Talk:Kashmir/Archive 7

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Hindu elite

@Towns Hill: Your recent edits to the Dogra rule section added material alleging that it promoted a "Hindu elite" to the detriment of the Muslim masses. The implication seems to be that, since Dogras were Hindus, they promoted Hindu elites and oppressed the Muslims. Yet, Chitralekha Zutshi says

As we saw, Kashmiri Pandits had entered the administrative machinery of state during the Afghan period, and by the Dogra period they were firmly entrenched in the lower levels of the state bureaucracy. Although the Pandits were, like all Kashmiris, excluded from the upper echelons of the bureaucracy, they continued to exercise control in the countryside, away from the urban centers of power.

In fact, another PhD thesis on the land revenue system says that the Afghans tried to replace the Pandit officials but didn't succeed. This tells me two things: (1) the Pandits were working as officials even before the Afghan rule, (2) the employment of Pandits had nothing to do with religion. For all we know, the Pandits have been playing this role for eternity (for we can't imagine that Mughals specially brought Pandits do it nor that that Shahmiri dynasty did it.)

You are also forgetting the fact that the Pandits were Brahmins. And, the Brahmins had a hold on the state machinery all over the subcontinent. In the British-ruled Madras Presidency, there was a non-Brahmin movement demanding reservations for jobs for non-Brahmins in the 1920s. The Kashmiris launched a similar movement in the 1930s, only ten years behind. In other parts like Uttar Pradesh, there were no such reservations until a couple of decades ago.

Given the historical context and the socio-political factors, I don't see any Hindu-Muslim divide in this affair, and I intend to get rid of any text that suggests there was. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 00:23, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

Zutshi also says,

Furthermore, many Kashmiri Pandits in rural areas were simply cultivators, with no connection to the revenue administration. Additionally, there was an important Kashmiri Muslim element in the revenue administration, drawn mostly from Sayyids and Pirs.

So, Muslims were not excluded from the administration, and it is wrong to make it look as if they were. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 00:54, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

A small clarification. 'Sayyids' and 'Pirzadas' (Pirzada being the 'kram' name) were not Kashmiris. They were exploitative outsiders and not part of the Valley's native Muslim peasantry who suffered during the Dogra rule. There was also Dogra state discrimination with anti-Muslim religious bias. There were also Kashmiri Pandits such as Prem Nath Bazaz who were sympathetic to the plight of their Kashmiri brethren among the Muslims. So its true that not all Kashmiri Pandits exploited Kashmiri Muslims. Lawrence also documents that there were many 'kind and gentle' Kashmiri Pandit officials, though as a body they were 'cruel'. But there was definitely a class divide which coincided with the religious divide in the Valley (it was somewhat different in Jammu). Kashmiri Pandits dominated the landowning and administrative classes and did exploit the Muslims (again, not all of them). Anti-Kashmiri Muslim peasantry co-operation also certainly existed between the Dogras and the Kashmiri Pandits, as the chakdari system demonstrates. Towns_Hill 01:50, 2 January 2017 (UTC) Towns Hill

I think you did not get my point. Whatever system was operating during the Dogra rule, was operating for a long time, as long as we can see in the past. So, you cannot put this under the Dogra rule section, implying that they instituted it. Do you have evidence that they instituted anything new (other than the fact they brought in Dogra overlords from outside the Valley)?

Secondly, you are communalising history. State officials exploited the poor peasantry. It so happened that, in Kashmir, the majority (though not all) officials were Hindu and the majority (thought not all) peasantry were Muslim. And this was the case even when the Kashmiris were ruling themselves, i.e., before the Mughals occupied Kashmir. Akbar tried to break the power of the officials, by getting rid of the one-third that they were collecting from the peasants. (See the section below.) But the system came back eventually, again well before the Dogras came into the picture.

All the scholars you are reading are not honest-to-goodness historians. They are looking at narrow parts of history and telling us what they find. They are also reproducing the observations of the local observers, who are also not historians. The PhD theses that I am citing from India are doing proper historical analyses, under historian supervisors, who are all guided by established historians of India like Irfan Habib, Ram Sharan Sharma etc. We can't discount the evidence they present.

Pinging Kashmiri, Wasiq 9320, Vanamonde93, Ghatus, to get outside opinion before we start going in circles. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 08:45, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

References

References

Mughal rule, land revenue, and oppression

I see a lot of talk about how the Mughal rule was oppressive and all. An example:

The Mughal period also saw a new development, namely increase in land and other revenues,[38: Land revenue was increased from one-third to one-half. Allami, Ain-i-Akbari, 374] drain of wealth, and withdrawal of state patronage to the development sector.[39: More than one half of the GDP was drained out of Kashmir, and except the construction of pleasure gardens; a a few mosques and a military cantonment, no interest was shown to the productive sector.] Without any regard for one-crop-a-year economy in Kashmir, the Mughals increased the land revenue from one-third to one-half,[40: Allami, Ain-i-Akbari, 374] and not less than half of the gross domestic product (GDP) was drained out of Kashmir to the capital of the Mughals as the state share.[41, Allami?]

Yet, Hangloo says

In 1586 when the valley was included in the Mughal empire, the land revenue was theoretically demanded at one third of the produce but in practice it amounted to two thirds. Emperor Akbar fixed the land revenue demand at one half.[2] Under the Afghans (1553-1819) the state demand worked out to 60 to 65 percent of the produce.[3] The Sikh rulers (1819-1846) fixed the state's share of produce generally at one half but over and above this share the state levied a number of cesses.[4]

This illustrates the difficulty of assessing land revenue demands. The headline figure is not all there is to it. A lot depends on the revenue collection system. I expect the pre-Mughal revenue collection system used middlemen, who apparently took as much money as the state. Akbar, on the other hand, employed salaried employees to collect revenue. But salaried employees are prone to corruption. So the system seems to have returned to middlemen again.

There are two other facts from Wani's account that are worth noting:

• drain of wealth. Whatever money the Mughal court took would have been spent on the state machinery and the army etc. The Kashmiris, who had little participation in these, would have seen little of it. So, roughly half the money went out of the Kashmiri economy. This kind of drain would have continued under Afghans and Sikhs too. But Dogras, being locals, couldn't "drain" the wealth in that way. The money paid to Dogras stayed within the Kashmiri economy. So, one would expect that things must have gotten better under the Dogras.
• one-crop-a-year-economy. If Kashmiris could grow only one crop a year, they would be obviously be poorer than the rest of the country. This would explain the observations of the British observers, many of whom say that the Kashmiris were poorer than what they saw in the rest of India. This has very little to do with what the government did. Jammu and Kashmir, being a large, underpopulated state, would have had higher administrative costs than other places. In fact, it seems that the Dogra regime was often in the red. Despite all the self-congratulatory accolades that Lawrence gives himself, Zutshi says that he didn't make much difference in practice. His reforms were also counterproductive in some ways. We should be careful not to take Lawrence at face value. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 01:49, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

It is also interesting that Wani is writing in 2016 in an apparently international venue, yet he doesn't know the standard history that the Indian historians know. The reference "[2]" in Hangloo's article is

• Irfan Habib, Agrarian System of Mughal India, 1962

This should have been standard stuff that every historian is expected to know. So, almost nothing you read regarding Kashmir is historically based. Notice also this comment from Zutshi:

King Lalitaditya, who ruled Kashmir in the eighth century, is quoted in the Rajatarangini as having said, “Cultivators must be repressed and their style of living must be lower than that of the city people or the latter will suffer.”[22] Clearly, this system was not a product of the nineteenth century, although Kashmiri poetry from this century is rife with references to the evisceration of the countryside to provide for the inhabitants of urban areas.

We don't know the land revenue demand of Lalitaditya but I don't think it would have been particularly different from the modern times. This is how India always operated. And, for the first hundred years of their rule, the British happily collaborated with the system, draining India's wealth to Britain. They even did worse, by instituting trade protection, which impoverished the urban populations in addition to the rural populations. Look at famines during the British rule. So, sorry, if Lawrence comes tom-toming himself to be a big hero trying to save the Kashmiris, we have to take it in perspective. Lawrence was also politicising and communalising the Kashmiri grievance, which was probably not much different from the rest of India, except for the fact that they were living in a one-crop-a-year economy. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 09:45, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

References

References

Foreign rule section

ps: why is that section called "Foreign rule"? why not "Sikh rule" or something more appropriate, descriptively neutral. Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 14:18, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

See the section above titled "Foreign rule". More generally, I thought there was overuse and abuse of religion in this article. And, it is getting worse. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 14:38, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

References

@Kautilya3: Indeed. The Muslim rule section, one above the Foreign rule section, looks short and odd. Needs more summary from WP:RS. It has a quote, the source claimed for that quote is Muhammad Asimov and Clifford Bosworth. The source starts the same way, but is stating something different:

Shah Mir arrived in Kashmir in 1313 along with his family, during the reign of Suhadeva (1301–1320), whose service he entered. In subsequent years, through his tact and ability, Shah Mir rose to prominence and became one of the most important personalities of his time. Later after the death in 1338 of Udayanadeva, the brother of Suhedeva he was able to assume the kingship himself and thus laid the foundation of permanent Muslim rule in Kashmir. – Muhammad Asimov and Clifford Bosworth

I don't see the "due to his race" etc part. The part starting with "Rinchan..." looks odd. We should be quoting exact. Do you see the support for "race" etc part anywhere? Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 15:34, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

Looks like it was vandalised. I have fixed it now. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 15:53, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

References

Paraphrasing

Will someone explain to me how, and by what rules of precis writing, the sentence:

Not only are Jammu, Ladakh, Azad Kashmir and Gilgit Baltistan separate from the Kashmir Valley geographically, they are also non-Kashmiri areas, with the Kashmir Valley being the genuine Kashmir

constitutes a paraphrase of the longer quote from Christopher Snedden's book, Understanding Kashmir and Kashmiris (OUP, 2015, pages 18 and 19) to which the sentence is cited:

In 1947, Kashmir was a geographically identifiable region that was called the Vale of Kashmir or the Kashmir Valley...In 1947, the other regions of J&K were not as well known as Kashmir. Jammu and other non-Kashmiri areas of J&K, except possibly Ladakh, had never enjoyed the geo-political unity, regional existence or continuous rule that Kashmiris had experienced for long periods...Kashmir's acclaim is why J&K was popularly called 'Kashmir'

Will they explain why this particular excerpt from Snedden has been chosen and how does highlighting it reconcile with other significant content about usage involving the word "Kashmir" in the introduction of the book, for example, in the first paragraph of the introduction, on page 7:

What is Kashmir? Who are Kashmiris? Terminology is important, especially if its use is clear. The term 'Kashmir' refers to the former princely 'State of Jammu and Kashmir', to use its official title. Under British rule of the Indian subcontinent that ended in 1947, the people called this entity 'Kashmir'.

Finally, will they explain, what significant NPOV content does this sentence add that is not already included in the sentence occurring earlier in the lead: "Until the mid-19th century, the term "Kashmir" denoted only the valley between the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal mountain range."

Until such time as I receive a cogent answer, I shall be removing this sentence from the lead. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:01, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

The previous sentence is simply not sufficiently clear enough and only seems to be limited in scope to the mid 19th century. It does not really make clear that 'Kashmir' is uniquely the Valley in all ways-geographically, culturally and ethnically- even today (and will be forever). Towns Hill

I asked for rules of paraphrasing, not your personal emotional fantasies. Please take this seriously, otherwise I will take this page to dispute resolution. You and other editors who are adding nonsensical, undigested, content are doing a major disservice to Wikipedia. Again, tell me how you managed "genuine." It doesn't occur anywhere in the first 100 pages of the cited text. This page has been stable for some ten years. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:37, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

Foreign rule

I am tentatively labelling the Mughal, Afghan and Sikh rule as "foreign rule". I was prompted by a comment of Wasiq 9320. But this is in fact how Kashmiris themselves think of this period. Some citations:

• Minahan, James B. (2012), Ethnic Groups of South Asia and the Pacific: An Encyclopedia: An Encyclopedia, ABC-CLIO, pp. 185–, ISBN 978-1-59884-660-7
• Dulat, A. S.; Sinha, Aditya (2015), Kashmir: The Vajpayee Years, HarperCollins India, pp. 130–, ISBN 978-93-5177-067-1
• Kalla, Krishan Lal (1985), The Literary Heritage of Kashmir, Mittal Publications, pp. 52–, GGKEY:7JAXGZQJRGN

Comments welcome. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 23:01, 20 December 2016 (UTC)

There is no Wikipedia mandate to spout the views of native Kashmiris in an article on Kashmir. Historians around the world don't grant Kashmirs any such privilege. Christopher Snedden for example, says, on page 55 of Understanding Kashmir and Kashmiris (OUP, 2015) "Following two attempts in 1813 and 1814, the Sikhs finally captured Kashmir in 1819 from the Durrani Afghans. This ended Muslim rule in, and over, this region, that had begun in 1339." Fowler&fowler«Talk» 16:19, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

Christopher Snedden is not a historian. He is a political scientist. He tends to view Kashmir in terms of present day political conflicts. But there is no evidence that this "view" is historically valid.

Chitralekha Zutshi states, on the contrary:

Almost all works on the history of Kashmir consistently portray the incorporation of the Kashmir Valley into Mughal India after Chak rule as the beginning of the end of Kashmiri independence, when Kashmiriyat came under threat from outsiders.

and when it passed to Afghan hands:

The same process unfolded in Kashmir, with the significant difference that, instead of becoming an independent kingdom, Kashmir succumbed to the Afghans in 1752.

and, finally, for the move to the Sikh hands, she doesn't even grace it with a separate section in the book. More emphatically, she says:

And yet, Kashmir from the mid-eighteenth to the mid-nineteenth centuries presents a clear case for the existence and articulation of a sense of belonging to a homeland, or mulk, which, although uttered in muffled tones for fear of persecution, was hardly weak or incoherent.

I also find your words Historians around the world don't grant Kashmirs any such privilege quite ironic. Nobody needs to grant any such privilege. Every people have an inherent privilege to define themselves. It is not anybody's job to define it for them or "grant" it to them. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 18:08, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

See also Victoria Schofield, p.3:

With the incorporation of Kashmir into the Mughal Empire, the valley of Kashmir’s long history as a kingdom in its own right came to an end... although the lives of the people were undeniably harsh, none of their rulers was answerable to some alien power in Kabul, Lahore or Delhi; accordingly, their actions form part of a history which Kashmiris regard as undeniably their own.

No religious distinctions here. The distinction between native and alien rule is clearly made.

Perhaps we can say "alien rule" instead of "foreign rule"? I am open to suggestions. What I don't want is a colonial-style religious classification into Hindu/Muslim/Sikh rules, when it is clear that it has no historical validity. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 19:50, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

Please stick to the relevant points not to ironies perceived, epiphanies experienced about systemic bias or rescue fantasies nurtured about native Kashmiri historiography. Again, in less allegorical language: how history of a certain region is documented by scholars of that region may be a WP editor's burning desire for seeing in print, but it is not Wikipedia policy. The best sources, published by well-regarded academic presses, reviewed in reputed academic journals, and cited by other scholars, come before shabby scholarship, whether foreign or indigenous. Period. Whether Snedden is in a political science department is unimportant. He has done work in the history of the Kashmir dispute, especially the Poonch rebellion of 1947, work that has been "christopher+snedden"+kashmir&btnG=&hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5 reviewed in scholarly journals. In contrast, A. S. Dulat, the man you have requisitioned for doing yeoman work on the native Kashmir POV is a policeman, the former head of India's famous or infamous spy agency RAW as well as the internal spy agency Intelligence Bureau, during the years the Hindu nationalists were in power 1998-2005. Dulat famously said that a Kashmiri “rarely speaks the truth to you because he feels you are lying to him”. A quote he repeats is “the only thing straight in Kashmir is a poplar tree”. I am very confused. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 10:25, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

References

@Kautilya3: Why not retitle all the subsections by century or year? Like pre-14th century, 14th-18th, etc? Or, pre-1338 CE, 1338-1819 etc? Alien rule is as odd as Foreign rule. Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 20:55, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

Well, the section titling is not really the big issue. If and when Mughan rule and Afghan rule have decent coverage, they can become sections of their own. But I am keen on documenting the fact that this is how Kashmiris view their history. And, that is something every reader of this page needs to know. It is not something that I particularly like. But who am I to say? -- Kautilya3 (talk) 21:18, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

The new section titles are better. Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 16:54, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

Anti-Muslim policies of Sikhs

The current text says:

The Sikhs enacted a number of anti-Muslim laws,[45] which included handing out death sentences for cow slaughter,[43] closing down the Jamia Masjid in Srinagar,[45] and banning the azaan, the public Muslim call to prayer.[45]

This was apparently done by the governor Moti Ram, about whom we hear, he was the "best governor" and "kind-hearted and liked by the people". Despite the measures indicated above, In all other religious matters Muslims were given full freedom. It also appears from this source that the Jama Masjid was not closed, but congregational prayers on Fridays in the Jama Masjid of Srinagar were banned.

Meenakshi Jain, a reasonably good but pro-Hindu historian, says this, regarding Ranjit Singh:

Similarly, the Sikh ruler, Ranjit Singh, while identifying with the Khalsa tradition, issuing coins in the name the Gurumutta (the general council of Sikh leaders), banning cow slaughter in his domain and azam in the holy city in Amritsar (his only recorded act which could be considered "anti-Muslim," Bayly 2001:219-220), did not endeavour to curb the practice of Islam in his kingdom. Muslim learned men were invited to the court when Ranjit Singh first assumed royal title in 1801. Ranjit Singh also appointed Nizamuddin qazi and head of the Muslims of the Lahore region, thereby fulfilling an important requirement for Punjab to be regarded dar-ul-Islam, a land where Islam could be freely practised. In a public gesture or respect, Ranjit Singh visited the mausoleums of Data Ganj Bakhsh and Shah Abdul Maali and made offerings.[4] He contributed to the repair of mosques in his kingdom, besides granting land for the upkeep of several Muslim shrines (Gupta 1991:425-428).

So the evidence is mixed, which is not reflected in the article text. I don't know enough about the Jama Masjid closure, but I do know that the Jama Masjid is an intensely political place till this day. Banning or restricting it could have been a political measure, rather than a religious one, especially given all the other evidence we have of the religious tolerance of these rulers. Pinging Joshua Jonathan and Ms Sarah Welch for their input. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 12:59, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

We also know that Guru Tegh Bahadur was executed for defending Kashmiri Brahmins. That needs to be covered too, to set the scene of the religious conflicts of the period. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 13:03, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

And also the fact that Kashmiri Hindus were force fed beef in order to convert them to Islam permanently. Once again, this means that cow slaughter has become a political symbol, rather than a religious one. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 13:10, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

@Kautilya3: First thing first. A quick wikitool scan suggests that at least one large para in Sikh-Kashmir section is exact copy of page 12 of this published about 3 years ago (don't know who copied whom, but 'lulu' publisher is non-RS, and if the wikipedia article is a copy of that source, we need surgery and rewrite).

Evidence is mixed indeed. While working on the Ranjit Singh article with @Apuldram, it was loud and clear that sources were divided on Sikh-Muslim relations during his era. Some Sikhs and Muslims had a relationship of respect, tolerance and support, as well as had serious regional conflicts, each side presented as persecuting the other. Ranjit Singh's army and administration had Muslims, for example. There was a period of mutual retaliation, particularly in Kashmir and elsewhere, depending on who was in power. For balance and NPOV, all this needs to be carefully summarized, they do not suggest one side only as persecutor or only as persecuted. Further, there were differences in the quality and aspects of Sikh-Sufi, Sikh-Shia, Sikh-Sunni relations. Other sources to consider for that section: Bayly, Ahmed, Low, and Murphy.

The text was contributed by Fowler&fowler in 2011. So it is obvious who copied from whom :-) Not that I would ever doubt the integrity of Fowler! -- Kautilya3 (talk) 14:38, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

@Apuldram: any other sources and suggestions to improve the balance and quality of Sikh-Kashmir section? Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 14:03, 2 January 2017 (UTC)

After some research, here are my conclusions. The banning of cow-slaughter and the banning azan were policies of the Sikh state, which were implemented throughout the empire, not specifically with regard to Kashmir. Rajmohan Gandhi Chitralekha Zutshi says at one point that these were ways of the Sikh state distinguishing itself from a Mughal identity. But Meenakshi Jain shows that the banning of cow-slaughter was done by all "Hindu" (i.e., Indic) rulers in this period throughout the subcontinent, clearly a religious, but not necessarily communal, assertion. The Hindu-Sikh distinctions were not underlined at this time. So, Hindus and Sikhs jointly formed the "ruling class" of the Sikh empire. At the same time, there was no religious bigotry. Ranjit Singh's rule seems more akin to Akbar's than Aurangzeb's.

The "closure" of the Jama Masjid was a specific policy of Dewan Moti Ram in Kashmir. Victoria Schofield explains:

Fearing discontent amongst the local population, Moti Ram closed the Jama Masjid to prevent crowds of disaffected Muslims from gathering there. Although the motive may have been political rather than religious, the closure of the mosque upset the local Muslim Kashmiris.

So I was right in saying that it was a political measure, rather than a religious one. I will edit the article according to this information. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 13:37, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

I suggest that you, and others here, not engage in research, treating all sources as equal---and with those suiting your long-held prejudices more equal---and making a mess of the page semantically and stylistically. Instead, let the experts who write text books, tertiary texts, or survey articles on Kashmir historiography, draw those conclusions. Please also don't edit the article according to whatever "information" you have divined unless you want to turn this article into a disputed page. There is no dispute about the horrors of Sikh rule in Kashmir. How many sources published by academic presses do you want me to cite? This is the main article on the Kashmir region. Its history section is perforce written in summary style. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:58, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler: Both @Kautilya3 and you are seasoned editors; for new editors/watchers of this page, let us recap WP:PSTS: "Wikipedia articles should be based on reliable, published secondary sources and, to a lesser extent, on tertiary sources and primary sources." Zutshi source used in the current section is not an encyclopedia nor text book nor tertiary source, it is a secondary source. So are others, they too survey/review past literature in part, just like Zutshi does. If you two and others want to see the history section in a tertiary source, see the history section in this. Reads very different from the history section in this article. Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 20:46, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

Please don't try recap WP policy sanctimoniously. I can do that too. Academic presses are more reliable than books published by Podunk Press on a side lane off Ansari Road in Old Delhi especially those dear to authors carrying monkeys of Hindu nationalist bias on their backs and nursing long ambitions to see them in print. Wikipedia doesn't explicitly say that, but it does more or less allude to that. See WP:SCHOLARSHIP: "Articles should rely on secondary sources whenever possible. For example, a review article, monograph, or textbook is better than a primary research paper. ...Material such as an article, book, monograph, or research paper that has been vetted by the scholarly community is regarded as reliable, where the material has been published in reputable peer-reviewed sources or by well-regarded academic presses." Compare the Google Scholar citation index of Chitralekha Zutshi's book or Mridu Rai's book and contrast it with those of the nobodys you are discussing here. In what history journal has 5000 years of Kashmir History been reviewed? (Really 5000 years?). The particular Britannica page you have cited is mostly about the post 1846 history of Kashmir. The pre-1846 history of the region, if it important, is in the Regonal States c. 1700--1850 page in Britannica's India page, and written by historian Sanjay Subrahmanhyan. That is doesn't say anything explicitly about Sikhs and Kashmir is because it does not consider it notable in such a compressed history. Let me put it bluntly: please don't engage in research here or in assessing due or undue weight and then in the interests of putative balance, like CNN, lower the bar so much that every prejudice leaps over it. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 02:03, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler, Sorry, I didn't realize when I started this discussion that it was your text. Nevertheless, I am afraid your text is not convincing. It sounds at best like a Muslim POV gripe. The banning of cow-slaughter and the banning of azan are essentially symbolic, and the "closure" of Jama Masjid is a political act, as Schofield has explained. If this is the best evidence you can come up with, it seems like you are blowing things up. I don't have access to the TN Madan source that you cited, and I guess you don't have access to Rajmohan Gandhi source either. But I can reproduce copious passages from it if you like. "Horrors of Sikh rule" sounds bad. More sources would be helpful. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 20:57, 3 January 2017 (UTC)

If you are serious, please revert the page to the stable version that had existed for ten years and that you and others are for a month now fast turning into a semantic and stylistic nightmare. We can then discuss what to add, remove, or amend. Otherwise, you are looking at this page turning into a disputed page. For your information, Triloki Nath Madan is one of India's most esteemed sociologists. That you don't have access to his work is not my problem. Go to a library. In contrast, Raj Mohan Gandhi is merely a popular biographer, who for most of his career was rearming people morally and declaiming from the lecterns of high schools of many continents: "If you point a finger at someone, there are three pointing back at you." Where did he receive his PhD and in what field? In what field of scholarship has he published? His foray into the 300-year history of Punjab has been published by a little known press in New Delhi (with address: SECTOR-2, 110049,, Pocket B, Sector 2, RK Puram, New Delhi, Delhi 110001) and founded in 2011. Please contrast the reviews of the book in scholarly journals (zero) with Zutshi's or Rai's books. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 02:03, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

Please don't badger Ms Sarah Welch. She only came over to offer advice on the Sikh rule coverage. I haven't done that much with the article either. Towns Hill has been adding a large amount of material lately. I cam over to review it and, if possible, clean it. I was more or less happy with what was here earlier but I also think it had seeds for degeneration. Given that Kashmir is a highly contested topic, that was bound to happen sooner or later.

My impression is that the History of Kashmir is an underdeveloped subject, quite surprising given its importance. What exists is basically reconstructed from popular memory, notes or texts from local people and observers etc. But this reconstruction does conflict quite seriously with authentic history we know about the other areas. Akbar is known as one of the kindest rulers of India, but the Kashmiris regard his rule as loss of independence. Ranjit Singh is known as a tolerant ruler, but Kashmiris see religious persecution in the Sikh rule. So on. These contradictions haven't been resolved. Zutshi presents both sides of the picture and leaves it at that. Perhaps we should do the same.

I am getting busy with RL at this time. Give me a couple of weeks, and I will move stuff over to History of Kashmir and leave this article roughly what it was earlier. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 10:13, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler:, @Kautilya3: Indeed. I have never edited this article, am here because I was pinged. I am glad @F&f concurs secondary sources are fine. Quality of the source matters indeed. Well-respected publishers or those with a peer review process, sources that have been reviewed in journals, sources cited in scholarly publications, sources authored or edited by peer-reviewed oft-cited scholars are better, and WP:RS to be preferred particularly in contested articles. @K: per my hazy memory, many of your comments in several posts on this talk page are generally supported by better quality sources, but these need to be located and cited. You are also quite right about Zutshi's publications. Her 2004 and 2014 books present many sides of the Kashmir literary story/history. Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 11:20, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

I am saying something more than just that secondary sources are fine. Rather, in compressed histories, especially in topics in which there are so many secondary sources as to support the craziest assertions, the job of selecting what to highlight, or of choosing how to summarize, can't be left to WP editors. I am suggesting that it belongs to authors of high-level (or, rather, higher-level) histories such as secondary/tertiary textbooks, or survey books, and sometimes in their absence, the set of books that might qualify have to be chosen judiciously. There is not always a WP guideline for this. That is the reason why in the histories I have written on WP, such as, for example, in the India, the British Raj and Company rule in India page, I have preferred textbooks used around the world (such as Burton Stein's A History of India or Metcalf and Metcalf's A Concise History of Modern India or Asher and Talbot's India before Europe or Anthony Low's book on Decolonization) to more specialized monographs (such as Bayly's Empire and Information or Low's Britain and Indian Nationalism, the Imprint of Ambiguity etc); when the latter are used, it is to illustrate a consensus view or a significant disagreement. I'm not sure what Kautilya3 has been doing on this page. For example, there are a number of reputable textbooks or scholarly surveys which talk about the Hindu elite in Kashmir during Dogra rule. One example is, Talbot, Ian; Singh, Gurharpal (2009), The Partition of India, Cambridge University Press. Pp. xviii, 206, ISBN 978-0-521-76177-2:

The modern history of Jammu and Kashmir is normally dated from the Treaty of Lahore (1846) which ended Sikh rule in the province and marked the beginning of a Hindu monarchy what lasted almost a century. During this period the Hindu elite established an ethnically and economically stratified society in which the status of the vast majority of Muslims was reduced to that of a heavily exploited and servile peasantry. (p. 54)"

In the presence of such high quality high-level opinions what is the point of mentioning a journal article as a "but on the other hand" opinion, unless it is a significant disagreement? In that sense, especially in vital, high-level, summary articles, all reliable secondary sources are not equal. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:54, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler: For more than 85% of world's population, English is neither the first nor the second language. Claims such as "textbooks used around the world" need caution and verification, even in the English-as-first-language part of the world. This and other meta-discussion on other articles or wiki policy in general is best addressed on some other talk page(s). For NPOV in this article, all significant sides found in quality sources are best summarized, just like Zutshi does, and as @Kautilya3 is suggesting. If multiple quality sources present different views/sides, more so. Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 16:14, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

I agree with Fowler that, for deciding what to highlight in a summary article, textbooks are a good guide. But for figuring out what the scholarly consensus is (or even whether it exists), we need to look at all the available sources. WP:NPOV asks us to do so. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 18:02, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

Ms Sarah Welch: This is the English Wikipedia. I have never seen any injunction to accommodate all scholarly opinions in all languages of the world. The sources that Kautilya3 has listed here are multiple no doubt, but quality they are not. One the one hand are two well-known historians of the 1947 partition, especially in the Punjab, Ian Talbot and Gurhapal Singh, from whom I have quoted above. On the other hand is an Indian policemen, the head of the notorious Indian spy agency, RAW, under Hindu nationalist dispensations, no less---during whose tenure many Kashmiris disappeared, and the ones who did not were at least maimed, blinded, tortured or had their loved ones disappear---who has written a book on Kashmir, as a cruel joke. We are being told that the rigorous work of Talbot should be considered just as reliable and the garbage written by the retired cop. What sort of joke is this? As for Zutshi's book, which I first introduced on this page, as did I Mridu Rai, it is a cross between a literary history and a longue durée. It is easy to write it as literary non-fiction in which nothing explicit needs to be said. Wikipedia histories are not. They are meat and potatoes histories If you so desire, you can create a new page Historical imagination in Kashmir and quote Zutshi to your heart's content. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 20:04, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

Kautilya3, please don't do me the disservice of claiming that you agree with me. I am suggesting that WP editors are not in a position to determine what the scholarly consensus is. It is the meta histories, macro histories, that make that determination. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 20:04, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler:, @Kautilya3: Claims that "a scholarly book is a widely used textbook and therefore tertiary/meta-history" needs verification. If it is "widely used textbook", someone should be able to identify a list of schools that use it as textbook. Who is the RAW/cop-author mentioned above? I suggested Bayly, Ahmed, Low, and Murphy above, along with the 2 books and other papers of Zutshi. Quality of the source matters indeed. Reread my comment above. Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 20:45, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

I think we are hopelessly mixing up issues here. Neither Talbot/Singh nor the Indian policeman had anything to say about the Sikh rule in Kashmir. As far as the Sikh rule is concerned, all the sources we have been discussing here are scholarly.

• Fowler wants to contest whether Rajmohan Gandhi is a scholar. Well, he is not an academic or researcher. I suppose I might call him a writer. His specialty is communal conflicts and that is what he is trying to discuss in this book. He has some 5-10 page discussion on Ranjit Singh's communal/non-communal outlook and he reviews a lot of literature on the subject, whose authors are people that Fowler will probably accept as scholars.
• The same goes for Zutshi. Her own research is on Kashmiri literature but, in the course of presenting it, she reviews the history, attributing it to historians (both Kashmiri historians and academic historians). The remark about Ranjit Singh trying to distinguish himself from a Mughal identity is sourced to Christopher Bailey.
• Meenakshi Jain is a historian but, in this book Parallel Pathways, she is reviewing the literature (on Hindu-Muslim relations generally, in the post-Mughal period). She has 3-4 page coverage on Ranjit Singh, which is all sourced to historians who researched the subject.

All of them count as "textbook authors" to me, who are bringing together a lot of published material, precisely the kind of sources Fowler is recommending we should use.

I see that we are hopelessly deadlocked. Any source that we bring, it appears will be shot down by some criterion that Fowler has set for himself. The only solution might be to go for mediation. I don't know if I am up to it at this point. (As I have already said I am getting busy with RL.) So I will just sign off. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 21:58, 4 January 2017 (UTC)

@Ms Sarah Welch and Kautilya3: OK, let's stick to Bayly. Where in Empire and Information does he talk about the benign attitude of the Sikhs to the Muslims in Kashmir? Please provide chapter and verse. The only remote connection I can see there is his evocative description of William Moorcroft (in Bayly's words "one of the great European explorers and antiquarians of Central Asia ... who added greatly to the British stock of information about the Punjab and the western Himalayas, quite apart from the mapping of Turkestan. A veterinary surgeon trained in the Scottish and Continental schools, his reports were voluminous, empirical and discursive. His description of the varieties, manufacture and trade in Kashmir shawls, for instance, was one of the densest pieces of commercial reporting to pass through the Company's archive in the early nineteenth century." Well, what does this have to do with Sikh rule in Kashmir? Obviously, the same Moorecroft had something to say about the Sikh rule in Kashmir as well. Here is a native Kashmiri academic (so dear to Kautilya3) telling us what: Wani, Aijaj Ashraf (2016). "Ethnic identities and dynamics of regional and sub-regional assertions in Jammu and Kashmir". In Yu-Wen Chen (ed.). Borderland Politics in Northern India. Chih-yu Shih. Routledge. pp. 45–. ISBN 978-1-317-60517-1. :"In 1819, Afghan rule was replaced by Sikh rule, Maharaja Ranjit Singh of Punjab, who carved out a strong empire by defeating the Afghans, annexed Kashmir in 1819, and governed it through his deputies called Subedars. The Sikh ruled Kashmir up to 1846, i.e. for 27 years; but during these few years, Kashmir suffered too much to find any precedent in the annals of its history. ... Moorecroft who visited Kashmir just five years after Sikh occupation of Kashmir has left many heartrending accounts of oppression ... by Sikh administrators. He says:

Everywhere the people are in the most abject conditions; exorbitantly taxed by the Sikh government and subjected to every kind of extortion and oppression by its own officers."

Fowler&fowler«Talk» 05:20, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler: Please reread my comment above. Nowhere does it state "benign attitude of X towards Y". From what I remember from my readings of Sikh history, Muslim governments/armies oppressed Sikhs, Sikh governments/armies oppressed Muslims, in a cycle of distrust and retaliatory violence. They also cooperated (Sufi Muslim saints and Sikh Gurus). On Bayly, see page 85 (Ranjit Singh - Izatullah cooperation). The political dynamics in the Sikh Empire, including those related to Kashmir, are on pages 128-141. Bayly and the additional sources I suggested above, are for @Kautilya3 and you to consider, both of you may decide, they are or they are not relevant for this article. Ms Sarah Welch (talk) 06:34, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

I asked because I had read Bayly's book carefully when it first came out some 20 years ago. I didn't think then, nor do I now, that it has much information on the Punjab. Although, its focus is intelligence and its use by the British to prevail (and at times to bumble) in India, Bayly's main field of interest had remained the North-Western Provinces (the name for United Provinces during the 19th century), his first love. Anyways, thanks. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:43, 5 January 2017 (UTC)

References

F&f's refs for taxation in Kashmir during Sikh rule

• (Kashmir: Shawls and Empires, 1500-2000, Michelle Maskiell, From: Journal of World History, Volume 13, Number 1, Spring 2002 pp. 27-65 | 10.1353/jwh.2002.0019) "The Kashmiri shawl trade in Asia was often disrupted by political turmoil in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and by the heavy tax demands of the Afghan and Sikh regimes that conquered Kashmir."
• Chowdhary, Rekha (2015). Jammu and Kashmir: Politics of Identity and Separatism. Routledge. pp. 5–. ISBN 978-1-317-41405-6. "The early assertion of Kashmiri identity was a consequence of the socio-economic situation in which the Kashmiri Muslims were placed. As the historical evidence shows, the condition of Kashmiris was quite dismal, as they were stricken by widespread poverty and faced severe hardships. Most depressing was the class of peasantry and the artisans who formed the largest number of people. The peasantry did not enjoy the proprietary rights on the land. While many of the provided labour to the absentee landlords in the Valley, many others were forced to leave the Valley in search of livelihood. The Dogra rule, established in 1846, had continued with the oppressive pattern of land ownership and land-tenure that was introduced since the tie of the Sikh rulers. As per this pattern, though the state owned all the land, jagirdars were granted large tracts of land and other than the landless peasantry the tilling was done by the tenants and tenants-at-will." Quote in Chowdhary's text: "Quote: The land revenue was exorbitant and the rent which the land-holders, farmers, and jagirdars collected was heavy. The peasantry usually left the land fallow and took to less exacting vocations; and in the Kashmir province, it was usually forced to cultivate the land. The peasantry also bore the brunt of paying a large number of cesses and taxes that the State imposed upon them. The State was also entitled to Begar, which meant forced labour and compulsory appropriation of goods and services from people (Kaur, 1996: 6) "
• Ekhtiar, Maryam (2011). Masterpieces from the Department of Islamic Art in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Metropolitan Museum of Art. pp. 399–400. ISBN 978-1-58839-434-7. Quote: "Kashmir was famous for the production of this type of textile. However, during the 1830s, hardships and severe taxation led Kashmiri weavers to leave the country ..."
• Textile Museum Journal. Textile Museum. 1982. p. 8."... the shawl industry in Kashmir faced increasing economic difficulties. Famines, epidemics among the shawl goats, growin competition from Eruope, and most important, severe government taxation, all had a detrimental effect on the industry. Diwan Kripa Ram, who became Sikh governor of Kashmir in 1827, demanded a tax of 26 percent ad valorem, which secured a considerable part of his annual state revenue. Such excessive taxes forced large numbers of Kashmir weavers to leave the country in the 1830s."
• Ames, Frank (1986). The Kashmir shawl and its Indo-French influence. Antique Collectors' Club. ISBN 978-0-907462-62-0. "The shawl industry began to decline with the institution of the dagshawl tax system during the beginnings of Afghan rule in Kashmir. The warring Sikhs sustained this system, perhaps not in name but in practice, if only to support their military exploits. The natural calamities of the 1830s caused the weavers to emigrate en masse to the Punjab, leaving their homeland. Finally, the master weavers refused to teach young apprentices their trade. As Jacquemont wrote in 1831, 'not one white beard was seen throughout the karkhandars'. The arrival of the French agents gave the industry a tremendous lift which lasted for twenty years. The moving eulogy of Hajji Mukhtar Shah's narrative shows the Kashmiri's deep recognition of the French, who did so much to spur creativity and employment in a depressed industry."
• Rizvi, Janet (2001). Trans-Himalayan Caravans: Merchant Princes and Peasant Traders in Ladakh. Oxford University Press. p. 60. ISBN 978-0-19-565817-0. "Moorcroft himself, passing through Amritsar in 1820, had encountered refugee Kashmiri weavers. He reported that: 'The yarn was formerly imported from Kashmir, but the [Sikh] Governor of that country has prohibited the export at the request, he pretends, of the Kashmirian weavers but, in reality, to discourage the foreign manufacture of shawls, the duty on which constitutes the chief source of his revenue.' "

Fowler&fowler«Talk» 01:53, 6 January 2017 (UTC)

please someone add the Hellenic alphabet word to the article

the article notes that the Ancient Hellenic name of Kashmir was Kasperia but does not contain the word in the Hellenic alphabet, which is Κασπηρία. Please can someone add it? Thank you. Andreas Mamoukas (talk) 17:45, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

I will add it. But do you have a reliable source for it. I have asked for a source ages ago, but none has appeared. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 00:11, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

Indian subcontinent and South Asia

The term Indian subcontinent in the lead sentence, which describes the geographical location of Kashmir, had stood stably in this article since 2007. It has recently been changed a few times to "South Asia."

Although I am generally in favor of using "South Asia" as a more geo-politically neutral term for "Indian subcontinent," it appears that the "Indian subcontinent" is still the predominantly-used geophysics and physical geography term.

• The Oxford English Dictionary, in its etymology of the adjective "South Asian" defines South Asia to be: "the name given to the southern part of Asia, now usually taken to comprise India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, and usually also Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, and the Maldives, and sometimes also Afghanistan, Burma (Myanmar) Tibet, and Iran." In its entry on the "Indian subcontinent," it says, "Also used with wider application to include Bhutan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and the Maldives. The term is roughly equivalent to South Asia, esp. in the wider use, although Indian subcontinent is sometimes considered to be more of a geophysical description, and South Asia more geopolitical."
• Encyclopaedia Britannica begins its "Kashmir" page with: "Kashmir, region of the northwestern Indian subcontinent. It is bounded by the Uygur Autonomous Region of Xinjiang to the northeast and the Tibet Autonomous Region to the east (both parts of China), by the Indian states of Himachal Pradesh and Punjab to the south, by Pakistan to the west, and by Afghanistan to the northwest."
• Among books on Geophysics or Physical Geography, there are 454 titles that have "Indian subcontinent" in contrast to 349 that use "south asia".
• In journal articles as well, in the fields of Geophysics or Physical Geography, there are 295 that favor "Indian subcontinent", and 236 that favor "South Asia"
• Although Kashmir is not a country, it is a geographical region. Wikipedia's own preference for the lead section of countries is: "The article should start with a good introduction, giving name of the country, location in the world, bordering countries, seas and the like," in other words, first the geographic location, then other stuff.
• Finally, per WP:CAUTIOUS and WP:UNRESPONSIVE, I feel that if the term in the lead sentence is to be changed from "Indian subcontinent" to "South Asia," it will need a wider discussion and consensus on this page.

I am therefore changing the lead sentence back to "Indian subcontinent." Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 00:05, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 2 April 2017

I would like to Request to Replace the main Image or Photo to the National Flag of Kashmir,Which is also available on Wikipedia. Thanks thumb Alidaar (talk) 19:04, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

• Comment The articles on other Indian states and divisions don't show an image of the flag. Do you mean something similar to what you have done to Kashmiri language? I would oppose that. Apuldram (talk) 21:52, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

Not done: please establish a consensus for this alteration before using the {{edit semi-protected}} template. EvergreenFir (talk) 19:38, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

Etymology

Please someone revise it per this article. 106.209.130.68 (talk) 13:05, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

Not done: It’s not clear what changes you would like made. Please request the change in a format: "add X" or "delete X" or "change X to Y". Apuldram (talk) 13:30, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

 Not done. This is not a reliable source. Please provide a reliable source. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 14:01, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

• @106.209.130.68: (1) I think you had etymology in mind, not entomology. (2) To me personally, the linked article is more convincing than any of the etymologies quoted in the article (actually I am of the opinion that the word kashmira is not of Sanskrit origin but, like many toponyms, predates the Indo-European era). However, given the WP:RS requirement on Wikipedia, articles should be based primarily on high-quality academic publications. — kashmiri ^TALK 18:25, 2 April 2017 (UTC)

• @Fowler&fowler: I think Snedden's book is anything but a RS on Indian etymologies, including the etymology of kashmir. The guy is a political scientist - I could not find any information that he would be an authority on Indo-European linguistics. I suggest we either find an alternative source for the Etymologies section or go back to what M.Monier-Williams proposes in his Sanskrit Dictionary 2nd ed. In any case, as a Sanskrit linguist, I won't be happy to have the current version stay. — kashmiri ^TALK 23:21, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

I might have been responsible for adding the Snedden source, prior to which there was only WP:OR. I don't mind it being replaced by better sourced content. However, I think the local traditions need to be mentioned too. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 23:44, 3 April 2017 (UTC)

Yes definitely, we need the traditional explanations of the word wherever they are common, but I think we need to be very clear that they belong to the same category of pseudo-etymologies as mananāt trāyate iti mantraḥ; almost bordering WP:FRINGE. Even if they happen to be cited in an Oxford-published book. — kashmiri ^TALK 00:50, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

I have revised the etymology section, including all etymologies (as per Sanskrit grammar, Nilamata Purana, 19th century Orientalists, folk etc). They are attributed (Bhattathiri, Babur, Wilson, Vigne, etc). Actually, the linked article is by a scholar of Sanskrit grammar is a very good reference (even though the author favours the traditional Sanskrit etymology, his research is thorough). Madanmohan123 (talk) 01:18, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

Kautilya3 why not reword and summarize, rather than delete altogether? The content had citations from many sources. Madanmohan123 (talk) 02:35, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

Well, it is in the edit history [1]. If Kashmiri can salvage anything from it, I am sure he will. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 02:40, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

That does not answer why you deleted everything rather than reword/summarize. You may have issues with Swarajya, but what is wrong in citing the other books (Sanskrit sources, Bhattathiri, Wilson, Vigne, etc)? Madanmohan123 (talk) 02:50, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

@Kashmiri: Whether or not you are a Sanskrit linguist, if you don't have a modern source, you don't have a source. Monier Williams (1872 edition, revised 1899) does not cut it. Besides it is a primary source. Please also read WP:NOTABOUTYOU. @Madanmohan123: This page is not about etymologies, in any case, beyond a cursory mention. If you want to discuss the etymology in detail please do so at the Wiktionary page. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 03:59, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler:, if detail is the issue, what I added can be briefly summarized. Given that there is a section on etymology, and there is a documented etymology of the Sanskrit word, it is relevant. At least as relevant as the other ones. What do you think? Madanmohan123 (talk) 06:14, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

@Madanmohan123: I applaud your diligence in finding the sources, but Misra is not a WP:RS source. By his own admission, as appearing in the biographical blurb, he is an investment banker who is an amateur researcher. He is moreover writing in a non-scholarly magazine. This is all very creditable, but does not make for a reliable source. You'll have to take out all the citations to Misra (and I mean every single one). Given that you don't seem to be aware of WP policy, I suggest that it is best, though, that you not add anything for now. In the next couple of days, I'll add some relevant material relating to the etymology of Kashmir from Michael Witzel's piece on Kashmiri Brahmins (this is the 1991 pre-print which was published as: Witzel, M. (1994). The Brahmins of Kashmir. A Study of the N¥ lamata. Aspects of Hinduism in ancient Kashmir. Ed. Yasuke Ikari. Kyoto: Institute for Research in Humanities, Kyoto University, 237-294.), which does have a few things on the etymology of Kashmir, though not as many as I had hoped. And also his slightly later work on Aryan and Non-Aryan names in Vedic India (Witzel, M. (1999). Aryan and Non-Aryan names in Vedic India. Data for the linguistic situation, c. 1900–500 BC. Aryan and Non-Aryan in South Asia, Evidence, Interpretation and Ideology. Cambridge Mass.: Harvard University (Harvard Oriental Series: Opera Minora III).) There is also fair amount of work he did on substrate languages of Indo-Aryan etc in the 1980s and 90s. Perhaps @Kautilya3: can look into this as well, as I'm a little pressed for time. You see, Madanmohan123, any reference to Kashmir occurs reliably for the first time in Indian literature in Patanjali c. 150BCE, (see Witzel, Brahmins). But this does not mean that the name itself is a Sanskrit name, and its creation a result of Sanskrit rules of noun formation. It could be a loan word from a non-IA language, or a Sanskritized version of a non-IA name. But, again, as I've said before, all this is very interesting, but it really does not belong to this page in any great detail. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 09:52, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

If kaś means 'to go' and mir means lake, that supports the first para, that the name refers to a dried up lake.
The whole section needs a copy edit. "popular, but uncertain" is pov and can be omitted. "Another" would be better than "An alternative, but also uncertain". etc. Apuldram (talk) 10:16, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

@Apuldram: The source says "uncertain." Witzel, an expert, also used "uncertain" in many places. Most of the early history of Kashmir is legendary. Please give me a few days. As I've explained above, I will add the etymology, whatever there is in the literature. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:18, 4 April 2017 (UTC)

@Apuldram: what you are saying is probably WP:OR. Misra's article cites Sanskrit sources (including Bhattathiri and Bhattoji Dikshita) which simply say kaś means 'to go' and nothing about mira being a lake. I can understand @Fowler&fowler: having issues with Misra being treated as reliable, but how can somebody have issues with reliable sources that Misra cites in his article: for example Bhattathiri and Bhattoji Dikshita? I do not know if @Fowler&fowler: knows Devanagari and Sanskrit, but as far as the Sanskrit etymology is concerned, somebody who can read Sanskrit is better suited to comment. As far as Witzel's article is concerned, it also refers to Nilamata Purana (NM) which traces to Kashyapa: nothing new. Madanmohan123 (talk) 02:28, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

@Madanmohan123: Like I said earlier, WP is only beholden to the reliable sources, not to personal opinions of Michael Witzel's work, or insinuations of what other editors know or don't know. Misra—an businessman, who pursues Sanskrit as a hobby is not a reliable source. It can't go in. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 07:04, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler: I get that, but what I am saying is that Bhattathiri and Bhattoji Dikshita are historical Sanskrit scholars. Their derivation of the word Kashmir should go in. Let us not cite Misra, but surely we can directly cite Bhattathiri, Bhattoji Dikshita, etc? Madanmohan123 (talk) 07:09, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

@Madanmohan123: Of course we can't. Their works constitute primary sources. We can only cite modern secondary sources, which on this contentious page should preferably be peer-reviewed scholarship. This is my last post in this particular thread. Please read WP's rules and guidelines. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 07:36, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

Edit request

Under the section on demographics, there is the following erroneous sentence Among the Muslims of the princely state, four divisions were recorded: "Shaikhs, Saiyids, Mughals, and Pathans. The reference in this article given for the statement is Imperial Gazetteer of India, volume 15. 1908. Oxford University Press, Oxford and London. pp. 99–102. But the original source does not say princely state. It uses Kashmir in the context of Kashmir Province when discussing these social divisions. Please change princely state to Kashmir since princely state includes Jammu and these were not the divisions among Jammu Muslims. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:C7D:9EAF:700:750B:31C9:443F:A08C (talk) 02:25, 8 April 2017 (UTC)

You are correct, of course. Thank you very much for your close reading of the IGI and also knowledge of historical Kashmir. This is an error that had lain buried in this page for ten years.

I have now changed it to "Kashmir province within the princely state." This is one of the great things about Wikipedia: people with specialist knowledge about a specific point, such as yourself, have means to more or less instantly access the encyclopedia and correct it. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 08:30, 8 April 2017 (UTC)

Note to others: please don't hyperlink "Kashmir province" to Kashmir valley, which is smaller. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 08:50, 8 April 2017 (UTC)

Well, in this instance, Kashmir valley is what is being talked about. No need to mention Kashmir province at all. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 10:53, 8 April 2017 (UTC)

As you will see in the map File:NWFP-Kashmir1909-a.jpg, Muzaffarabad, which was in Kashmir province and is today in Azad Kashmir, is not in the valley. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:02, 8 April 2017 (UTC)

PS I'm adding this here for possible future reference: the valley is 120 miles long at its greatest extent, running northwest to southeast, and including the inner slopes of its surrounding mountains as shown in an old Britannica page, but (allowing for some OR) Muzaffarabad was something like 140 miles from the southeast end of the valley, if actually measured in the map. The jagir of Punch, which is much closer to the valley, was in the province of Jammu (see top of same Britannica page) For modern, non-OR, proof see this book which clearly states that Muzaffarabad is outside the valley Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:34, 8 April 2017 (UTC)

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Reversion of 2 of my edits

I made 2 edits, but they seem to have been reverted and I have been asked to discuss the same on this page, so here goes:- Under the section titled, "Mughal rule", there is a sentence, "Later Mughal rulers oppressed Kashmir's Hindus and temple demolitions, forced conversions, rape and discrimination against Hindus occurred.", which I changed to, "Other than Jalal-ud-din Akbar who was tolerant, Muslim rulers oppressed Kashmir's Hindus and temple demolitions, forced conversions, rape and discrimination against Hindus occurred." as the source/reference used says exactly that.

I also edited this sentence in the lead, "The rule of his descendants, under the paramountcy (or tutelage) of the British Crown, lasted until 1947, when the former princely state of the British Indian Empire became a disputed territory, now administered by three countries: India, Pakistan and China." to, "The rule of his descendants, under the paramountcy (or tutelage) of the British Crown, lasted until 1947, when the former princely state of the British Indian Empire acceded to India, but Pakistan occupies its North-western, and China its North-eastern parts." as the accession is mentioned in the body of the article. Please stop reverting these edits or else I will be forced to complain!-Dona-Hue (talk) 20:11, 25 May 2017 (UTC)

The Chinese occupied those parts only in 1962 after annexing Tibet and Pakistan occupied those parts only in 1948, after Kashmir acceded to India. I am planning to mention 1962 and 1948 also now in that sentence!-Dona-Hue (talk) 20:41, 25 May 2017 (UTC)

As I didn't revert those edits, I hope you will accept my understanding of the edits.
The original second statement (that the region became a disputed territory) seems to me to reflect a neutral point of view, whereas your modification implies that Pakistan and China are in the wrong - a partisan point of view.
The first statement doesn't need to mention Jalal-ud-din Akbar. If you wish to show that not all of the rulers were intolerant, that can be done more simply by adding the adjective 'most' before Muslim. Apuldram (talk) 21:51, 25 May 2017 (UTC)

I accept your version of the first statement. The second is NPOV according to me as that is the fact - the Maharaja acceded to India. The Chinese claim Arunachal Pradesh also, but that is not considered disputed territory (it only mentions territorial disputes and since there is no reference for that I will be removing those words). In the same way, their claiming any other part should be mentioned as the facts are!-Dona-Hue (talk) 04:59, 26 May 2017 (UTC)

Even where a topic is presented in terms of facts rather than opinions, inappropriate tone can be introduced through the way in which facts are selected, presented, or organized. See Impartial tone. Apuldram (talk) 09:33, 26 May 2017 (UTC)

The first edit changes "later Mughal rulers" to everybody "other than Akbar". The source is vague about who did the oppression, whereas your edit brings in specifics which weren't in the source. That is source misrepresentation. Moreover, S. S. Toshkhani is an expert in literature/culture, not a reliable source for history. Ideally, we should not even be using this source. WP:NPOV means representing the scholarly consensus. It doesn't help to claim that one source said something. You need to know what all sources say.

Your second edit uses the term "occupied", which is not WP:NPOV. Very few reliable sources use such a term. The geography is also faulty. "Northwestern" is nowhere equivalent to "northern and western" (which is what the souce said). "Northeastern" is also not in the source. Finally, I don't think this detail is warranted in the lead. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 11:26, 26 May 2017 (UTC)

Okay, Kautilya3, so what should we do?

Can you find good, acceptable soùrces/references online so that we can add these 2 statements (I don't know if references I use will be acceptable)-Dona-Hue (talk) 09:25, 27 May 2017 (UTC)

As far as I know, there are no reliable sources that state what you believe. You should give up trying to add them. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 10:28, 27 May 2017 (UTC)

@Dona-Hue The article already discusses the position at length in neutral terms in the section Kashmir#Current status and political divisions. You appear to be trying to insert a point of view held by only one of the disputing parties. That infringes WP:NPOV, one of Wikipedia's three core content policies. You should give up trying to do that. Apuldram (talk) 11:33, 27 May 2017 (UTC)

@Apuldram. You wrote,"The first statement doesn't need to mention Jalal-ud-din Akbar. If you wish to show that not all of the rulers were intolerant, that can be done more simply by adding the adjective 'most' before Muslim." Can we add at least that sentence?-Dona-Hue (talk) 15:58, 27 May 2017 (UTC)

Another point-The Chinese occupied Eastern Ladakh (what they call Aksai Chin/Qin) only in 1962 and so, to say, "The rule of his descendants, under the paramountcy (or tutelage) of the British Crown, lasted until 1947, when the former princely state of the British Indian Empire became a disputed territory, now administered by three countries: India, Pakistan and China." is wrong and should be edited!-Dona-Hue (talk) 16:06, 27 May 2017 (UTC)

@Apuldram:, thanks for implementing the editor's concerns. Unfortunately, I find the source for the Mughal rulers passage quite dubious. If it is going to become contentious, we need a proper WP:HISTRS. There is quite a lot of propagand from all sides on this page. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 23:15, 27 May 2017 (UTC)

@Kautilya3, I am shocked that you have removed the sentence supported by the reference by Toshkiani. I suggest you restore it with a proper reference!-Dona-Hue (talk) 14:37, 28 May 2017 (UTC) Dona-Hue (talk) 14:37, 28 May 2017 (UTC)

I feel that that sentence is extremely important!-Dona-Hue (talk) 14:39, 28 May 2017 (UTC) Dona-Hue (talk) 14:39, 28 May 2017 (UTC)

You could probably use one of the references used in the article on Religious_violence_in_India - Dona-Hue (talk) 15:19, 28 May 2017 (UTC)

Apuldram can you add that sentence back with references from the article Religious_violence_in_India?- — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dona-Hue (talk • contribs) 16:42, 28 May 2017 (UTC)

Please read WP:HISTRS. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 17:34, 28 May 2017 (UTC)

Will do. There are reliable historical sources. Be patient. I'm rather busy. Apuldram (talk) 19:05, 28 May 2017 (UTC)

@Dona-Hue: There is no shortage of scholarly references to the intolerance of Jahangir and Aurangzeb to Hindus and Sikhs, but I haven't found a reference to that in Kashmir, apart from the one you provided, to S.S. Toshkhani, which Kautilya3 does not consider to be reliable by itself. Accordingly, until we have more evidence, I feel we should leave the section as it is. Apuldram (talk) 09:50, 3 June 2017 (UTC)

The Toshkhani reference was here much before I started editing this article. Kautilya3 is following me around and reverting all my edits, probably because I am breaking some Wikipedia rule or the other, so I will wait for you to do the needful. Thanks!—Dona-Hue (talk) 10:04, 3 June 2017 (UTC)

You should not make allegations against editors (of "following you around") without evidence, and certainly not on article talk pages. You can't possibly think the main article on Kashmir wouldn't be on my watch list?

If either of you have good sources for persecution by the Mughal rulers, please feel free to add them to the articles on those rulers. I am happy to learn, as always. But please make sure you use WP:HISTRS and, when there is conflicting information, present all POVs. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 10:13, 3 June 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 10 August 2017

203.24.7.9 (talk) 07:57, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

Change from "Indian-administered territory" to "Indian state", from "Pakistani-administered territories of Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan" to "Pakistan Occupied Kashmir and Pakistani-administered territory Gilgit-Baltistan"

✗ Not done That expresses a pov that is not supported by a reliable source. Apuldram (talk) 08:13, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 11 August 2017

It is not Azad Kashmir, it is POK 49.204.226.153 (talk) 17:24, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

 Not done Please cite a source that will explain and support your request. Apuldram (talk) 17:50, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

External links modified

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Name

jammu kashmir? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.48.68.73 (talk) 08:05, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

Please search for "name" in the archives of this talk page for past discussions. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 14:56, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

IP 171.48.68.73, Jammu and Kashmir is here, in case you want to read about it. cheers. --DBigXrayᗙ 15:59, 18 September 2018 (UTC)

Pakistan administered Kashmir AfD

A deletion discussion open at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Pakistan administered Kashmir may be of interest to people who have this page on their watchlist. power~enwiki (π, ν) 03:32, 10 December 2018 (UTC)

Infobox

Hi, I know it was probably meant well but I just reverted the addition of the infobox at the Kashmir article because it will likely lead to yet more nationalist edit warring in a contentious topic area. Infoboxes act as honeypots for people who often don't even read the article and so distort the contents, which of course is a big problem for such areas. Infoboxes are not compulsory things and we already have a special sanctions regime in place due to the extent of nationalist etc issues relating to such articles, so it seems daft to invite trouble. - Sitush (talk) 10:09, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

• A very unfortunate revert from a fellow editor. Infobox is not compulsory as per your personal suggestion, but it is an important part of the article on WP. It provides a brief summary and facts regarding the subject. Its your personal point of view that it will start edit warring and create problems, does that mean we stop improving the article? You need to find a better reason.  MehrajMir (talk) 13:55, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

• No, it is your opinion that one is needed just as much as it is mine that it may cause problems. Stop being so aggressive and talk it through sensibly. - Sitush (talk) 14:05, 30 January 2019 (UTC)
• For what (if anything) it may be worth, three people have thanked me for that edit and one person has queried whether I meant to do it. - Sitush (talk) 14:07, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

• Mehrajmir13 Sitush: I was the one who queried, but at that point I didn't know that the infobox had been only very recently added to the article. I then figured out that this article (in which I have made more than a few edits, had mysteriously gone from my watchlist. I agree with Sitush. There is no need for an infobox especially in an article that has a map and three representative pictures, one in each region of control, in this long-disputed land. Please also see my post on WT:INDIA about why non-English scripts should not be allowed on the Kashmir page. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:16, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

• Thank you for providing the explanation. I'm not aware about the thread on INB. I will now leave it to others if they want to include an infobox.  MehrajMir (talk) 15:41, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

• I think that infobox should be still retained. Other similar regions like Kurdistan, Baltistan, also have infoboxes and it does not appears that it is causing problem there. We should try having an infobox here for now and see how it goes. How does this sounds? 103.255.5.64 (talk) 16:37, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

• I disagree. This a long-standing article with special standards. The other articles you mention are not in this league. My worry right now is that some editors such as King Zebu have added text directly to the lead, in particular, the third paragraph, which does not represent a summary of the lead. I won't revert it now, but will rewrite it in a few days. In particular, their edits violate a long-standing understanding about this page that it is a historical article about the Kashmir region up to 1948-49. What happened in this region after 1949 belongs in detail to other pages. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 17:12, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

• Hi everyone, I was just looking at other articles of territorial disputes, everyone has an infobox including those of disputed islands. Most importantly it's sibling Kashmir conflict (the most volatile of the two) has got a huge infobox. I can't see any special exception here. MehrajMir (talk) 19:29, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

This page is not about a territorial dispute, in which the text can be graphically and cognitively simplified by listing the names of the belligerents and putting emojis for their flags. This page is about the region. It was modeled on the Britannica page, Kashmir region, which is about the geography, the historical demographics and the history until 1948-49, which doesn't really describes the conflict except very briefly the antecedents in the 1950s. The infobox in Kashmir conflict was added without discussion by a drive-by named Wareditor2013 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) at 12:15 on 29th May 2013 in this edit with edit summary, "Added Conflict Info box, removed previous box," except that there wasn't any previous box, just an image. That edit was immediately reverted by editor Mrt3366 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), now blocked, at 12:29 on 29th May 2013, with edit summary, "(Reverted good faith edits by Wareditor2013 (talk): Per WP:BOLD. Let's discuss. This is a controversial article, kindly take caution before altering lead among other things.)" That edit was soon reverted by another blocked editor, Faizan (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), in this edit at 13:29 29th May 2013, with edit summary, "(Reverted to revision 557337907 by Wareditor2013: restored better revision. Whats wrong with the infobox? Why prefering a sole territory?. (TW))" In other words, the infobox was added in a back and forth between one drive-by and two blocked editors, in mid-2013 as a result of a discussion that will not stand up to any WP guidelines-related scrutiny. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 20:53, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Muslim POV

For almost a century until the census, a small Hindu elite had ruled over a vast and impoverished Muslim peasantry.

The sentence above is a textbook example of British divide and rule propaganda. It makes a feudal exploitation look like a communal Hindu vs Muslim issue. This is typical of British polemics who do propaganda against the Dogra rulers to support the Pakistani agenda. Ian Talbot and Gurharpal Singh are not experts on Kashmir. They should not be cited anywhere on this article. Perhaps Sumantra Bose can be cited but then his opinion should be attributed to him per WP:CLAIM. 42.108.245.163 (talk) 10:32, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

The Pandits constituted in their efflorescence no more than 4% of the population of the valley. They were favored by the ruling Dogras. As a result, though there were some poor Pandits, most managed to live comfortably in contrast to the Muslim peasants, who were the wretched of the Kashmir earth. Unfortunately in the period 1846 to 1947 that was no the Muslim point of view (POV). Had awareness of exploitation been a part of the Musim point of view in the 1850s, the Dogras would have long gone by 1947 and today there would have been no conflict. The Muslim peasants were too timid in those days. Oh, but you are looking for references. Talbot and Singh are fine. They are experts on the partition, so they would know about Kashmir in the period before and after 1947. There are many other sources. Sumantra Bose, by the way, is no expert on Kashmir. He was merely looking to use Kashmir as the guinea pig for his political solutions. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 00:22, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

It still requires attribution. Because there is no proof that such a POV represents the scholarly consensus.

WP:CONTEXTMATTERS. Pandits were Brahmins. They were naturally going to comprise most of elite, as was the case in most Indian societies of the time. They had an elite status in Kashmir even under Afghan and Muslim rule. Ian Talbot and Gurharpal Singh have conveniently overlooked that latter fact when they claim the Hindu elite "established" a stratified society. So I am inclined to regard it as a biased source. You will need to add an attribution.

I am also sure you can find other sources which parrot the same POV. But they will need to be filtered to see if they have done a proper scholarly inquiry. They will have to have taken the history of Kashmir and Pandits into context. There are also many sources showing the position of Muslims was improving in 1931.

Ian Copland. “Islam and Political Mobilization in Kashmir, 1931-34.” Pacific Affairs, vol. 54, no. 2, 1981, pp. 228–259.

one must admit that the overall position of the Muslim community was no worse in 1931 than it had been at the beginning of Hari Singh's reign. Indeed, in some respects it was arguably better

Hari Singh was introducing democratic reforms. It wasn't perfect I grant you but Muslim representation was gradually, even if slowly, improving. Compare that to its contemporary, Hyderabad, which actively avoided democracy to keep the Hindus out. Kashmiris had it a lot better. To be neutral the article needs to indicate the "Hindu" Hari Singh's benevolence to the Muslim peasants. 42.108.225.33 (talk) 10:56, 14 February 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for your post. Some of your concerns are in fact mentioned, albeit tersely, in, "Driven into docility by chronic indebtedness to landlords and moneylenders, having no education besides, nor awareness of rights,[56] the Muslim peasants had no political representation until the 1930s."[60] 56=Sumantra Bose; 60 =Talbot & Singh. I haven't taken a good look at the article in some time. Will do so in the coming weeks. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 12:22, 14 February 2019 (UTC)

Maratha "rule"

I have respectfully reverted an editor's well-meaning but unreliable edit claiming that Kashmir was ruled by the Marathas. Please discuss here, editor, what you're attempting to do. As I say in my edit summary: winning a battle hundreds of miles away does create a rule. For the latter the foundations of an administration have to be set up. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 09:10, 22 February 2019 (UTC)

Changed it to "expedition". Furthermore, stop constant edit warring and stop your insults with other editors. You have constantly done so for the last several months. Stop this! (Highpeaks35 (talk) 21:08, 23 February 2019 (UTC))

Doesn't really work as a part of the Kashmir article. If the Marathas touched on Kashmir (an expedition), then perhaps that should stay in the Maratha article. What does a battle that changed nothing have to do with the history of Kashmir? --regentspark (comment) 23:40, 23 February 2019 (UTC)

I checked both sources that have been cited in this brief new section. Neither says that the Marathas reached Kashmir. They only very briefly pushed back Ahmad Shah Abdali's sons to the west of the Indus while Abdali had returned to Afghanistan, but then became severely undermanned as more than half their army was recalled back to the Deccan for a campaign in South India. Abdali returned to India and wiped out the small Maratha army. The Marathas never got to Kashmir, not even in an expedition. Here is the full quote from one source, one paragraph from which is being quoted in the section (i.e. the optimistic letter from Raghunath Rao (aka Raghoba) to the Peshwa (dated 4 May 1758), or more correctly the letter of good intentions. Here is what happened, according to the source:

The Peshwa Balaji Baji Rao, who was the leader of the Maratha confederacy from 1740 onwards thought of himself the potential dictator of the subcontinent. In his dreary palace at Poona, with his Chitpawan Brahmin advisors, the Peshwa made grandiose plans of conquering all of India. In 1753, he ordered his lieutenants to collect a tax, Chauth, from the Mughal provinces of northwest India. At that time, the Marathas dominated many fronts. The Nizam had been humbled. Mysore, Bengal and Orissa were subjected to repeated raids. The Rajput states in western India and the Mughal successor states of Awadh and Rohilkhand lived in daily fear of Maratha incursions. The Peshwa directed his brother Raghunath Rao alias Raghoba to lead the expedition to the Indus. In 1757, Raghoba crossed the Chambal with an army of 50,000 soldiers. By April 1758, Taimur and Jahan Khan had retreated to the west of the Indus. At this critical juncture, the Peshwa called Raghoba and most of his troops down to south India to crush the Nizam. Only 15,000 Maratha troops were left in Punjab. The impatient Peshwa, not finishing one job completely before initiating another, had miscalculated. Raghoba's recall gave breathing space to Ahmed Shah Abdali. While Abdali was preparing an army to invade India again, he received diplomatic support from the Rohilla leader Najib-ud-Daulah and the Nawab of Awadh, Shuja-ud-Daulah. In Najib and Shuja's reckoning, Abdali was bound to return to Afghanistan after a temporary stay in India. And in the meantime, if Abdali could crush the Marathas, then Najib and Shuja would be saved from paying Chauth to them. Abdali advanced and crushed the Maratha forces in Punjab. The ominous news finally travelled deep south.

Fowler&fowler«Talk» 04:16, 24 February 2019 (UTC)

So Kashmir was not captured by Tukoji Holkar? (Highpeaks35 (talk) 04:26, 24 February 2019 (UTC))

If it is not the case that Tukoji Holkar did not capture Kashmir, please remove the Maratha section. (Highpeaks35 (talk) 04:27, 24 February 2019 (UTC))

PS I can only tell you what's in the source. The source from which I have quoted above: Roy, Kaushik (2004), India's Historic Battles: From Alexander the Great to Kargil, Orient Blackswan, pp. 80, 81, ISBN 978-81-7824-109-8, is the one from which the blurb in the Maratha expedition section is taken. The letter is one of intentions only. Says Raghunath Rao, "We have decided to establish our rule up to Kandahar." In reality, Rao never got much beyond the Indus. He was only in the Punjab, and that too for a short time. I note also that Stewart Gordon's magisterial Gordon, Stewart (16 September 1993), The Marathas 1600-1818, Cambridge University Press, ISBN 978-0-521-26883-7 makes no mention of the Marathas in Kashmir. You can search the book in the Google books link I have provided. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 04:33, 24 February 2019 (UTC)

Respectfully, Highpeaks35, Can you please tell us why you reverted my edit in this edit with edit summary, "Undid revision 884540164 by Fowler&fowler (talk) the page clearing mentions not to edit war. The section is well referenced. The onus is on you." if you weren't sure that the edit was well referenced. Why are you now asking me to remove the section? I have already removed it once. You reinstated it, please remove it. Noting also for RegentsPark. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 09:25, 24 February 2019 (UTC)

Fowler, I think Highpeaks35 is agreeing with you that the section should be removed. The revert you refer to was before the discussion above. Best, --regentspark (comment) 14:14, 24 February 2019 (UTC)

OK, thanks, RP. I got confused. Apologies @Highpeaks35:. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:37, 24 February 2019 (UTC)

Afghan Weakling ruler?

Under "Afghan rule" heading, and I quote: "The Afghan Durrani dynasty's Durrani Empire controlled Kashmir from 1751, when weakling 15th Mughal padshah (emperor) Ahmad Shah Bahadur's viceroy Muin-ul-Mulk was defeated ..." Its difficult to believe the "weakling" adjective is necessary or fair to this paragraph, I suggest re-edit, which I can't as I'm not a registered member. 83.254.95.46 (talk) 13:32, 6 March 2019 (UTC)

200.68.143.158 (talk) 04:22, 28 February 2019 (UTC) baden k.

Direct additions to the lead

I have removed direct additions to the lead, ones which do not constitute summaries of this article's main body content. This article has always been about the history of the Kashmir region. It is not about the history of later India Pakistan conflicts. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 03:34, 25 March 2019 (UTC)

Massive revision

I reverted this massive revision here. @Kautilya3 and My Lord: you guys are an expert on this topic. Can you guys look into this? (Highpeaks35 (talk) 23:56, 7 June 2019 (UTC))

Reverted edits to Shah Mir Dynasty and Mughal sections?

Hello Fowler&fowler, I was wondering why my expansions to the sections on the Shah Mir dynasty and Mughal history of Kashmir were reverted? These sections are currently quite ambiguous and lacking in detail, which is quite odd considering the level of detail in the rest of the article. I had also thoroughly cited all my claims. What should I do to improve those sections if I cannot expand them? Ahmadnisar1213 (talk) 15:16, 5 June 2019 (UTC) Ahmadnisar1213

@Ahmadnisar1213: The article has had a long, fraught, history. Many of the edits that have survived are the result of long, fraught, discussions on the talk page. Many of the other edits that have survived have been snuck in when everyone was sleeping, and are brimming with POV. The Shah Mir section (with a popular spin on how a vast majority of Kashmiris came to become Muslim by forced conversion) is a case in point. In such a page, we simply cannot, after 14 years, have large text or data dumps, sourced adequately, or reliably, though they might be claimed to have been. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with your architecture-related edits; however, when coupled with the previous spin on Shah Mir, they begin to look random, that is, one set of "facts," sourced to publications that are being claimed to be reliable sitting atop other "facts," with similar claims, but with no thought to cohesion of the textual material, to undue weight, or synthesis. In response to your post, I will, however, remove most of the Shah-Mir section. The basic facts in that section will need to be more reliably written. But in the future, please discuss your edits on the talk page first, and in semantically digestible bits. In the next three or four days, I will post some more balanced sources here. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:09, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

As for your Mughal rule edits, you have cited from UNESCO, suggesting thereby two things, that UNESCO is a reliable secondary sources, and that the Mughal gardens in Kashmir are a UNESCO World Heritage site. UNESCO, especially its descriptions of its listed sites, are primary sources, not peer-reviewed secondary sources. Secondly, the Mughal Gardens in Kashmir are not yet a UNESCO World Heritage Site, only nominated for inclusion by the Indian government. (Please scroll to the bottom to the tentative list here.) The text that accompanies the nomination suffers from the common optimistic tone and history of such submissions. They are even less reliable.

But you see how, a single edit that you think is reliable, and that you add in a good faith, takes a lot of time for time-strapped other editors to delve into and to correct. Imagine what happens when there a several such edits, in a larger body of text, that has been added in one single edit. It begins to strain the manpower resources that Wikipedia has. It is better therefore to first discuss the on the talk page. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:28, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

PPS I have now reduced the bloated, and unreliably sourced, Hindu and Buddhist section as well. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:54, 7 June 2019 (UTC)

@Fowler&fowler Thank you for the explanation and I understand the rationale for the reverted edits. Ahmadnisar1213 (talk) 15:18, 11 June 2019 (UTC)Ahmadnisar1213

"most militarized zone" ??

"Kashmir is widely regarded as the world's most militarized zone"

This seems to be a very subjective statement, and definitely not encyclopedic.

It is true because Indian occupied Kashmir is under military curfew based lock down from 14 days on this date. It is forced by Indian army to ensure reduce Muslim men and increasing Hindu to rape Muslim women for land. Ngnrpu (talk) 13:30, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

Hindus in Kashmir, needs some expansion under demographics

@Kautilya3: please include this expaison as it's not only Pandit Hindus who are native to valley but also Karkun, Vora and Trambu, Telis.

The largest caste of Kashmiri Hindus is the Kashmiri Pandits (Kashmiri Brahmins), who are divided into several gotras, such as the "priests (gor or bhasha Bhatta), astrologers (Zutshi), and workers (Karkun)". The majority of Kashmiris who belong to the kshatriya varna use the surname Gourtra. Kashmiri Hindus of the vaishya community are found in the Vora and Trambu regions of Sopore. Under the rule of Sultan Sikander Butshikan in the 14th century A.D., many Kashmiri Hindus, including those of other religions were forcibly converted to Islam.

Also please link this Kashmiri Hindus main article there too. 117.198.240.135 (talk) 15:18, 18 August 2019 (UTC)

Kindly keep unbiased and neutral opinion and avoid Hindu fascism based on nazi inspired RSS extremists. Indian forces have already locked down Kashmir for killing Muslim Kashmiris. Please Ngnrpu (talk) 13:27, 20 August 2019 (UTC)

The demography of this page is based on the decadal censuses conducted after 1871 CE in the British Indian Empire. The Hindus in the Kashmir Valley remained at a stable 4% to 5% of the population. The Hindus in the entire Kashmir region remained at a stable 21% to 22%. Most scholar, which include TN Madan, Mridu Rai, Chitralekha Zutshi, Barbara and Thomas Metcalf, agree broadly with these numbers. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 15:05, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

References

"Azad Kashmir"

In the opening paragraph the Pakistan-controlled part of Kashmir, "Azad Kashmir" should be shown in inverted commas or otherwise labelled as PK-controlled/administered to maintain a neutral POV. Only the PK government calls it "Azad". The URL links to a fuller explanation. I had recently inserted the inverted commas but somebody removed them. It is a very sensitive subject and so a neutral POV is extremely important. Dori1951 (talk) 17:42, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

No - as MOS:SCAREQUOTES - "Quotation marks, when not marking an actual quotation, may be interpreted as "scare quotes", indicating that the writer is distancing themselves from the otherwise common interpretation of the quoted expression."
Wikipedia reflects the de facto position, which is that Azad Kashmir "is a region administered by Pakistan as a nominally self-governing jurisdiction."
Your quotation marks are purely your PoV addition, NOT a "neutral PoV" at all, which is why they keep being removed, and why they will be removed in future. - Arjayay (talk) 18:10, 23 February 2020 (UTC)

improvements to shah mir dynasty section

I came across this journal and i wish to have a discussion on it here.

1. The wikipedia page under "sikh rule" section mentions "....he conquered and subdued Rajouri (1821), Kishtwar (1821), Suru valley and Kargil (1835), Ladakh (1834–1840), and Baltistan (1840), thereby surrounding....". reading the journal, it clearly says "shahab-ud-din had inherited only the kashmir valley from his father, sultan ala-ul-din(1342-54), but he succeeded in bringing under his subjection the Hazara district, most of the northern punjab, gilgit, Baltistan, ladaskh, Kishtwar, jammu and the hill-states on the sourthern slopes of the pir panjal mountains. in fact these territories remained part of the kingdom of kashmir until the end of Hasan Shah's reign." Only wikipedia page of zain-ul-abidin mentions this but that is not correct according to this citation. For example, the page says "...With the arrival of Ali Shah on the throne, the territories had once again begun to assert their independence..." but the journal suggests that these were under the kashmiri kingdom till hasan shah's reign, which was the 9th king of shah mir dynasty, coming third after ali shah.

2. the wikipedia page mentions under "shah mir dynasty", "Hamadani's son also convinced Sikander Butshikan to enforce Islamic law" while this journal suggests otherwise to the tune of "the only notable exception was, however, sultan sikander, who influnced by the zeal of his wazir, suhabhatta, a new convert, ordered forcible conversion and temple destruction. But when sultan zain-ul-abidin ascended the throne, he completly reversed his father's policy, permitting the temples to be repaired or rebuilt and those persons who had been forcibly converted to revert to their former religion." -- — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mhvienp (talk • contribs)

Can you update the Shah Mir dynasty page first, so that we can see what the corrections are? Then we can summarise them here as needed. (Please remember to sign your posts.) -- Kautilya3 (talk) 14:24, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

i have made changes in my sandbox page. Please confirm the edits there before making changes on the actual Shah Mir dynasty page. Sorry for forgetting to sign. Mhveinvp (talk) 17:53, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Ok, I did some copyediting but it looked good. You need to add the citation though. Cheers, Kautilya3 (talk) 19:50, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, @Mhveinvp: The Proceedings of the Indian History Congress, 1953, is not a reliable source. This is a high-level article. If whatever it is you are attepting to add to this article has not made it into well-worn textbooks in nearly 70 years, then it does not belong here. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 02:33, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Ok. that citation might be unreliable but i was able to find others on google scholar to confirm all of these claims of the original piece about suhabhatta, and and about kingdom of sultans. I have very less experience with editing with wikipedia, that's why i go to talk pages first and push edits on my sandbox before going live. If you don't want me to use that source, fine but there are other sources that corroborate the content Mhveinvp (talk) 06:47, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

References

Treaties

The text I added on Treaty of Lahore (9 March 1846) and the Treaty of Amritsar (16 March 1846) I was in process of being edited. I was in process of adding the references.

The Treaty of Lahore (9 March 1846) and the Treaty of Amritsar (16 March 1846) lapsed under Article 7 of the Independence Act 1947. The Act was passed by the British Parliament on July 18, 1947 to assent to the creation of the independent states of India and Pakistan. The aforementioned Article 7 provides that, with the lapse of His Majesty’s suzerainty over the Indian states, all treaties, agreements, obligations, grants, usages and sufferance’s will lapse.

The 7 year old Maharaja Duleep Singh Bahadur (Sikh) was under the control of the East India company when he sign The Treaty of Lahore on 9 March 1846 which gave Jammu and Kashmir and its people to the East India Company.

Under the British legal system and international law a treaty signed by the 7 year old Maharaja Duleep Singh Bahadur and under duress is not valid. (The International Court of Justice has stated that there "can be little doubt, as is implied in the Charter of the United Nations and recognized in Article 52 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, that under contemporary international law an agreement concluded under the threat or use of force is void.)

Maharaja gulab Singh (a Hindu and the relative of Harri Singh) originally worked for the Sikh Empire. But then betrayed the Sikh empire by siding with the East India Company in the First Anglo-Sikh War. His name is mentioned in the treaty of Lahore too. He collected Taxes for the East India Company and the money was then given by him to the East India Company.

The removal of Article 370 of the Indian constitution further invalidated The Instrument of Accession.

Alistair Lamb also disputed the validity of the Instrument of Accession in his paper Myth of Indian Claim to JAMMU & KASHMIR –– A REAPPRAISAL'

Where he writes "While the date, and perhaps even the fact, of the accession to India of the State of Jammu & Kashmir in late October 1947 can be questioned, there is no dispute at that time any such accession was presented to the world at large as conditional and provisional. It was not communicated to Pakistan at the outset of the overt Indian intervention in the State of Jammu & Kashmir, nor was it presented in facsimile to the United Nations in early 1948 as part of the initial Indian reference to the Security Council. The 1948 White Paper in which the Government of India set out its formal case in respect to the State of Jammu & Kashmir, does not contain the Instrument of Accession as claimed to have been signed by the Maharajah: instead, it reproduces an unsigned form of Accession such as, it is implied, the Maharajah might have signed. To date no satisfactory original of this Instrument as signed by the Maharajah has been produced: though a highly suspect version, complete with the false date 26 October 1947, has been circulated by the Indian side since the 1960s. On the present evidence it is by no means clear that the Maharaja ever did sign an Instrument of Accession."

Indian troops actually began overtly to intervene in the State’s affairs on the morning of 27 October 1947

It is now absolutely clear that the two documents (a) the Instrument of Accession, and (c) the letter to Lord Mountbatten, could not possibly have been signed by the Maharajah of Jammu & Kashmir on 26 October 1947. The earliest possible time and date for their signature would have to be the afternoon of 27 October 1947. During 26 October 1947 the Maharajah of Jammu & Kashmir was travelling by road from Srinagar to Jammu. (The Kashmir State Army divisions and the Kashmiri people had already turned on him and he was on the run and had no authority in the state). His new Prime Minister, M.C. Mahajan, who was negotiating with the Government of India, and the senior Indian official concerned in State matters, V.P. Menon, were still in New Delhi where they remained overnight, and where their presence was noted by many observers. There was no communication of any sort between New Delhi and the travelling Maharajah. Menon and Mahajan set out by air from New Delhi to Jammu at about 10.00 a.m. on 27 October; and the Maharajah learned from them for the first time the result of his Prime Minister’s negotiations in New Delhi in the early afternoon of that day. The key point, of course, as has already been noted above, is that it is now obvious that these documents could only have been signed after the overt Indian intervention in the State of Jammu & Kashmir on 27 October 1947. When the Indian troops arrived at Srinagar air field, that State was still independent. Any agreements favourable to India signed after such intervention cannot escape the charge of having been produced under duress. (The International Court of Justice has stated that there "can be little doubt, as is implied in the Charter of the United Nations and recognized in Article 52 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, that under contemporary international law an agreement concluded under the threat or use of force is void.)

Additionally Maharaja had no authority to sign the Instrument of Accession because he was on the run. The prevailing international practice on the recognition of state governments is based on the following three factors: first, the government’s actual control of the territory; second, the government’s enjoyment of the support and obedience of the majority of the population; third, the government’s ability to stake the claim that it has a reasonable expectation of staying in power. The situation on the ground demonstrates that the Maharaja was not in control of the state of Jammu and Kashmir and was fleeing for his life and almost all of Kashmir was under the control of the Kashmiri people and the Kashmiri Army that had rebelled against him. His own troops had turned on him. With regard to the Maharaja’s control over the local population, it is clear that he enjoyed no such control or support. The people of Kashmir had been sold by the East India Company and he charged them high taxes thetefore the Kashmir Muslims, Hindus Pandits and Buddhists hated him. Furthermore, the state’s armed forces were in total disarray after most of the men turned against him and he was running for his life. Finally, it is highly doubtful that the Maharaja could claim that his government had a reasonable chance of staying in power without Indian military intervention. This assumption is substantiated by the Maharaja’s letters. Therefore the Maharaja had no authority to sign the treaty, the Instrument of Accession it has no legal standing." — Preceding unsigned comment added by Johnleeds1 (talk • contribs) 22:37, 17 May 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 7 June 2020

106.207.48.98 (talk) 17:19, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

Please revise this article and add recent updates

 Not done: as you have not requested a specific change in the form "Please replace XXX with YYY" or "Please add ZZZ between PPP and QQQ".
In addition, you need to cite reliable sources to back up your request, without which no information should be added to, or changed in, any article. - Arjayay (talk) 17:21, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

India POV promotion

I'm on vacation. I really do want to be on vacation. But no sooner have I gone than blatant POV promotion is rampant again. The language of the lead has been stable for 13 years. May I please request neutral editors and administrators such as: RegentsPark, Sitush, Vanamonde93, Abecedare, Bishonen, Johnbod to please add this page to their watchlist and to ensure that the hard-won NPOV consensus of the lead is maintained. It is mainly India-POV edits, which in the absence of a critical mass of Pakistan-POV edits to balance it, are running riot. Best regards, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 14:12, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

"Pakistan-occupied Kashmir" listed at Redirects for discussion

A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. The discussion will occur at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2020 September 28#Pakistan-occupied Kashmir until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Soumya-8974 ^talk _contribs ^subpages 06:07, 28 September 2020 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 10 October 2020

In the sentence under the map, the word "districts" should be removed, as this map does not show any administrative-level districts. Atelerixia (talk) 03:43, 10 October 2020 (UTC)

 Done Kautilya3 (talk) 12:51, 10 October 2020 (UTC)

"Kashir" listed at Redirects for discussion

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Article expansion

Taking it forth, from the discussions of Talk:Kashmir Valley and as suggested by Fowler&fowler, I'm presenting few sections starting with Geography and Climate for inclusion in this Kashmir region page. Any additions and improvements are appreciated.  MehrajMir (talk) 04:12, 28 October 2020 (UTC)

Sections Geography and Climate moved to the article, please see Kashmir#Geography.

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 20 November 2020

In the first sentence of the last paragraph of the section "Geography," change the phrase "...from one part and the other" to "from one part to another," as more than two geographic regions are discussed. Nerdy314 (talk) 14:21, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

 Already done -ink&fables «talk» 16:36, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

"Jammu and Kashmir Area" listed at Redirects for discussion

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Infobox Kashmir territory

I have created {{Infobox Kashmir territory}} to maintain harmony among the articles of the territories of Kashmir. I tried to implement the infobox in Aksai Chin, Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan, but unfortunately, Kautilya3 reverted my edits saying that WP:CONSENSUS should be achieved for implementing the template. In order to achieve consensus, I have initiated a discussion here. --Soumya-8974 (he) ^talk _contribs ^subpages 13:02, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

I'd like to make three points: (a) is there a real need for a hard-wired template if what is being templated is already hard-wired as a WP image, and nothing else is being added in the template? (b) if there is consensus, it will need to be implemented in all of what is being called first-order Kashmir-related pages, i.e. Jammu and Kashmir (union territory), Ladakh, Azad Kashmir, Gilgit-Baltistan, Aksai Chin, Jammu and Kashmir (state), Jammu and Kashmir (princely state); this will require a wider India-Pakistan consensus, which we have for the image file, but do not for the template; (c) in my experience, ordinary readers and editors are sometimes suspicious of templates as the edits therein are not transparent and not as easily monitored. For these reasons, I'd be reluctant to endorse changing the image to a template. I'm on vacation, I'll check again in a week's time. Best, Fowler&fowler«Talk» 13:32, 4 December 2020 (UTC)

You're only seeing an image if you're looking at an instance of the template without any parameters. You should check out a transclusion, or its source code, to see what it does. – Uanfala (talk) 16:44, 13 December 2020 (UTC)

Personally, I prefer the well-documented and well-understood templates for critical things like infoboxes. (I personally don't care for infoboxes and never read them. But I am aware that a large majority of Wikipedia readers read them on mobile devices, where the infobox is essentially "in your face". So its accuracy is quite critical.)

The fact that your proposed template was tricky to maintain was demonstrated by the fact the key header line was missing in your first version. We cannot be dependent on you to maintain this template for ever. Unless the template is documented and there is a team of editors involved in its creation and maintenance, we can't simply use "private" templates in infoboxes. -- Kautilya3 (talk) 13:49, 13 December 2020 (UTC)

Using {{infobox settlement}} directly should generally be undesirable – this is for all practical purposes a meta-template, and articles about places in any major country should ideally use a custom-made wrapper. I've been thinking for a long time that we should do one for India and Pakistan (either a common wrapper, or two closely related ones), and I believe the current template may be a step in the right direction. Some of the benefits of such a solution that are particularly relevant for Kashmir articles are: 1) the ability to turn off the use of flags; 2) consistent display of the pushpin maps so as not to leave the appearance of favouring any one side; 3) error-detection that could catch when people change a place within Pakistani Kashmir to claim it's part of India and vice versa; 4) the ability to easily turn off the use or display of native scripts. – Uanfala (talk) 16:44, 13 December 2020 (UTC)

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