Talk:Sita Ram Goel

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Hornplease edits
Hornplease seems to belong to the same cabal of Marxists who are in a state of permanent hysteria with regards to Hinduism/Nationalism. A reader of his comments and edits would not leave even a simpleton in doubt with regards to his 'objectivity'. Same old censorship game, be it the Romila Thapar page or any other page dealing with History.

God! Why do such people not get gainfully employed somewhere? Pity you, Hornplease. If you want, can suggest a good Doc for your illness —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.196.249.242 (talk) 06:28, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

Convert from what?
He was a marxist, he then converted to Hinduism. "Why I Became A Hindu", he had to have started from somewhere. Bakaman%% 23:10, 26 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Read that book once more.he never relinquished his dharma. Bharatveer 04:07, 27 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Marxist has nothing to do with religion or being an atheist really. At worse I hazard Sita Ram went through a phase where he "lost" his religion before he refound, lots of people undergo it and it does not mean conversion. You can be a marxist, communist and a religious person. The suppression of religion in the communist world is to prevent unauthorized gatherings so that the dicatators can prevent ideas non conducive to them from propogation.--Tigeroo 05:10, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

deletions
looks like certain users are vandalizing this page  Baka man  19:04, 23 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Your ill-considered interventions will be ignored until you understand that accusations of vandalism in content dispute are considered personal attacks.Hornplease 10:25, 27 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Removing large portions of material is defined as vandalism. Doing it for an extended time despite opposition from one or more other editors is tendentious. Baka man  16:19, 27 December 2006 (UTC)


 * See above. On a related note, congratulations on discovering the policy on tendentiousness! Are you attempting to avoid being tendentious these days? (As if I didnt know...) Hornplease 19:13, 27 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I never was tendentious. I read up on it so you couldnt use false canards to lecture me and misrepresent my edits. Perhaps arbcom didnt teach you a lesson. Apart from banned trolls, you are the only user on wikipedia who harbors fantasies of this sort. Baka man  19:17, 27 December 2006 (UTC)


 * You clearly learnt nothing from arbcom. As I have pointed out elsewhere, your active and rather pathetic solicitation of 'votes' even from very inexperienced editors does not serve to cancel out - oh, whatever, you probably arent even reading this far. In any case, I was given very strong indication that the ArbCom would not consider your behaviour, as the case was getting too messy. I fully expect you'll be up there sometime, though. In expectation of that glorious Judgment Day, perhaps a certain moderation of tone would be in order? No? Well, your decision. Have fun! Hornplease 19:26, 27 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Funny considering this and this and . Considering Seadog is a member of MedCab, and the majority of the other votes were from Admins or near-admins I'll do the "charitable thing" and ignore your comment. 1 vote doesnt account for the consensus. Dont forget your "vote" put you in the same category as such pillars of the project like, and (even BhaiSaab was of a different opinion). I would think that even when a banned anti-Semite disagreed with you a point would have been made, but its "your decision". Even the one user that you seem to have a productive relationship with (Rama's Arrow), decided he would support constructive editors against distinguished experts in the art of harassment. Baka  man  19:51, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Requested explanations
"(...)The forfeiture is exactly the sort of thing which had landed us where we are: where intellectual inquiry is shut out; where our traditions are not examined, and reassessed; and where as a consequence there is no dialogue. It is exactly the sort of thing too which foments reaction. (...)"Freedom of expression which is legitimate and constitutionally protected," it [the Supreme Court] declared last year, "cannot be held to ransom by an intolerant group or people." (...)The "victories" in having Shah Bano reversed, in having Rushdie banned - "victories" which were loudly applauded by the "secularists"; the success in convincing political parties - with maps and lists - that Muslims would decide their fate in hundreds of constituencies; to say nothing of the "victories" of the violence in Punjab and Kashmir - the reaction is the cumulative result of these distortions in our polity" is a long, off-topic quote that does not discuss Goel. So too the other quotes, which together create a degree of imbalance in the article; this is not a soapbox, particularly for fringe views.

That he attacked Romila Thapar is possible, but he attacked all mainstream Indian historians, so why single out Thapar? Also, Meera Nanda is probably relatively nn at this point. Finally, he is known for his polemics, is he not? I trust this is satisfactory, please discuss each point in turn. Hornplease 10:25, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Hornplease 10:25, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Deleted/pruned passages
These were the paragraphs that were deleted or shortened in your last edit. We'll see what we can make of them.


 * Goel has also criticized the work and research methods of Marxist historians like Romila Thapar.

This may be notable because of the famous letter he sent to Romila Thapar.


 * No one has ever refuted him on facts, but many have sought to smear him and his writing. They have thereby transmuted the work from mere scholarship into warning. (...)The forfeiture is exactly the sort of thing which had landed us where we are: where intellectual inquiry is shut out; where our traditions are not examined, and reassessed; and where as a consequence there is no dialogue. It is exactly the sort of thing too which foments reaction. (...)"Freedom of expression which is legitimate and constitutionally protected," it [the Supreme Court] declared last year, "cannot be held to ransom by an intolerant group or people." (...)The "victories" in having Shah Bano reversed, in having Rushdie banned - "victories" which were loudly applauded by the "secularists"; the success in convincing political parties - with maps and lists - that Muslims would decide their fate in hundreds of constituencies; to say nothing of the "victories" of the violence in Punjab and Kashmir - the reaction is the cumulative result of these distortions in our polity.


 * The case has been criticized by Elst, who wrote: "Conversely, banning this book would send a signal that the present establishment will do what it can to prevent Hinduism from rising up, from regaining self-confidence, from facing the challenge of hostile ideologies."


 * The American author David Frawley wrote about Voice of India:While Voice of India had a controversial reputation, I found nothing irrational, much less extreme about their ideas or publications. They were simply doing for the Hindu religion what intellectuals in other religious traditions had done for theirs. Their criticisms of Islam were on par with the criticisms of the Catholic Church and of Christianity done by such Western thinkers as Voltaire or Thomas Jefferson. In fact they went far beyond such mere rational or historical criticisms of other religions and brought in a profound spiritual and yogic view as well. 


 * Sita Ram Goel has often been described as an "intellectual kshatriya".


 * The Belgian writer Koenraad Elst met Sita Ram Goel in India and wrote about his work: "The importance of Ram Swarup's and Sita Ram Goel's work can hardly be over-estimated. I for one have no doubt that future textbooks on comparative religion as well as those on Indian political and intellectual history will devote crucial chapters to their analysis. They are the first to give a first-hand "Pagan" reply to the versions of history and "comparative religion" imposed by the monotheist world-conquerors, both at the level of historical fact and of fundamental doctrine, both in terms of the specific Hindu experience and of a more generalized theory of religion free from prophetic-monotheistic bias.


 * K. Elst also stated:  "Come to mention him, I found that in moral stature and depth of scholarship, he completely dwarfed the Stalinist "eminent historians" and other icons of "secularism". Which is why I cannot help frowning when I see Meera Nanda forget her limitations and berate a towering personality like Goel."


 * David Frawley said about Goel that he was "modern India’s greatest intellectual kshatriya", and "one of India’s most important thinkers in the post-independence era". According to Frawley, "Sitaram followed a strong rationalistic point of view that did not compromise the truth even for politeness sake. His intellectual rigor is quite unparalleled in Hindu circles..." --Bondego 10:05, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Deletion discussion
This template and all the books in it were the sole contributions of a single editor. Most of the books are self-published, and though some are of note as often-quoted handbooks of certain streams of thought within political Hinduism, not all of them are notable. All are self-published, and none are peer-reviewed. Can I solicit suggestions on which of them are candidates for AfDs? Hornplease 09:52, 23 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I have nominated Sita Ram Goel for Wikipedia collaboration of the week. After going through such a collaboration, it should be easier to decide on such questions. --Bondego 13:36, 23 December 2006 (UTC)


 * That does not work anymore. I ask again, which of these articles do you think I should take to AfD?

Hornplease 10:27, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

What do you mean "that does not work anymore?" This article never had anything like that, was never nominated for collaboration, Good Article or Feature article. It is in bad shape. What is wrong with improving and expanding the article first? It makes it easier to decide, because we would have more information. It seems the article will be selected for collaboration this or next Friday.

Are we here to censor and delete, or are we here to improve articles? If the author article is worthy of retention, then it is a fairly natural progression to wikify his book titles. These red links then cry out for articles. But not all of his books have the same importance, and maybe up to one third of the articles are among his less important works. I have now finished reading his autobiography, which is the only book by him I have read in full, and will begin improving the Goel article. It is not among his most cited or well-known works, but an autobiography has IMO automatically notability for people interested in this topic. After some more research, preferably after the collaboration, I could identify his less important works, which could be redirected if must be. --Bondego 12:02, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

I have redirected his book "History of heroic hindu resistance...". Primarly because the book reviews a book by another historian (Ram Gopal). (There is also additonal matter in the book, esp. the last chapters, but half of it is a review.) --Bondego 17:27, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

I have now redirected in total four book articles. In my opinion, these are not among the most important books of Goel. Additionaly they were also very short articles. Of course, others who know more about his works than I may disagree, and if somebody thinks so in the future, he may recreate it. There are now six books left where Goel is the sole author, and four books were he is not the sole author. --Bondego 18:00, 11 January 2007 (UTC)


 * I still think that most of those are non-notable.
 * Please note that the article as it stands nowhere states that Goel was not an accredited historian, includes no evaluation of Goel by any academic authority, and does not explicitly state that all his work was, in effect, self-published. Hornplease 09:33, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

If you can source any of these claims, write it in the article. Goel's degree was in history from the University of Delhi (see here for a definition here . ) and the article does not make the claim that he was a mainstream historian in any way. The article does include criticisms and evaluations by academics and other notable people. I have seen quite a lot of negative criticism of Goel by searching the internet, but the problem is that many of such criticism, though some by notable academics, are IMO too simplistic, and they often don't criticize his arguments, only his pov or alleged political standpoints, and the article does not need to report a dozen examples of the same simplistic criticms. The negative criticism I have added has the advantage that Goel replied to it. Even a scholar of high standing like Edwin Bryant is too simplistic, describing him as an "extreme and vociferous anti- Marxist". But if you think other negative criticisms are notable, add them. And if you want to add more positive criticism in the article, a good place to start might be the book "India’s only communalist: In commemoration of Sita Ram Goel". Many other such criticisms are of course not on the Internet, because Goel's earliest writings date back to the 1950s and 1980s in India. When you say selfpublishing, you are probably referring to his Voice of India publications. Voice of India was founded by Ram Swarup, so at least legally (but not pratically) one could say they were published by Swarup, and Voice of India has published works by many other scholars and writers, not only by Goel. Anyway, even if self-published, it is not the only criteria for notablility, and there are many notable self-published books, also with articles on wikipedia. Not all of his publications were in Voice of India, and his bibliography is incomplete. I've seen some other books and publications by him that I didn't add to the bibliography because they were IMO not notable enough for a general bibliography, and I know that he has for example written more books in Hindi than the two in the bibliography, and even some poetry and a novel, but I couldn't find the title of these books. If you want to make claims about the details of his bibliographies, can you please give us a complete bibliography of Goel, so that we have a sound basis to discuss this. While researching a bit for the Goel article I became for the first aware of Koenraad Elst's publication about Goel in a book edited by Arvind Sharma, which I didn't know before. Contrary to this article here, I have tried to make the Elst bibliography complete by searching the Internet, and despite it I found the A. Sharma publication only now. Instead of making Original Research claims about his bibliography, you or somebody else please give us his full bibliography if we want to discuss this. Maybe it is available in the book "India’s only communalist: In commemoration of Sita Ram Goel", I don't know. After thinking about it, I'm going to redirect another of his books (Defence of Hindu society). For the same reason as before, and the article is not well developed. Please note that this means that there are now only 5 book articles, were Goel is the only author (and not only a co-author or editor). One of these five, Catholic Ashrams, has a large part written by others like Devananda and Bede Griffith, so all in all there are now 4 and a half books that are written only by Goel. I think 4 and a half are not too much for him. If an author is notable there is no reason NOT to cover the body of his work. Some of his books are also critical of Islam and Christianity. If you look at List of books critical of Islam, you'll see that most if not all books critical of Islam are not written by top-notch academics. (Bat Ye'or, Robert Spencer, Ibn Warraq, Oriana Fallaci, Srđa Trifković, even if their books are scholarly are not top academics) I see no reason that Goel's books in this genre are less notable than the books by others on that "list of" article, they all are. Compared with other genres, authors in this genre do not have the highest academic qualifications. Their works are sometimes still very scholarly, but because of of the political climate or whatever reason, in this genre we will not find scholars with the same academic qualifications as in other book genres. The books on List of books critical of Islam are notable because they are influential or well known, not because of their high acamdemic qualifications. The genre is still notable, and has even a "list of" article. --Bondego 20:15, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Missing articles

 * Sri Garibdas and his Granth Saheb
 * Bibhuti Bhushan Bandopadhyay

Good article
This article could be a good "Good Article". See here for guidelines: --Bondego 15:01, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
 * Please note that the article as it stands nowhere states that Goel was not an accredited historian, includes no evaluation of Goel by any academic authority, and does not explicitly state that all his work was, in effect, self-published. Hornplease 09:34, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
 * I will respond in a few days. --Bondego 22:03, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

If you can source any of these claims, write it in the article. Goel's degree was in history from the University of Delhi (see here for a definition here . ) and the article does not make the claim that he was a mainstream historian in any way. The article does include criticisms and evaluations by academics and other notable people. I have seen quite a lot of negative criticism of Goel by searching the internet, but the problem is that many of such criticism, though some by notable academics, are IMO too simplistic, and they often don't criticize his arguments, only his pov or alleged political standpoints, and the article does not need to report a dozen examples of the same simplistic criticms. The negative criticism I have added has the advantage that Goel replied to it. Even a scholar of high standing like Edwin Bryant is too simplistic, describing him as an "extreme and vociferous anti- Marxist". But if you think other negative criticisms are notable, add them. And if you want to add more positive criticism in the article, a good place to start might be the book "India’s only communalist: In commemoration of Sita Ram Goel". Many other such criticisms are of course not on the Internet, because Goel's earliest writings date back to the 1950s and 1980s in India. When you say selfpublishing, you are probably referring to his Voice of India publications. Voice of India was founded by Ram Swarup, so at least legally (but not pratically) one could say they were published by Swarup, and Voice of India has published works by many other scholars and writers, not only by Goel. Anyway, even if self-published, it is not the only criteria for notablility, and there are many notable self-published books, also with articles on wikipedia. Not all of his publications were in Voice of India, and his bibliography is incomplete. I've seen some other books and publications by him that I didn't add to the bibliography because they were IMO not notable enough for a general bibliography, and I know that he has for example written more books in Hindi than the two in the bibliography, and even some poetry and a novel, but I couldn't find the title of these books. If you want to make claims about the details of his bibliographies, can you please give us a complete bibliography of Goel, so that we have a sound basis to discuss this. While researching a bit for the Goel article I became for the first aware of Koenraad Elst's publication about Goel in a book edited by Arvind Sharma, which I didn't know before. Contrary to this article here, I have tried to make the Elst bibliography complete by searching the Internet, and despite it I found the A. Sharma publication only now. Instead of making Original Research claims about his bibliography, you or somebody else please give us his full bibliography if we want to discuss this. Maybe it is available in the book "India’s only communalist: In commemoration of Sita Ram Goel", I don't know. After thinking about it, I'm going to redirect another of his books (Defence of Hindu society). For the same reason as before, and the article is not well developed. Please note that this means that there are now only 5 book articles, were Goel is the only author (and not only a co-author or editor). One of these five, Catholic Ashrams, has a large part written by others like Devananda and Bede Griffith, so all in all there are now 4 and a half books that are written only by Goel. I think 4 and a half are not too much for him. If an author is notable there is no reason NOT to cover the body of his work. Some of his books are also critical of Islam and Christianity. If you look at List of books critical of Islam, you'll see that most if not all books critical of Islam are not written by top-notch academics. (Bat Ye'or, Robert Spencer, Ibn Warraq, Oriana Fallaci, Srđa Trifković, even if their books are scholarly are not top academics) I see no reason that Goel's books in this genre are less notable than the books by others on that "list of" article, they all are. Compared with other genres, authors in this genre do not have the highest academic qualifications. Their works are sometimes still very scholarly, but because of of the political climate or whatever reason, in this genre we will not find scholars with the same academic qualifications as in other book genres. The books on List of books critical of Islam are notable because they are influential or well known, not because of their high acamdemic qualifications. The genre is still notable, and has even a "list of" article. --Bondego 20:15, 7 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Note that you have agreed with all the points I have raised above. (a) He is not an accredited historian inasmuch as he appears to have received merely an undergraduate degree in the subject; (b) the article does not make clear that all the academic authorities that can spare the time to consider such a marginal figure make it clear that he is not considered anywhere near sufficiently reputable, which you make clear above; (c) He ran Voice of India, which published all of his books, as well as the festschrift that you seem to think is a reliable source. Hornplease 08:57, 10 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Khuswant Singh does not have a degree in history and studied law in England. His work 'History of Sikhs' is rated a one of the best works written on Sikh history. Cunnhingham and Colnel Tod et al were military officers and their books are still used as reference on Indian history. What about Solzhenitsyn ? Should his historical works/essays on the communist Russia be discarded because he did not have a Ph.D in history? Your point about this author's competence to write history is a mute one. History writing is not such an esoteric art form as you make it sound, especially when people who oppose Goel - people like Romila Thapar et al- are even citing Nehru's works (who was a politician first and foremost with no background in histriograhpy)  as 'historical research' which are of dubious academic worth. The NCERT books in India are littered with Nehru's personal opinions as if they were the work of some "accredited historian". I read a lot of crap in Nehru's 'history' books- like Gengiz Khan being a Buddhist etc and other such nonsense. The point is Nehru is quoted by all these historians (who oppose Goel)  with the likes of VA Smith et al . Nehru's  academic credentials as a historian were non-existent in the strict academic sense of the term, especially in the sense these Marxim-trained academics question Goel's credentials (who atleast had a degree in history). So there is a lot of hypocrisy and double-standards flying around. Thanks. --Internet Scholar (talk) 18:16, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

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Serious NPOV issues
This article has serious NPOV issues. For example the only two comments in the Legacy section are from two prominent prominnents of Hindutva, neither of which are historians (except perhaps by their own fancy; but the scholarly community does not consider them as such). One of them (David Frawley) is an astrologer for Christ's sake. Who cares what a third rate pseudoscience-promoting quack thinks of this guy? Brusquedandelion (talk) 11:35, 14 March 2024 (UTC)