Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/India House/archive3

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was archived by Graham Beards via FACBot (talk) 22:14, 17 November 2015 [1].

India House[edit]

rueben lys(s): rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 15:56, 6 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

This article is about an Indian nationalist organisation that existed in London in the first decade of the 20th century. It is a slightly overlooked but important topic, in being the first prominent arena of nationalist works of a number of Indians who later became famous for various different reasons. Most famous amongst these people is V.D. Savarkar, but there is also leaders like Har Dayal, M.P.T. Acharya, V.N. Chatterjee and others who are associated with different political thoughts in India. The article failed FAC twice in the past almost seven years ago because of prose. It has remained stable since. I copy edited it recently to improve prose on the back of two other copy edits in the past by other editors. Would like to see this article meet FA criteria. rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 15:56, 6 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

FAC coordinator's comments[edit]

FAC Coordinator's Comment - there are too many unsourced statements throughout the article; there should be no none. There are problems with the formatting (click on refs 2,7,11,26,31,33,36,44,52,73,and 85 for examples) and there are unused sources in the references. Graham Beards (talk) 16:18, 6 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. I have addressed the references now (as many as I could identify). If you highlight which sentences maybe require citations, I will try to find these ASAP.
One dead link, which I have tagged, remains along with the unused sources. Graham Beards (talk) 06:31, 7 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Thankyou Graham. The dead link has now been replaced with literature ref. Unused sources have been removed.rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 07:35, 7 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Comments from Brianboulton[edit]

A few initial observations:

  • You say in the text: "India House was a large Victorian Mansion..." etc. As the house is very much still there, the present tense should be used. The word "mansion" should not be capitalised; I don't thinbk the pipe-link to Victorian architecture is particularly helpful to readers.
  • There is too much use of the phrase "such as", throughout the article, sometimes in very close proximity – see "Indian nationalism in Britain" section. Try and use some variant phrasing.
  • In the second paragraph of the lead, you include a list of "prominent Indian revolutionaries and nationalists associated with India House". Of these, " V. V. S. Aiyar" is not mentioned in the body of the article at all, while "V.N. Chatterjee" and "P.M. Bapat" are only mentioned once, in passing, from which I must assume that their association with India House was fleeting. AS the lead is supposed to highlight the most significant aspects of the text, maybe you should reconsider the inclusion of these marginal names.
  • Incidentally, you need to be consistent in formatting the initials in names: V. V. S. Aiyar has spacing while other names do not. Choose one format (the spaceless one is much preferred)
  • In the final paragraph of the lead, the first sentence needs re-punctuating: "In 1909 a member of India House, Madan Lal Dhingra, assassinated..." etc. You should also wikilink Secretary of State for India.
  • "Countermeasures" is one word, not two.

These are minor issues in what appears to be a well constructed and comprehensive article. Brianboulton (talk) 16:42, 8 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Brian,

  • India house "was" is now corrected to "is".
  • "Such as" is now appropriately reworded.
  • Name formatting has been consisten(~ified, for want of a better suffix)
  • The members mentioned in the lead are mentioned in the body as well, either in the transformation section or in the world war I section. V.N. Chatterjee is perhaps a bit undementioned but his role in wwi is more notable.
  • Secretary of state is already wikilinked (or an elf has done this interim).
  • Countermeasures oneworded.

rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 17:37, 8 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

  • I am happy with these responses. I have begun to read the text and will post further comments in a day or two. Brianboulton (talk) 15:44, 23 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Prose etc: I have begun a more detailed review of the article. These are my comments on the first few sections:

Lead
  • "The most famous of these..." is too prescriptive for a neutral encyclopaedia article. "Famous" is a rather vague term, anyway. I would reword along the lines: "...were associated with India House, notably..." followed by the list of names, undifferentiated.
Nationalism in India
  • "business-owners, merchants and professional-class" – suggest slight rephrase: "business owners, merchants and professionals"
Indian nationalism in Britain
  • "was also established" – delete "also"
  • Give year in which the parliamentary "Indian Committee" was established
Indian Home Rule Society
  • You say: "When inaugurated as a student-hostel in 1905...", but you have given no details of how or when the house was acquired, of by whom. This is important information that needs to be researched and included.
  • We need a clearer explanation of the "British Committee"
  • "the Raj" rather than "The Raj", and only link on first mention.
  • I'd stick to "Bhikaji Cama" as per the lead, rather than "Madam Cama"
  • Overlinking: Henry Hyndman
The Indian Sociologist
  • "it has been argued" should not be used without specifying by whom. Someone must have made this specific suggestion.
  • "TIS itself..." – latter word redundant
  • "calling these to be the last resort" – "this", surely, as it refers only to political violence.
  • "stinging" is editorial opinion, and should be neutralised, e.g. "strong"
  • Chirol was not the editor of The Times (the paper should be wikilinked, by the way). Chirol was foreign editor, an important but subordinate position, from 1899 to 1912. His WP article has got it wrong - see his ODNB article for details. Incidentally, his birth name was "Mary Valentine Ignatius Chirol"; his parents were either sadists or had a weird sense of humour.
  • "As a liberal politician, Morley refused to take action at the time..." It is not a given that "liberal" politicians will not act illiberally (think e.g. Nick Clegg). I would delete the first four words.

More will follow. The article is, I must say, generally well written and informative, and in my view can easily be brought to FA standard. Brianboulton (talk) 09:26, 26 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Re: the above comments.
  • "famous" now changed to "notable.
  • I have not changed hyphenation etc merely because the very kind copy-editor did not alter these, and my gut feeling is these are adequate at the moment. Happy to revisit this in the near future once a full prose review is offered.
  • I don't understand this point – I don't recall raising any question of hyphenation in this review. Brianboulton (talk) 22:18, 30 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Re:"...business-owners..."rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 07:45, 31 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • Year of the Parliamentary committee establishment is probably difficult to pinpoint since it was an informal but cohesive pressure group. but see next point.
  • The British Committee of the Indian National Congress is now a seperate and detailed article that should offer the interested reader more info incuding background and dates.
  • Raj now uncapitalised at "t"he
  • Stinging will be changed in the next ten mins.
  • Chirol now corrected to his appropriate position.
  • I agree his parents must have not been his most favourite people.
  • Morley's political views and its influence on his actions and lack thereof now restructured to make this clearers.rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 12:36, 30 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately I can't add to these comments at present, as I shall be away for the next week, but I'll look in when I get back, to see if the nom is still open. Brianboulton (talk) 13:31, 2 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Image[edit]

Image review

  • File:India_House_collage2.jpg: if I'm reading this correctly, several parts of this collage are non-free, yes? Can you explain why you chose to use this? I think it would make more sense to use a simpler image, ideally a free one
  • File:Champakraman_Pillai.jpg: what is the original source of this image? Nikkimaria (talk) 02:58, 17 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Nikki. This actually touches upon the very substance of the article itself. Although India House itself was a residence, ie a building, the term "India House" came to collectively describe the organisations that worked under its roof, the radical nationalists who lived and worked there, and the nationalist ideologies that emerged from this group of organisations and people. So when you say "India House", the term is associated with the latter group rather than the house itself. The article has an image of the house itself, but the introductory collage is a mash of the people who used the building for their works, or in the case of Anant Lakshman Kanhere, people whose actions in India were directly influenced by the organisations living in India House in London. The image of Maud Gonne ties in the links to Irish nationalist groups that had ties to the house. The central image of TIS ties everything together in that it was Kirshna Verma's mouthpiece and expressed the ideologies emerging from the house in words, and therefore represented all of this. The collage therefore exemplifies to the reader what India House was and what it influenced. This is important, since you will see from the "Influence" section that the house had a huge influence on many different aspects of Indian politics, from the independence movement before and during the great war, through Gandhian independence movement, to Hindu-nationalism and Indian communism which have had effects even upto present day Indian politics.

A simpler image, say for example of the house itself, or of Savarkar (who is the most famous association of the house) will be insufficient to the extent it will skew the reader's focus to either one individual (Savarkar or Dhingra) which would be leading to an inappropriate inference, or to the building itself, ie the architecture etc, which is absolutely not the focus of the article nor notable in any shape or form.

I hope this clarifies.


With regards to the source of Champakaraman Pillai image, it was obtained from commons, and the source is given as a website called Indianetzone. The website is listed as holding Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 permissions per here. The photo itslef is of Pillai in his young middle age, and Pillai himself died in 1934 in Germany. The image is therefore taken sometime between 1910s and/or early 1920s. I cant say anything more about this image.rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 09:51, 17 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The Indianetzone website hosts the image, but the image was created long before that website existed - the image is not covered by their CC license. As you'll see from the tag on the image description page, it is unclear whether this image is in the public domain or not. Nikkimaria (talk) 14:35, 30 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

New comment Could editors please review the replies to their comments. It will help me clarify if concerns have been adressed.rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 19:35, 19 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Re:Nikkimaria's comments regarding images Thanks Nikki for your comments. I have looked through the previous two nominations, where the issue of images were discussed as well. The Champak image I have figured out is actually a retouch obtained from this page which belongs to Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan. I have communication from Bhavan confirming permission on the basis of free license to use the base image (I can forward this to wherever may be necessary). I presume netzone has obtained this through similar understandings.rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 15:44, 30 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Is that free license for the original image or only for the retouch? If the former, you can forward that permission to OTRS; if the latter we still need to determine the status of the original. Nikkimaria (talk) 17:28, 30 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]
The original image. I will have this forwarded.rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 22:09, 30 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Communication now forwarded to OTRS.rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 07:47, 31 October 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Update. I have now heard back from OTRS. Summary is the wording is unclear as to wether orignial copyright holder releases the image. I am changing this image to one of Ghadar di Gunj which should convey a similar message. More input welcome.rueben_lys (talk · contribs) 15:03, 9 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Support on prose per standard disclaimer. These are my edits. I enjoyed this one a lot. As always, feel free to revert my copyediting. - Dank (push to talk) 16:06, 6 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Closing comment - Sadly, this nomination has stagnated and as there is no clear consensus for promotion, I am archiving it. I hope the nominator continues to improve the article and I look forward to seeing it back at FAC sometime after the required two-week wait. Graham Beards (talk) 23:23, 14 November 2015 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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