Talk:Violence against Muslims in independent India/GA1

GA Review
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Reviewer: LT910001 (talk · contribs) 04:32, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

If there are no objections, I'll take this review. I'll note at the outset I've had no role in editing or creating this article. I welcome other editors at any stage to contribute to this review. I will spend a day familiarising myself with the article and then provide an assessment. Kind regards, LT910001 (talk) 04:32, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

Thanks for waiting. In conducting this review, I will:
 * Provide an assessment using WP:GARC
 * If this article does not meet the criteria, explain what areas need improvement.
 * Provide possible solutions that may (or may not) be used to fix these.

Commentary
Thanks for your edits to this article, and I apologise for the shockingly long time it's take for this article to be reviewed. Some provisional comments:
 * The content of this article is certainly controversial in nature and I worry that it may not be neutral. Factors in this consideration include quotations from selected sources, the use of single citations to support contentious statements, the lack of inclusion of alternate viewpoints, the use of very strong language ("During the incident, young girls were sexually assaulted, burned or hacked to death"), and the article's opening statement ("These incidents have been described by Gyanendra Pandey as a new form of state terrorism, stating that these are not "riots" but "organized political massacres".)
 * Sections of this article should be fleshed out to provide more context to the reader. Several individuals are named without indication of what their role is, and some degree of introduction could be provided regarding the viewpoints and/or influences of certain organisations. Additionally, several sections may need disambiguation, including which state is affected in the "Nellie massacre". This could be ameliorated by providing several sentences extra in most subsections to provide a bit of context about each state.
 * The lead section of this article is extensively cited, which makes me worried they are primarily covered in the lead rather than the article. Lead sections should act as a summary of the content of the article.
 * Additionally, this article appears to be experiencing repeated vandalism.

Some small issues comments:
 * This article is rigorously sourced
 * This image has a flag for date and year of publication.
 * This image states that it was taken in early 2003, but was used to illustrate the section titled '2002 Gujarat violence'.
 * Slumdog millionaire is perhaps one example that permeated the Western world of the Bombay riots
 * This sentence "The Assam movement insisted on striking the names of illegal immigrants from the electoral register and their deportation from the state. There was widespread support for the movement, which tapered off between 1981 and 1982." is uncited.
 * Spaces are needed here "Moradabad1980" and here "All Assam Students Union(AASU) "

I would be happy to discuss these issues with you, and given the extremely long time you have had to wait for a review, would be happy to wait for your reply (will close review on December 27th of no reply recieved). Kind regards, --LT910001 (talk) 07:46, 8 December 2013 (UTC)
 * Shall deal with the "small issues" first. Why is the article being "rigorously sourced" an issue? The image for the calcutta riots is authentic so far as I know, I did not upload it, but will track down the source. The image for 02 Gujarat was taken in Ahmedabad in February/March 2002, the 03 near the bottom is a typo. You think Slumdog millionaire ought to be in the depictions section? Ref and spaces added. Darkness Shines (talk) 14:20, 8 December 2013 (UTC)
 * Sorry! That was meant to be 'comments' and 'rigorously sourced' was intended as a positive comment. Apologies for the misinterpretation! --LT910001 (talk) 12:56, 9 December 2013 (UTC)
 * Ok, on to the other issues then, regarding the vandalism, this is to be expected in an article which covers a controversial subject, not a lot can be done about that unfortunately. The lede is cited because if it were not it would very quickly be peppered with CN tags, again due to the controversial nature of the content, however I am quite sure everything in the lede is also covered in the body. I added which state the Nellie massacre happened in per your suggestion. On "strong language", quite simply the sources describe these incidents in much the same way, hence I followed the sources, I am not in the habit of sugarcoating the facts, also not seeing a problem with the Pandey quote, this is a well respected scholar in the field. As for alternate viewpoints, what alternate viewpoints? I have yet to see any TBH. Which organizations need fleshing out? Darkness Shines (talk) 13:37, 9 December 2013 (UTC)

Second opinion
Unfortunately, all other issues aside, I do not think that this article meets the neutrality criteria of the GA review. I have therefore asked for a second opinion. --LT910001 (talk) 14:31, 9 December 2013 (UTC)
 * I've read through the article in its entirety, and I do think that there are some issues with neutrality. Specifically, the article lists a group of people who argue that the anti-Muslim violence is institutionalized, but does not address why they have to make this argument in the first place. Is the perception of "unorganized riots" a popular one which is not represented among experts, or is there significant disagreement over the causes of the violence? The article seems to be making an argument that the violence is institutionalized. This is not the impartial tone required for Wikipedia.


 * The article says that Paul Brass' research "shows" that RSS organizations have a central role in the violence. What role does he believe they play? The citation points to a grouping of essays, but I can't find the specific quote from the author on this. The use of the word "show" implies broad agreement with his point of view; tying a political group to terrorism deserves at least another source to concur. The clause about "forming military groups" is a step in the right direction. Who are these groups?
 * I would suggest taking the scholars' names out of the body of the essay unless there is a compelling reason to put them in. The statements they make should be accurate enough to stand on their own.
 * Some of the headings need more objective openers. "In October 1946, in Bihar, between 7,000 and 8,000 people were killed in an anti-Muslim riot." Is a much better opening than "The destruction of the Babri Mosque by Hindu nationalists led directly to the 1992 Bombay Riots.[66] BBC correspondent Toral Varia called the riots "a pre-planned pogrom,"" The opening of a section should be descriptive. The who, what, and when. The why and how come later.
 * There are numerous unattributed assertions in the article: "Cultural nationalism has also been given as a reason for instances of violence" "Another reason given for these outbreaks of violence" "It has been described as one the largest and most severe pogroms since the World War II," "Several scholars have likewise concluded that the riots must have been pre-planned,"
 * Overall, the article substantially engages the subject at hand, and addresses the main issues for its topic. The sources provide verifiability to much of the content, which is helpful. However. The article goes beyond simple repetition of the sources, and makes an argument about the causes of the attacks which doesn't seem to be universally accepted. To overcome these issues, the article needs more details about the immediate perpetrators of the violence before it can attempt to connect it to broader political organizations. Given the complexity of the issues, it would benefit the article to engage with viewpoints that disagree. Forbes72 (talk) 21:55, 10 December 2013 (UTC)
 * Fucking great,once you find these mythical sources let me know,read the fucking sources numbnuts, everything you have written is shite, read the fucking source and learn, Darkness Shines (talk) 22:45, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

Conclusion
I'm summarily failing this review. As stated above, this article does not meet the neutrality or verifiability criteria, and this is from two reviews. Additionally, I refuse to continue any review when such an adversarial tone is used. I encourage renomination when the issues above have been addressed. I wish you all the best in future nominations, --LT910001 (talk) 03:18, 11 December 2013 (UTC)