsPark (comment) 16:04, 3 October 2020 (UTC)
The article is about British India, and even the current title demonstrates that. There's no reason to have a wordy title when a shorter and clearer one makes more sense. LearnIndology (talk) 16:16, 3 October 2020 (UTC)
To pick up on what RegentsPark has said, British India is an imprecise term for which this page is a good approximation, but not an unambiguous one. This page is precise though. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:19, 4 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Support - Several other editors expressed before, the current name will just confuse readers. Even the opposition has stated, that even notable news outlets have confused the terms. Wikipedia is a user friendly website, as mentioned in WP:Readers First. It is very important to maintain that. Tessaracter (talk) 09:08, 4 October 2020 (UTC)
"British India" is an imprecise term, and I have now clarified this in the lead. It was not unambiguously used for any one thing. For instance, it was used as a synonym for "the British in India" during the period 1612 to 1757 when the Company towns, or outposts, were tenancies. That means the EIC had leased these from the local Indian rulers. But its best approximation is this page. The top of the page does point to British India (disambiguation) for the various uses for which the expression has been employed. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:12, 4 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Support On Wikipedia, we clearly need to follow Occam's razor. Presidencies and provinces of British India is logically equivalent to British India, and the name British India has been consistently named by many RS as a widely used name that had come into use before 1900s. Ambrosiawater (talk) 06:47, 6 October 2020 (UTC)
What is clear is this: (a) "British India" is imprecise. (b) This page is precise (so, obviously, it cannot be logically equivalent to BI). (c) The ordinary readers, writers, and publishers, including e.g. a Pulitzer prize winner from the NY Times do not know what British India is, mostly confusing it for British Raj. (d) I would like to ask all the "support" voters here: Was Surat in 1705 in British India? Was Madras in British India in 1720? Was the British Residency in Delhi before 1857 a part of British India? Was Bangalore in 1820 a part of British India? Was it so in 1890? All in all, this page is the best approximation, especially for the period 1858 to 1947. But there are notable exceptions and it is best not to simplify the picture or sweep the anomalies and outliers under the rug. When a name such as "British India" is redirected, a reader is warned, and they examine the page information in the front/top matter more carefully. A straightforward move will give the wrong message, especially when (I wager) most Wikipedians do not know what constituted British India and what did not Fowler&fowler«Talk» 17:01, 6 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose. If "British India" is being used to cover the periods before and after 1858, then it is not being used in a clear and consistent way but as a shorthand. For that reason, the present title is clearer in its scope. Srnec (talk) 23:06, 8 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Support. Clearly, as mentioned by several editors who commented earlier. Our first concern is to maintain accuracy and not to confuse the readers. Wikipedia policy, mentioned in WP:Readers first is absolutely clear in this. The current title is nothing but confusing for those who are not familiar with the subject. As others point out, let us not confuse the readers. We at Wikipedia provide the research needed for people to further their knowledge, not to confuse them. ─ The Aafī (talk) 17:50, 11 October 2020 (UTC)
    Um. Our first concern is to maintain accuracy, unfortunately for your argument, the current title is the accurate one. British India, though a simpler title, is actually inaccurate. --RegentsPark (comment) 22:11, 11 October 2020 (UTC)
    British India is an accurate title for an article, but it sounds like there is some real disagreement on whether it's an accurate title for this article. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 20:01, 12 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Comment @Oiyarbepsy: Since you proposed the move, please tell me what British India is, and then I'll tell you all the exceptions. In other words, that article will become an unfocused dab page in prose. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 21:30, 12 October 2020 (UTC)
@Oiyarbepsy: Sorry about that. That wasn't fair of me. We are trying to build better. Give me a day, and I'll give some examples here of the complications. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 21:47, 12 October 2020 (UTC)
It's complicated is not a reason to avoid an article, and in fact, makes it far more important to have an article. After all, we have special relativity Oiyarbepsy (talk) 04:47, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
That's right and I agree Oiyarbepsy. It makes zero sense to have an article called "Presidencies and provinces of British India" without having an article called "British India". LearnIndology (talk) 04:58, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
@Oiyarbepsy:? I said British India is imprecise. That means it lacks precision, that it is couched in indefinite terms, it is vague, which special relativity is not. Why don't you create a short page in your sandbox on what ou think is British India is? Fowler&fowler«Talk» 09:16, 14 October 2020 (UTC) Corrected ping. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 09:36, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
@Fowler&fowler: @Oiyarbepsy: I think Oiyarbepsy has a good point. If the term is imprecise, we should have an article outlining the dimensions of that imprecision. Even if it be a sort of extended disambiguation page. It does make sense that we shouldn't redirect British India to this Presidencies and Provinces of British India while also saying that the Presidencies and Provinces are not all of British India. --RegentsPark (comment) 12:51, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
@RegentsPark: I am creating a summary of the year-long discussion in 2008 and 2009 that created the present consensus. A huge huge effort it was. In fairness to Xn4 and Strawless, they offered some cogent content-based reasons. These present nominators are offering nothing but some general-purpose Wiki-sense arguments. Anyway, you might be surprised by the huge, huge, amount of time we spent. I even wrote a "British India" dab-in-prose page with a new side-bar/template. I had forgotten all this. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 19:02, 14 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Support: I fully agree, hatnotes are confusing to new readers. My support is based on this well written statement for a simple title: Those hatnotes are extremely confusing to someone who isn't already familiar with the history of British rule in India. An uneducated readers will have no clue whatsoever which of those links they should use to learn. And learning is what we're supposed to be about. Our readers expect that they can type in British India and get the history of British India - all of it, not just some of it, and they shouldn't have to know anything about it from elsewhere before they read about it here. I could not have summarized it better myself. Mohanabhil (talk) 17:09, 24 October 2020 (UTC)
  • If it is a place being ruled by the British, what does "British India" mean in the title of the book Business, Race, and Politics in British India, c. 1850–1960 (recall, India became independent in 1947).
  • If it is the geographical region of this page, which existed between 1602 and 1947, what does "British India" mean in the book: Aryans and British India; Aryans is a reference to a migration/diffusion of people/language in the mid-second-millennium BCE.
  • If it a place? What does it mean in the book: Who Was Who in British India? (The first return in the Google Search says: "Over 5,000 entries on the British men and women who played a significant role in British India" Does that mean Gandhi, Nehru, or the Nobel Prize winners Rabindranath Tagore and C. V. Raman were not Who in British India if we are to redirect this article to British India; after all they lived in the Presidencies and Provinces of British India.) The funny thing is that the Who's Who contains people who never stepped foot in India, British or non-British. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 11:55, 25 October 2020 (UTC) PS @Oiyarbepsy: Please write an article on what you think "British India" should be about and present it on this talk page in the manner that I did in discussion of 2008 and 2009. If it not a significant content fork of this article, we could move your article to British rule in India which currently redirects to British Raj; it could be a great overview article. @RegentsPark: Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:16, 25 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Support: I want to thank Oiyarbepsy for bringing up this RfC. I was planning on bringing this issue up again: [9] This title is extremely concerning for three reasons. First, even the opposition has stated, and noted by others, that without an article for British India, even well-known media have incorrectly used the wrong term. Second, we need to take into account WP:UCRN -- in this light, changing the name is a must. Third, we don't even have an article on British India, yet we have an article for "Presidencies and provinces of British India"? This is very concerning and not how things should be done. No wonder there is so much misunderstanding. Those three cases alone should make this RfC go with those of us who have voted "support." --1990'sguy (talk) 02:26, 26 October 2020 (UTC)
  • "British India" is not only a vague term but also a casual term connoting in anachronistic fashion a kind of ownership which the British never had in India, as they did in the settler colonies: 13 colonies of the US, Canada, British South Africa, Australia or New Zealand. They spent time in India to be sure, in many instances doing stalwart work, but down to the last man and woman alive, retired in Great Britain. Their children were born there, but at the age of five, six, or seven, sent to boarding school in Britain. In all the great famines of the 19th or 20th centuries, in which tens of millions of Indians died, there is not a single instance of a Briton dying of starvation or of succumbing to malaria or cholera in a weakened state brought on by malnutrition. The nominator says, "Isn't (this page) simply about British India?" And I keep asking, "So what was British India? Please tell me." I've been asking everyone to write that page on this talk page, even a barebones one, so we can examine what precisely is being proposed. Have you seen a "British India" page on Britannica?? There's not even a remote acknowledgment of the term there. But there is a "British Raj" page written by the historian Stanley Wolpert.
  • A If you want to redirect "British India" to a dab page and lock down the redirect:
  • British India refers chiefly to :
  • Presidencies and Provinces of British India
  • It can occasionally refer to the "British in India," i.e. the British people with the experience of having lived in India (whether in a sojourn or in domicile)
  • It can occasionally refer to the segregated neighborhoods in which the British lived in India or the society that they created therein.
  • It can occasionally refer to the "British people involved in the enterprise of India."
  • It can inaccurately refer to Company rule in India
  • It can inaccurately refer to British Raj
I'm happy to support that.
But to expand the "British India" dab page one word beyond what I have proposed above is to create highly POV content forks against which there is a clear precedent on this page, stated by the admin Philip Baird Shearer who oversaw the last year-long discussion in 2008 and 2009, and by the arbitrator and admin Nichalp who was a part of that discussion. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:19, 26 October 2020 (UTC)
  • We need a dab page at the least because, otherwise, this is going to come up again. If British India redirects here then, as the simpler version, it appears appropriate. A dab page will capture the complexities of British India and make it clear that no one detailed article fits the term exactly. --RegentsPark (comment) 23:55, 26 October 2020 (UTC)
  • Oppose per Fowler&fowler. Ytpks896 (talk) 16:46, 26 October 2020 (UTC)

Oppose. This is a specific page which details Princely States / Provinces.

British America and Thirteen Colonies have a separate distinct page, no? TheBlueKnight (talk) 18:13, 31 October 2020 (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.

Fowler&fowler's summary of the RfC and discussion in 2008-2009 that led to this consensus

Here were the notable stages of the discussion:

  • Stage 0 (early Sept 2008):
  • At that time and a few months before, "British India" was being redirected to British Raj (See e.g. PBS's post, but Xn4 had intermittently redirected "British Raj" to "British India" or edited "British India" as an independent article ( here)
  • "Presidencies and provinces of British India" in the long name did not exist, but had "Provinces of India" (here) and "Presidencies of British India" (here) did.
  • A page "British Empire in India" was being redirected to British Raj ( here), and another page
  • "British rule in India" was also redirected to British Raj (here)

Vontrotta, and TheBlueKnight and Umar Zulfikar Khan. (Xn4 and Strawless) wanted a stand-alone article.

  • Stage 2: Discussion and different proposals
  • By 28 September 2008 Vontrotta and RegentsPark wanted British India to be redirected to British Raj (here). but Xn4 and Strawless disagreed. By the end of October I complained it was taking too long.
  • 28 October 2008, admin PBS offered a compromise: move the current article into user space. Then move British rule in India to here and modify it so it is a true dab page for the term "British India" ([Talk:Presidencies_and_provinces_of_British_India/Archive_2#A_possible_compromise here])
  • 29 October 2008, arb Nichalp weighed in, "I'm strongly opposed to having content forks" i.e. independent article on British India ([Talk:Presidencies_and_provinces_of_British_India/Archive_2#View_by_Nichalp here]), continuing, "I suggest the following breakup:
  • "British Rule in India" that details the arrival of the British in India up to 1950, when India became a republic. The article also contains a summary of the following articles:
  • "British Raj" [scope 1858 - 1947] with a strong focus on governance and rule
  • "Company Rule in India" [scope 1757 - 1857] with a strong focus on the expansionist programmes of the Company
  • British India be redirected to British Raj
  • An additional article can detail the relationship between the suzerain states of India and the British.
  • I told Nichalp that "British India" was different from "British Raj", in response he withdrew the redirect idea and wrote a short stub/dab-in-prose explaining "British India" ( here)
  • (Early November 2008) I expanded Nichalp's idea into a short article) There was some back and forth, Nichalp and RP came aboard and Nichalp considered it to be A class, suggesting we consider FAC.
  • (9 November 2008) There was talk about creating a sidebar.

....

  • Xn4, Umar Zulfikar Khan and Strawless were banned from Wikipedia for sockpuppetry and for attempting to create a false consensus.
  • (March 2009) PBS moved my stub with sidebar into mainspace (here) and titled "British India" (to be continued when I'm feeling less exhausted. Please do not edit) Fowler&fowler«Talk» 18:56, 14 October 2020 (UTC)

My word, how exhausting to wrap my mind around these sequence of events. Kudos to @fowler for his patience.

I understand the difference between the Company Rule and the Crown Rule but unfortunately most Indians don't. Most Indian text books will say "The British Ruled India for 200 years" not drawing a distinction between the EIC and the Crown.

This is my suggestion - Let British India be one short page which divides the eras and mentioned associated names with that era. I hope this is constructive and helpful TheBlueKnight (talk) 18:04, 31 October 2020 (UTC)

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