Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sujit Meher


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. Consensus in this community discussion is that this is an exercise in self-promotion, which we empathically do not want, by a non-notable person. Accounts who continue with such editing may find themselves summarily blocked.  Sandstein  21:38, 31 March 2016 (UTC)

Sujit Meher

 * – ( View AfD View log  Stats )
 * Other relevant AfD: Articles for deletion/Dreams Beyond Grades
 * Other relevant AfD: Articles for deletion/Dreams Beyond Grades

Sujit_Meher, a young fashion designer, is the author of the purported "bestseller" Dreams Beyond Grades, which I am concurrently listing. I don't know how best to AfD two connected articles which are both disrupted/recreated, etc, by the same crowd of disruptive socks, so I'll just put the relevant information in both places, and cross-link. (Look out for new socks in this discussion.) The article has been repeatedly speedied and recreated. See the deletion log here:. Yunshui eventually restored Sujit Meher, obviously with some misgivings, on request from a new user, Celebtech. Yunshui's AGF seems frankly of the suicidal kind; consider also the dialogue here. Anyway, Yunshui has left the project, but he was a checkuser and has blocked most of the socks involved in this saga of (to my mind obvious) self-promotion: and. A new sock showed up when I prodded Dreams Beyond Grades yesterday, user:Fashiongrade2016, who removed the prod, restored copyright material to Dreams Beyond Grades, and restored unsourced puffery to Sujit_Meher. Blocked as a sock by Floquenbeam. The story emerging is of SPAs (or to put it more bluntly, socks) determined to promote the person Sujit Meher at all costs, in Sujit Meher and in Dreams Beyond Grades, repeatedly removing speedy templates and prods, requesting undeletion and recreating Sujit Meher with new accounts. I think we should delete and salt all this unscrupolous self-promotion. Oh, the article? Well, it fails WP:NBIO and the sources are all promotional. Bishonen &#124; talk 16:46, 23 March 2016 (UTC). Bishonen &#124; talk 16:46, 23 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of India-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 20:00, 23 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Fashion-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 20:00, 23 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Authors-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 20:00, 23 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Businesspeople-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 20:00, 23 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Delete (See below) Keep, as much as it pains me to say this, because the COI editing and other shenanigans have been deeply obnoxious and very disruptive. I'd say he passes WP:GNG. Leaving out the interview, the book plug, and ones with passing mentions, there are multiple articles about him and his designs in The Telegraph (Calcutta) , , ,  and at least one in The Times of India . They are all with bylines by reporters who regularly write on "lifestyle" topics for these papers (Pratyush Patra and Minati Singha). They span two years, and each one has different content. Yes, they're puff-piece-y in style, but that's how fashionistas write. The book is utterly non-notable. Voceditenore (talk) 08:42, 24 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Changing my "keep" to "delete". I'm going to defer to DGG's judgement and persuasive arguments here, and I must say it wasn't a difficult decision. Voceditenore (talk) 07:26, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Yeah. There's just now been some more disruption of both articles by a new sock, User:Mokaverma2016, removing AfD templates, restoring copyvio, threatening others with blocks (!) etc. It's a pity obnoxiousness is not a deletion reason, but of course it's not. I understand what you're saying about the normal way fashionistas write, Voceditenore. I have trouble taking the sources seriously, but then it's not important that I sympathize with them, or indeed that I sympathize with the article subject. If you say he's notable, I believe you. But if the article is kept, it'll need to be pretty much permanently watched against further peacockery and copyvio, sigh. Bishonen &#124; talk 11:37, 25 March 2016 (UTC).
 * Hmmmm. Yes, User:Mokaverma2016's approach to deletion templates and restoring copyrvio is remarkably similar to User:Novelbuzz's. I certainly won't weep if this article gets deleted. I've got it on my watchlist and if it's kept, I'll keep it there. UGH! Voceditenore (talk) 12:01, 25 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Comment Are we sure that the journalists aren't basically recycling press releases issued via, say, the National Institute of Fashion Technology? That institution and its faculty/alumni have been an absolute pain across various articles, notably Govind Kumar Singh. - Sitush (talk) 12:42, 25 March 2016 (UTC)
 * That was my first thought but after running various distinctive phrases etc. through Google, I have not been able to find any press releases similar to these articles. That doesn't mean that it didn't happen, simply that the source press releases aren't on line. It may also be common practice in India and Sri Lanka to feed stories to reporters. You'd be surprised at the amount of press Dinesh Subasinghe gets from the main papers in Sri Lanka, who all seem to uncritically take his word for his various accomplishments and write them up in lengthy, flowery articles. But it's very hard to prove that's what's going on. Voceditenore (talk) 14:01, 25 March 2016 (UTC)
 * I think commonality of suspicion among experienced 'Pedians should count for something. Please note that Google doesn't index a lot of India-centric stuff very well, which is one reason why someone at the India Project created a special search facility for English-language Indian news sources. - Sitush (talk) 11:20, 26 March 2016 (UTC)
 * I checked using the India Project's search engine and it produced the same results as Google, i.e. the five articles I've linked above and zero press releases. I also did individual searches directly on the most common press release sites in India (india-press-release.com, www.prnewswire.co.in, news-pr.in) and found nothing. I have found quite a few NIFT press releases, but none of them mention Meher. The article is currently neutrally written. The sources are of the type that for any other subject at AfD would almost certainly be considered independent, reliable, and sufficient. I think we'd be on a very slippery slope here to (a) delete an article simply because it has attracted obnoxious COI editors (b) allow "suspicion by experienced Wikipedians" to override these sources, especially when that suspicion is potentially coloured by the obnoxiousness of the article's editors and not supported by any objective evidence. Voceditenore (talk) 14:36, 26 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Oh, indeed. If you've delved that deeply then I agree entirely with you. I can't concentrate well enough to dig deep at the moment, sorry. - Sitush (talk) 14:53, 26 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Keep - As per Voceditenore. He is mentioned in fashion-related articles in several reliable sources and the Wikipedia article is acceptably neutral. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 12:29, 27 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Delete and Move to Draft instead if needed as this may seem minimally acceptable, I believe we can wait for better and, although the current amount of sources would seem acceptable, I'm still concerned about solidity. Asking for any helpful analysis.  SwisterTwister   talk  04:57, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Delete. The sources are promotional or mere mentions; the purpose is promotional. " mentioned in fashion-related articles" is not notability. If anything, such mentions and such promotional sources are good evidence there is nothing better available. I fully share  Voceditenore's doubts about Indian news sources in the arts and applied arts and probably business also. --I no longer regard coverage by them as proof of anything but that the persona has a press agent.  As evidence for my doubt, see the actual content of some of the stories:  is as pure a press release as has ever been written. phttp://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bhubaneswar/Odia-designer-to-showcase-folk-fashion-at-Bangalore-show/articleshow/22445443.cms?referral=PM] is a somewhat longer equivalent, all in his own words with no indication of any editorial responsibility.   lists his name among several dozen people whom it does not consider among the famous designers of the title. Just his name--not a single word about him. But perhaps there is a little bit of editorial honesty--they all refer to him isn such terms as "budding designer" "young designer" or the equivalent--those are polite phrases that indicate what we would call  not yet notable. .  please look at the actual sources again.
 * Looked at with some editorial judgement of our own and knowledge of WP, this is not good faith editing. It's obvious work by a press agent, in apparent violation of our terms of use. According to the TOU, we all are responsible for enforcing them, and the way to do this is to  delete the article and block the editors.
 * Lack of notability is not the only reason for deletion. Borderline notability combined with clear promotionalism is an equally good reason. Small variations to the notability standard either way do not fundamentally harm the encycopedia, but accepting articles that are part of a promotional campaign causes great damage. That these are part of a promotional campaign is shown by the simultaneous attempt at an article about his book, a book not even in WorldCat.  Once we become a vehicle for promotion, we're useless as an encyclopedia .  DGG ( talk ) 07:09, 29 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Note. The creator of the article on Meher's book, User:Novelbuzz, has been attempting today to canvass more people to this discussion (yet again!) and asking them to remove the AfD template:, , , . Voceditenore (talk) 07:26, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Still more canvassing:, , . Voceditenore (talk) 10:14, 29 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Keep - Dear Admins, He is mentioned in all fashion-related articles by all eminent fashion journalist in several reliable sources and the Wikipedia article is acceptably neutral. I wrote about his book, and about book concern he might not be an author but he himself listed in those top 10 alumni of NIFT, and that published in NIFT website itself. And i guess its enough to be a notable person. Please kindly look at it Voceditenore DGG. If you go through his Facebook fan page. He has also verified as public figure by facebook itself with more than lakhs nos of followers. Which again shows the symptom of a notable person. And now a days Facebook is also a reliable source to verify a person to know whether he is a known person or not. His fb page: — Preceding unsigned comment added by Novelbuzz (talk • contribs) 09:03, 29 March 2016
 * Anyone can fake Facebook stuff and puff it up. The NIFT is known to be highly self-promotional. You are already getting a reputation for doing similar stuff here via your canvassing etc. All of this has been seen before at other NIFT-related articles. It needs to stop. - Sitush (talk) 09:15, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Sitush Here NIFT published something that he was in the judge panel of IIT Kanpur Fashion Event. How can someone be a judge of such prestigious college like IIT without any notable mark? I guess IIT is not promoting him And there it clearly mentioned a renowned fashion designer by NIFT itself. Please go through the link.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Novelbuzz (talk • contribs) 09:20, 29 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Note And we can't say all media houses like The Times Of India, The Telegraph and other medias, NIFT, IIT and all are promoting him. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Novelbuzz (talk • contribs) 09:32, 29 March 2016


 * You may not be aware that IITs have also got into problems on Wikipedia due to their promotional activities. - Sitush (talk) 09:56, 29 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Delete Finally got my brain into gear and have had a look at the sources and for other sources. My original gut feeling - advertorial/promotion/no real notability stands. Please note that The Times of India is nowadays in many respects little more than a vehicle for puff pieces and has lost much of the kudos that once it had: standards have dropped enormously, even on such basic things as quality of prose, let alone of subject matter. Truly notable designers get mentions outside their own country: fashion is an international "movement", not a parochial one. DGG has it right, as far as I can see. - Sitush (talk) 09:12, 29 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Delete - I wasn't going to get involved, but then I was one of the lucky several to get solicited by Novelbuzz and so I thought I may as well take a look. Sorry, but I have to agree with everyone else who is saying delete. When this person becomes properly notable, then he can have an article, but right now, at my most super-charitable best, it is too borderline to call either way, and because I'm not feeling super-charitable about being canvassed, I'm going delete. Mabalu (talk) 09:57, 29 March 2016 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.