User talk:Ram1751

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File source and copyright licensing problem with File:Boston Little India.jpg

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October 2017

Please do not add or change content, as you did at List of signature songs, without citing a reliable source. Please review the guidelines at Wikipedia:Citing sources and take this opportunity to add references to the article. Please do not use forum posts by random people on the internet as a source. Bennv3771 (talk) 04:03, 24 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

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September 2020

Please do not add or change content, as you did at Rose, without citing a reliable source. Please review the guidelines at Wikipedia:Citing sources and take this opportunity to add references to the article. In this edit: [1], and similar edits in rosewater, you added a source from pinkjinn.com, an "influencer" blog with affiliate links, which is not a reliable source per WP:QS. I have removed it. Also, it and the other BBC source do not actually verify the information that you added them to, for example that rosewater is used in barfi, baklava, halva, gulab jamun, gumdrops, etc. Your contributions are appreciated, but it would be helpful if you could ensure that citations you add meet the requirements for reliability, and that they expressly verify the statements to which they're added. Thank you. IamNotU (talk) 12:43, 27 September 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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List of Hindu temples in the United States

Hello Ram1751 I was wondering if you would consider downsizing the files and have them centered, like here for example. I would do it myself, but am not very familiar with these kind of class="wikitable". Thank you for your time. Lotje (talk) 16:20, 4 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Lotje, I don't have the time right now, but maybe later. BTW your layout wikitable edit is fine, but the Notes column is unnecessary. The notability topic, of which this is a leftover, has been resolved and closed on the Talk page. Ram1751 (talk) 01:45, 7 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Lotje, thank you for your edits. While you are making them, if you could remove all the red links, that would greatly improve this article. Thank you. Ram1751 (talk) 17:35, 7 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Lotje, I notice the lead now says, "This is a list of Hindu temples, centers, and ashrams in the United States, which number 0 as of 2021." I believe the '0' result may be related to your layout wikitable edit. Do you know how to fix this? Thank you. Ram1751 (talk) 03:13, 1 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Ram1751 going through the history of the article, this is where it went from 890 as of 2021 to 72 as of 2021 and finaly to 0 as of 2021. That I know now, but how to fix this? Trying to figure that out. If need be, I'll have to ask for help at the Teahouse, or do you have another, better idea? Thanks and so sorry for this. Lotje (talk) 05:26, 1 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Lotje, sorry, I don't have any ideas. Thanks for your effort! Ram1751 (talk) 05:32, 1 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Found out what I did wrong. I'll fix 1 for now and

Lotje (talk) 05:34, 1 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The thing is, when I start adding the territory abbreviations to the differente states (like class="wikitable sortable" id="tableTempleWikiAR" style="width:73% for Arizona) the problem with the images creeps up again, so, I am stucked this time. Lotje (talk) 06:05, 1 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Done (I hope)

Lotje (talk) 06:56, 1 November 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Primary sourcing on Gurumayi and Siddha Yoga

Hi, just a note to say that we need to be extremely careful with primary sources here; the organisation's website and books have a clear promotional intent. We should use them only to establish basic facts, and even there we really need to use independent (secondary) sources. Chiswick Chap (talk) 10:01, 5 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Could you please stop your slow-motion edit-warring and discuss things properly please. I have a) explained the reasons to you, b) started a talk page discussion, and c) invited you to join it. It is not acceptable to keep on sniping from the sidelines, removing important facts and so breaking the sense of the article, all without actually either contributing anything or even joining in the dialogue. We can freely discuss the form of words, but frankly there is no doubt whatever given the multiple sources provided that the ashram in South Fallsburg was downsided and the crowds that used to visit there and in Ganeshpuri diminished.

If you have a "side" in this matter, especially if you have a connection with Siddha Yoga, then you really need to declare a conflict of interest; Wikipedia is not censored, and it is not acceptable for any organisation to attempt to limit Wikipedia's expression of reliably cited evidence. If that doesn't describe you, but you have some other reason for your actions, then again it would be far more productive if you'd explain it so that we can come to some accommodation.

I do hope all this is clear. You have been editing for some years now, so it may well be that all these matters are obvious to you: in that case, I'm sorry to have to mention them, but discussion really does now seem to be necessary, so I feel obliged to raise the matters. All the best, and looking forward to discussing the article with you. All the best, Chiswick Chap (talk) 18:07, 6 October 2021 (UTC)[reply]

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Your submission at Articles for creation: Bharatiya Hindu Temple (December 18)

Your recent article submission to Articles for Creation has been reviewed! Unfortunately, it has not been accepted at this time. The reason left by Novem Linguae was:

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To pass WP:GNG, need citations to around 3 high quality sources such as newspapers and books that go into multiple paragraphs of detail about the subject.

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note

Thanks for fixing (by removing) the statement I had added at List of Hindu temples in the United States. Right, it did not belong ... I put it in quickly based mostly on its title and was expecting to refine it, but I had another editing task to continue with first and I was distracted and didn't get back ... obviously I had not properly read the source. Sorry about that, and thank you for fixing it.

Okay, then, I am not sure, but I think it could be a useful source to provide some statement in an overview section of List of Hindu temples in India, or in a different article. Perhaps you might comment at Talk:List of Hindu temples in India#overview section, including a statement re TTD (which i opened)? BTW, as I mention there, I visited one large temple in Andhra Pradesh to which many Hindus go on pilgrimages (on a trip when I went to a wedding in Visakhapatnam), but I haven't yet figured out which one that was, out of the Andhra Pradesh ones listed there.

Thanks, --Doncram (talk,contribs) 20:04, 26 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

My pleasure.

I've fixed the lead in List of Hindu temples in India and commented in its talk page. Ram1751 (talk) 20:50, 26 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for both of those things. This is out of my knowledge area, obviously.

By the way, glancing at the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams article, I interested to see that, when it was formed at least (in 1932 or so) it had Madras government staff/funding. Not so much separation of church and state as in the U.S.!

About that article, 1) maybe you could fix its lede?, and 2) maybe it would make sense to list their temples in a section in that article? (organized by state and union territory)

The lede currently states

"TTD is an independent trust which manages the temples including the Tirumala Venkateswara Temple in Andhra Pradesh."

That cannot be exactly correct, it does not manage all temples of every religion in Andhra Pradesh. I'm focusing on the usage of definite article "the". That it "manages the temples" could be changed to "manages some temples". Or, better, manages all or some of the temples in Andhra Pradesh that are dedicated to the Venkateswara form of Vishnu. Or that it manages about 58 or whatever number temples dedicated to Venkateswara around India and elsewhere?

And 3) there's another correction needed for the statement in List of Hindu temples in India. I wrote confidently-like that there were 28 states and 2 UTs to go, but was not positive about those counts, i.e. would those be before or after the one opened in Jammu recently, or would that be after they finish several in progress that were mentioned. I do figure it would be possible to be much clearer if there was a list-table in that article, organized by state/UT. But actually, now at States and union territories of India i see there are in fact only 28 states and 8 union territories in total, so my interpretation was outright wrong. Could you possibly fix that?

I'm sorry to have caused bother, if this is bother to you, but I am hoping you'd just like to fix some obvious problems and that you are capable where I am not.

thanks, --Doncram (talk,contribs) 00:18, 27 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Doncram, no bother at all. Regarding Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams, note the Madras Presidency was in British India in 1932, so laws governing church/state separation were likely different in the colony.

I don't know if I have the bandwidth to fix its lead. I notice the article has other issues, like potential original research throughout - a template may help. I agree listing their temples in the article would improve it. A complete list appears to be here: https://www.tirumala.org/MoreTemples.aspx

Regarding the Hindu temples list, it looks like you fixed the lead.

Appreciate the outreach! Ram1751 (talk) 20:44, 28 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Sandesh

Ram I've seen your changes in Sandesh but it's not any promotional edit, it's stupid to use Indian subcontinent as country 126.78.37.227 (talk) 07:48, 12 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

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Pongal and Pukkai

Hello, I'm replying to your message left on my page about my recent changes to the ‘pongal’ article, on which I had taken the liberty of mentioning the Sri Lankan variant of the dish, in order to make the article more coherent.

In fact, the ‘pongal’ article as it currently stands mentions that this dish is prepared with an abundant use of dairy products (especially milk, but also clarified butter (ghee)). It also gives a general overview of this dish as being vegetarian, and is categorised as such.

However, in the meantime, it seems that contributors have added content about ‘kozhi pongal’ (chicken pongal) and ‘sanyasi pongal’ (‘pongal of the sanyanis’; implying vegetarian), terms unknown in southern India. Just as cooking pongal with meat is a traditionally unknown practice in southern India, even among meat-eating people.

These variants and their qualifications are in fact related to ‘pukkai’ or ‘pookai’, a Sri Lankan dish similar to pongal, but differentiated from it both by the people who prepare it, i.e. the Sri Lankan Tamils, and also by a number of culinary researchers and food anthropologists. The ‘pookai’ differs from the ‘pongal’ in that it traditionally does not use cow milk outside specific religious offerings (which the article asserts is the general case for the ‘pongal’), and that it can easily and traditionally be cooked with meat (which the article contradicts in the case of the ‘pongal’).

— All pongal varieties are made with cow's milk. —

Monks Of Kauai Aadheenam (1997). Monks' Cookbook. Himalayan Academy Publications. pp. 91–92. (a sourced quote from the Pongal article)

I mention below extracts from references that it would be useful to add to my previous contributions, in order to better source these new contributions:

— Milk-rice is known as kiri bat by the Sinhalese Buddhists and as pukkai by the Tamil Hindus and the Ceylon Moors (Muslims). [...] One such ritualized way of preparing milk-rice among the Tamil Hindus is to conduct a pongal. The word pongal comes from the Tamil verb 'to bubble up and boil over. A new clay pot is placed on an outdoor hearth in front of the temple or the household shrine room and is decorated with markings of sacred burnt cow dung, sandalwood paste, and vermilion powder. Sometimes also flower garlands are placed around the pot. The basic idea in a pongal is to heat the milk by itself over a brisk fire until it swells up and bubbles over the side of the pot in a messy but nevertheless auspicious and pleasing wave of white froth. [...] At the annual Tamil festival of tai pongal, which is held in mid-January, the cooking of the milk-rice is carried out with the hope that the carefully prepared pot of pukkai will signal good luck and prosperity for the year ahead. [...] According to local standards in Sri Lanka, pukkai should have somewhat gummy or rubbery consistency. —

McGilvray, Dennis, Kuper, Jessica, ed. (1997). The Anthropologists' Cookbook. London: Kegan Paul International. pp. 200–203.

Pukkai is therefore as similar to the kiribath of Sinhalese cuisine, and pal sorru of Sri Lankan Moors cuisine (in which ‘pukkai’ is also present) as to the pongal of South Indian cuisine. It should also be noted that the Sri Lankans make (or at least used to make) a distinction between ‘pukkai’ as a dish, and ‘pongal’ as a feast and ritual preparation of the ‘pukkai’ (the process of making ‘pukkai’ in a certain way, with pot cooked on fire and milk overboiling, is known as ‘pongal’, not the dish itself, until recently), particularly on this occasion. Something non existent in India, where both are named the same.

Picking up on McGilvray's 1997 article on Pukkai, Elisabeth Luard, in her 2001 book "Sacred food: cooking for spiritual nourishment", mentions both the pukkai (sweet) of the Tamils of Sri Lanka and the ven pongal of South India, in the section devoted to dishes linked to rice harvest celebrations in Asia. While relating these two recipes within the larger context of harvest festival dishes around the Bay of Bengal, she nevertheless distinguishes the two dishes.

— The growers of the Bay of Bengal, the most prolific rice producing area of India, plant and harvest three crops a year. [...] Naturally enough, harvest home is celebrated with a feast of new rice. A the cauldron comes to the boil on its fire of rice stalks, the cooks chant "pongol pongol", the name given to the dish itself that mimics the noise the grains make as they rattle against the sides of the pot. [...] In Hindu Tamil regions of Sri Lanka, anthropologist Dennis McGilvray noted in the 1970s, the ritual rice dish offered to the gods at the harvest home is pukkai. This, he reports, is a sweet milk pudding prepared at the temple according to the pongol method, a Tamil word meaning "to bubble and boil, and is made with new rice set aside from the first threshings, and fresh milk, preferably from the cow, the animal sacred to Hindus. —

Luard, Elisabeth (2001). Sacred food: cooking for spiritual nourishment. Chicago: Chicago Review Press. pp. 58–59.

Pukkai is reported here as, when cooked in a religious context, as part of temple offerings, or prasada, preferably using cow's milk. But in the secular context (including for religious occasions like Pongal), coconut milk is common and even preferred. Which is highlighted in the source that I had mentioned in my edits (a cookbook on traditional Jaffna cuisine), now deleted, as well as in the article by McGilvray, where an emphasis (illustration) is made on the preparation of coconut milk.

Just as its preparation as a savory and meaty dish, similar to a khichdi, is common and traditional, outside the orthodox Hindu religious context of course. Which is mentioned in the work of Cynthia Shanmugalingam (Rambutan: Recipes from Sri Lanka) cited on the Pongal article. The criticism that can be made of this reference is that it, following the current modern trend (linked to contemporary history, the dominant cultural and political ideologies on both sides of the Gulf of Mannar, etc. or simply cultural influence) qualifies "pookai" as "pongal", which can lead to confusion and often invisibilizes the culinary practices specific to Sri Lankan Tamils.

Drusekoana (talk) 13:56, 8 September 2024 (UTC)[reply]