Talk:Nair/Archive 18

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File:Nair_Women.jpg

From the above thread, I see some editors have expressed their doubt whether File:Nair_Women.jpg actually belongs to Nair. I suggest them to go to this link which is the source of this image. The caption of the image clearly says "NAYAR FEMALES". If you doubt the credibility of the author, well, that is a different issue. -- ॥..शूद्रमक्षरसंयुक्तं दूरतः परिवर्जयेत्..॥ ^kon [Dotty] 19:25, 30 July 2011 (UTC)

Exactly, you sound like a pundit in history, may be you should help the helpless govt out!! .History was no doubt manipulated in all ages by the powerful. Dotty's Bappa (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 14:29, 2 August 2011 (UTC).

Bappa, thanks. Ganapati Bappa Moria!! -- ॥..शूद्रमक्षरसंयुक्तं दूरतः परिवर्जयेत्..॥ ^kon [Dotty] 23:49, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

<redacted> Dotty's Bappa (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 05:15, 3 August 2011 (UTC).

I have just redacted the above, which I suspect is obnoxious/pbscene (my knowledge of Malayalam is limited, but growing) - Sitush (talk) 08:47, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Alright, now that this has switched over to another language, I think the usefulness of the conversation to participants on en.wiki has drawn to a close. Only one editor questioned the authenticity of the picture, and that editor hasn't responded, and several others have supported the inclusion of the picture, so it looks like consensus is clear to keep it. Qwyrxian (talk) 05:19, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Brahmakshatriya

Something should be mentioned in the article about possible status of Nairs as Brahmakshatriya (Brahmin father, non-brahmin mother). In contrast to other Brahmakshatriyas, such as those in North India, who basically belonged to their father's Brahmin caste, the Brahmakshatriyas of Kerala, since they practiced matriarchy, belonged to their mother's Kshatriya caste.124.180.6.138 (talk) 00:12, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

This general issue has been raised previously and I have seen a table of the four possibilities in one of the sources (I forget which one right now). However, this is the first time that I have seen anyone, anywhere use the term Brahmakshatriya. Please could you provide some reliable sources that use the word in connection with the Nair community. In particular because the entire "kshatriya" bit of it is moot. - Sitush (talk) 02:54, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

This is purely hoax, like the article Brahmakshatriya. There is no such thing existing as Brahma-kshatriya. The term was never in use in Kerala. Traditionally Nairs were considered as Sudras, not as Kshatriyas and were called Malayala Sudra in Travancore documents. Also, in Hindu intercaste marriages, offsprings were always assigned with lower one of their parents' castes. --Nair (talk) 00:53, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes. I knew that it was dodgy when I responded, but AGF and all that. I had never seen the term before and subsequently could find very, very few uses of it. The table I refer to does, as you say, demonstrate that they took the lower caste designator. Thanks for confirming my suspicions. - Sitush (talk) 01:14, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

Mamankam Festival

After the capture of Thirunavaya by Samoothiri, the festival often turned into battlefields. The Chavers (Suicide squad) to assassninate the Samoothiri participating from the kingdom of Valluvanad hailed from the four of the most important Nair families of Valluvanad. These families were:

   * Putumana Panikkars
   * Chandrath Panikkars
   * Kokat Panikkars
   * Verkot Panikkars

A total of 18 deshavazhis (Governors) of Valluvanadu went to the Mamankam festival, led by the lead Nair from each of the four main families. Apart from the four lead warriors, the other 14 hailed from the following families (Swaroopams):

Two Nairs from unknown Valluvanad families, Two Nambuthiris from Valluvanad, Two Moopil Nairs from the Valluvanad Royal House, Achan of Elampulakkad, Variar of Kulathur, Pisharody of Uppamkalathil, Vellodi of Pathiramana, Nair of Parakkatt, Nair of Kakkoott, Nair of Mannarmala & Pisharody of Cherukara.[3] Out of the 18 deshavazhis, 13 were Nairs (Mostly Menon Panicker section of Kiryathil Nair subcaste), 2 were Namboothiri Brahmins and 3 were Ambalavasi Brahmins.

The ruler of Valluvanadu hailed from the Vellattiri subdivision of Samanthan Nair subcaste, and held the title of "Moopil Nair". Zamorin belonged to the Eradi subdivision of Samanthan Nair subcaste. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.203.147.186 (talk) 17:14, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

As always, we need reliable sources to add any of this information. Qwyrxian (talk) 01:28, 6 September 2011 (UTC)

References

1. ^ Maha-Magha Encyclopaedia of Indian Culture, by Rajaram Narayan Saletore. Published by Sterling, 1981. ISBN 0391023322. 9780391023321. Page 869.
2. ^ "Medieval Kerala". education.kerala.gov.in. http://www.education.kerala.gov.in/englishmedium/historyeng/chapter8.pdf. Retrieved 2011-05-18.
3. ^ http://kerals.com/keralatourism/kerala.php?t=83
4. ^ വേലായുധൻ, പണിക്കശ്ശേരി (ഭാഷ: മലയാളം). സഞ്ചാരികൾ കണ്ട കേരളം (2001 ed.). കോട്ടയം: കറൻറ് ബുക്സ്. pp. 434. ISBN 81-240-1053-6.

• William Logan - Malabar Manual — Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.203.192.162 (talk) 07:18, 6 September 2011 (UTC)

This all looks like it would go better at the Mamankam festival page. That article is a big mess (lots of uncited material), so the best "easiest" thing would be to fix everything there. The question of whether or not to include it here is if it is so important to Nair history. That's unclear to me from your description above, but perhaps a short summary with a "Main" template would be good? Anyone else have an opinion? Qwyrxian (talk) 06:27, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Panapillai Amma

Panapillai Amma was the title held by the consort of the ruling Maharajah of Travancore. Its literal translation is 'the royal consort' since as per the formerly existent matriarchal system in Travancore, the Maharajah's sister, and not his wife, was the Maharani. Thus the wife took the title of Panapillai Amma. The Panapillai Amma's were always from families of the Thampi caste of the Nair nobility and their homes were called Ammaveedus.The Maharajah married these Thampi ladies through the Sambandham form of wedlock known as Pattum Parivattavum.

Similarly Royal consorts of the Maharajahs of Cochin were known as Nethyar Ammas, most popular of whom was Parukutty Nethyar Amma who was awarded the "Kaiser-i-Hind" by the British only to eventually earn their displeasure due to her nationalist work. As common among the matriarchical castes of Kerala, the form of marriage was Sambandham here also. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.203.147.186 (talk) 17:06, 5 September 2011 (UTC)

As always, we need reliable sources to add any of this information. Qwyrxian (talk) 01:28, 6 September 2011 (UTC)

reliable sources: Travancore State Manual by V.Nagam Aiya — Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.203.192.162 (talk) 07:13, 6 September 2011 (UTC)

Could you tell me the page number? I see the book at [1], and it doesn't seem to be searchable. Of course, we would only include a sentence or two of what you wrote above here, as we are only interested in this info so far as it is related to the Nairs, not Travancore in general. Qwyrxian (talk) 06:23, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

page no:234 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.203.157.199 (talk) 16:35, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

Is that p. 234 in the link provided above by Qwyrxian? I can see nothing about Nairs anywhere near that page, regardless of what spelling of the name might be used (it favours Nayar). There was more than one volume, I think, & so perhaps this is the problem. -Sitush (talk) 16:47, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

Poonul

Having read the various arguments about the status of Nairs as either Kshatriya or Sudra, would the performance of a Hiranyagarbha ceremony do anything to change the view? Considering that Varmas were essentially ruling Nairs before they invested themselves with the sacred thread- wondering if the Hiranyagarbha would resolve the situation once and for all! Clearly, however Nairs never really had a problem with their classification, since they ruled the land and any nominal title was useless in their eyes; and also it depends on how much current day Nairs really care about adopting true Kshatriyahood. I wonder if there are any current day Nairs with the sacred-thread?121.220.66.7 (talk) 06:52, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Only the position of reliable sources can be shown, and even then we must reflect all views. So, if some reliable sources say that they were shudra and others says that they were kshatriya then it is necessary that we reflect these disparate opinions. We do not take sides because we do not have the expertise, as Wikipedia contributors, to determine which reliable sources are "correct". - Sitush (talk) 09:28, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from 49.14.46.137, 19 September 2011

The name Nair came from word Naalar(Fourht), because the Nairs are the fourth Hindu cast soodra in Kerala area; The Nairs (all sub casts)were doing slavery for three upper casts like veluthedath,karuthedath,Nair padayaali, pandaari etc,.including sharing of wives for upper casts; The non Arya s were not been allowed even to come in front of Arya upper casts, only their soodras (fourth cast whom derivated from Maha Vishnu's palm to serve upper casts) done every thing for them..word Nayak is not the origin of Nairs because The word Nayak no where could see in Kerala history. 49.14.46.137 (talk) 06:49, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Dear Maharashtra IP, I suggest you doing the following:

1. Create a username.
2. Find some reliable sources such as published books to support your points.
3. Avoid offensive language.

Thanks --Nair (talk) 09:31, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Note

This article has been mentioned at Wikipedia talk:Noticeboard for India-related topics.MW ^ℳ 03:52, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

"Martial race" in lede

Reference---Durato Barbosa's book 16th century--- These nairs besides being all of noble descent have to be armed as knights by the hand of the king or lord with whom they live and until they have been so equipped they cannot bear arms nor call themselves nairs but they enjoy the freedom and exemption and advantages of the nairs in many things In general when these nairs are seven years of age they are immediately sent to school to learn all manner of feats of agility and gymnastics for the use of their weapons First they learn to dance and then to tumble and for that purpose they render supple all their limbs from their childhood so that they can bend them in any direction And after they have exercised in this they teach them to manage the weapons which suit each one most That is to say bows clubs or lances and most of them are taught to use the sword and buckler which is of more common use among them In this fencing there is much agility and science And there are very skilful men who teach this art and they are called Panicars 1 these are captains in war These nairs when they enlist to live with the king bind themselves and promise to die for him and they do likewise with any other lord from whom they receive pay This law is observed by some and not by others but their obligation constrains them to die at the hands of anyone who should kill the king or their lord and some of them so observe it so that if in any battle their lord should be killed they go and put themselves in the midst of the enemies who killed him even should those be numerous and he alone by himself dies there but before falling he does what he can against them and after that one is dead another goes to take his place and then another so that sometimes ten or twelve nayrs die for their lord We have a "cn" tag on the term "Martial race" in the lede; looking over gBooks, I see plenty of mentions of their being martial, but not seeing much really explicit that they were classified as a martial race in the same way as the Rajput (and to a lesser degree, the Maratha). I think we can easily find sources saying "considered as" but "classified" is a bit more explicit and would require something pretty firm and authoritative. I would really like to see something too to verify the claim that they were de-listed as Marital by the British after that failed uprising. I did find a ref saying that after the uprising the Brits kept them out of the military, but again, that is a general observation, whereas "de-listing" is quite precise and specific and requires a more explicit ref. Anyone have any good materials for the cite, or are y'all okay with broadening the phrase to denote more general perceptions and less official decrees? MatthewVanitas (talk) 06:11, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

The entire sentence should be removed. Also the next sentence that immediately follows. It is not because there are no reference to martial status, but because there is no need to mention British in the lede. Brits are only one of many Foreign powers who colonized India, and mentioning them alone in the lede is surely undue weight. Btw, this is KondottySultan with new username. --Nair (talk) 07:35, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

I have been searching also, and yesterday did a little tidying up at the linked article while looking for a corroborating cite there. Something needs to give, I feel. Especially since there have been several appeals here for this info + the tags have been in place for a while.

I do not understand Nair's point about weight (are you sure that you can use that name, btw? it sounds as if you are representing a group & so could be against policy). - Sitush (talk) 07:42, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

This is not a new username, it is usurped from another years-old account. The usurpation itself was done by one of those administrators. There are many such usernames: User talk:Ezhava, User talk:Brahmin, User talk:Mexican, User talk:Canadian, User talk:Arab, User talk:America "Nair" is singular and used by millions as a surname. Therefore it is not against any Wikipedia policy. --Nair (talk) 09:55, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Fair enough, though your raise an interesting point about the British and WP:UNDUE, I would counter-argue that "the British labeled the Fooian caste a Martial Race" is an extremely popular sentence put into WP caste articles. I personally would not object to that phrase being removed, and more general statements about the military nature of the Nair being put into the lede, though I would submit that the British limiting them from military service, but then later allowing the Nair Brigade to form, is worth mentioning in the lede. I will BEBOLD and tweak that sentence now, but I'm open to counter-suggestions, or just revert with no hard feelings if you object and can explain why here. MatthewVanitas (talk) 14:40, 3 August 2011 (UTC)

Matthew, Wikipedia:Other stuff exists. I strongly opine that when it comes to Hindu castes, their status or recognition during the Hindu rulers is what counts. That is, the recognition Nairs recieved from Europeans/Muslim rulers/Buddhist emperors is not at all relevant when determining their caste-status or whether they are "martial race" or not, etc. Only local Hindu kings were loyal to caste system and hence the historical status of Nairs should be determined on the basis of how they were officially treated by Hindu kingdoms, such as Travancore. Seriously, I am wondering why you people can't find the current notation in the lede of British raj inappropriate. Four European powers colonized the region: Portuguese, French, Dutch and finally English. Then how can we mention British alone in the lede? We read from the body part that Portuguese also recruited Nairs in their army. This means that if Brits are mentioned in the lede, Ports also should be mentioned. If Brits had a list of "Martial races" then French could have another such list. Again colonial period is only one phase of the long history of Nairs, but this phase was given undue importance. (Not only in the lede, but throughout the article.) --Nair (talk) 02:21, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

I agree that if we were discussing colonists then mentioning only one of the colonising nations would be undue weight. However, the reason that the Brits are mentioned in the lead is not because they colonised the place but because the Nairs were (allegedly) a classified as a martial race at that time. The Portuguese (apparently) did not do so. Your argument is based on a false premise. - Sitush (talk) 08:27, 4 August 2011 (UTC)

Following are the facts which could be easily traced. [Theres one thing i'd like to know. What interests you so much in Nair's Sitush ? I'm very curious about this since the way you've like locked up the description and monitoring everything. Are you somekind of owner or moderator who would need convincing to "allow" people to make changes or contribute to Nair description ? Do you work for wikipedia ? ]

I dont think any reason why you should not consider the following quotes which were made during their times unlike the kinds authors have researched and come up with recently.

1510.—“The first class of Pagans in Calicut is called Brahmins. The second are Nair, who are the same as the gentlefolk amongst us; and these are obliged to bear sword and shield or bows and lances.”— Varthema

1563.—“…The Nairs who are the Knights.”—Garcia

1755.—“The king has disciplined a body of 10,000 Naires; the people of this denomination are by birth the Military tribe of the Malabar Coast.”—Orme

1661. - “Olive colored they (Nair Women) grow their ears long and consider it fashionable, they wear gold and silver ornaments in the big ear holes... They grow hair and tie it in a peculiar fashion on the head. Chewing betel leaf is common and their teeth are thus often black in color. From a very early age they get military training, though fierce they are also well behaved, which is the custom here…….These Nairs rarely laugh…They are born in Noble families and are adept warriors. They come out with sword in one hand and shield in the other. They are a proud and arrogant people.” - Logan

1661.- “"... it is strange how ready the soldier of this country is at his weapon...they are all gentlemen and are termed Nayars ... they send their children to (Kalaris) when seven years old and their body becomes so nimble and bends as if they had no bones” - Logan

1603. - “The men of war which the King of Calicut and all other kings have is Nair…..each being a gentleman……their women be of great beauty and rare to catch sight of…..possessing fine neat features….befitting the noble class” - John Kanding

"...On the west coast there are a few curious distinctions that indicate, apparently, difference in racial origin. The first of these instances is that of the Nair, the military caste of Malabar. Their traditions point to the north as their native land; they are light in colour, in very great contrast to the rest of the castes of the tract, have retained the custom of polyandry, with a good deal of serpent worship. It appears that they advanced upon their present tract by way of the coast higher up, but how they got there does not appear. As with the Arya, they found a dark race in possession and enslaved them on their estates, where they labour to the present day. In the same tract, too, there is a class of Bráhmans, the Nambudiri, of remarkable fairness of complexion, and noted for their rigid ceremonial puritanism. Then, again, in the track of the Nair's alleged progress, we find a peculiar caste of Brahmans, partly occupied in the cultivation of spices and betel nut, but settled mostly above the Gháts, and not therefore so well sheltered from foreign influences as the Nair, who sought the coast. These Havig or Haiga Bráhmans show their connection with the Túlu country in their speech, and, like the Nairs, attribute to their caste a serpent origin in Rohilkhand, a statement borne out by their title. Between these we have a class of female temple servants of an equally light complexion amidst a universally dark population.."( Jervoise Athelstane Baines , ( 1893 ), General report on the Census of India, 1891 , London , Her Majesty's Stationery Office , p. 184) ↑

"Before quitting the country (Kerala) Hyder Ali Khan by a solemn edict declared the Nairs deprived of all (social and political) privileges and (ordered) not to carry arms. This ordinance was found to make the submission of the proud Nairs absolutely impossible because they would have thought death preferable to such humiliations and degradation. Therefore, Hyder Ali Khan by another ordinance, consented to restore all social and political privileges including carrying of arms, to the Nairs who embraced the Mohammadan religion. Many nobles had to embrace Islam; but a significantly large section (Nairs, Chieftains and Brahmins) chose rather to take refuge in the kingdom of Travancore in the South than to submit to the last ordinance"- Prince Ghulam Muhammad of Mysore

"The Nairs of Malabar who attained much celebrity in warfare....justly entitled born soldiers...by the virtue of their descent they must always bear arms..they constitute the third and the last of the honoured castes....a privilaged people....the Rajahs like the oriental monarchs are fond of exaggerating their importance and boast of the number of Nairs they have in their country and service to impress us (the portuguese) with the idea of their wealth and power" - The Book, Letters from Malabar

"I like to see these nairs who never care their lives who lead an army of similar people even against mighty ocean of enemies and fight to win like a hell-fire " - Lord Wellington

Also adding sne link. http://books.google.co.in/books?id=vRwS6FmS2g0C&printsec=frontcover#v=twopage&q=nair&f=false I'll come up with better links. I have sribd scanned copied with proper descriptions and proof to support.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Aaryan Nair (talk • contribs) 19:56, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

The quotes are ridiculously undue weight and Wikipedia does not exist to glorify a community, whether yours or that of anyone else. Your call to arms says it all, really. - Sitush (talk) 20:10, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

That was funny. Writing something on wikipedia wont glorify any person or group. I insist on changing it cause i'm pretty sure of what the reality is. I also asked whether you work for wikipedia. If yes then I wont waste my time for this stupid description. Otherwise i'd like to know who you are and what interests you so much in defaming a particualr group on some website, investing your time in some place which isn't related to you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aaryan Nair (talk • contribs) 08:50, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

None of us works for Wikipedia--we're all volunteers. As for the other points, no one is required to give out any personal information. And you need to stop the personal attacks, because you can't say someone is "defaming" another group unless you have evidence. Sitush's reasoned rejection of your undue quotes (which I agree with) is not "defaming". Qwyrxian (talk) 08:53, 4 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm not interested in personal details. Just wanted to know what interests him in the description. I'm pretty sure the description is a collection of neagtive aspects, hence my curiosity.

Fake images?

Can I add CN tag to image captions? I'm not sure about this. Because atleast two of the images in this article seems to be misplaced. -Nair (talk) 01:23, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

Why not tell us here & see if anyone has the answer? No need to post the image itself, the caption would suffice or, alternatively the filename wrapped in the nowiki tags like this (you'll have to edit this section to see the tags) - Filename.png - Sitush (talk) 09:12, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

Comments and discussions made here may be ignored and forgotten, but a CN tag, once added, will remain there until a decision is reached. That is why I prefer to add tags. Anyway I will try to be optimistic. My concern is over two images. May be these things are already cited in the article, but I would like to be sure about it.

1. The So-called "Headquarters of the Nair Brigade"[2]: The image given here is that of present Legislative Museum, situated right at the heart of Trivandrum city. I have no doubt that this building had some official significance during the Travancore era. But do we have any reference to believe that this was actually the headquarters of the "Nair brigade"? Even then, was this building used solely as Nair headquarters or was it just one among many of its purposes? What exactly do we know about this?

2. Nair feudal chief belonging to the Ettuveetil Pillamar[3]: The source of this image is a self-glorification Website[4] which simply says "An Ettuveedan". The website does not give the source of this image, such as "Painting found on a tomb in ABC" or "Mural in XYZ palace" etc. Anybody can start a website and upload such images. We cannot take this until we have some proof that this image belongs to Ettuveettil Pillai. Again, which Ettuveettil Pillai? Ettuveetil Pillamar were eight warriors each from a different family, living in different villages. Even if this image belongs to one Ettuveedan, which one? The description of the image is in German which reads: "Ein Nayar aus der Gruppe der Pillai, zeitgenössische Darstellung um 1750" (Translation: A Nayar from the group of Pillai, contemporary illustration from around 1750). Pillai is a subgroup of Nair and there are thousands of Pillai families unrelated to Ettuveedans. I think we need to dig into this issue a little. --Nair (talk) 13:02, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Your raise great points; for 1) I suggest we briefly look into whether this building did indeed serve as a Bde HQ or no. For 2), unless we have any reason to believe it's specifically tied to Ettuveedans, it should be removed, or at least re-captioned if it still serves a use. Thanks for bringing up these details! I do think that there are some Public Domain pics of the actual Travancore Bde or Rgt to be found online, and those would probably be even better additions. MatthewVanitas (talk) 13:47, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

So, would you suggest adding the "Citation Needed" tag or "Dubious - Discuss" tag? I hope it is OK to add tags to image captions. --Nair (talk) 14:46, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

I suppose that you could but it doesn't serve any useful purpose since by the sounds of it the issue is being investigated already. If I were you then I would ping MatthewVanitas in a couple of days if there is no development. Rather than add a dubious/cite needed tag we should move straight to deleting the images unless the issue can be resolved. But give it a couple of days at least. Just my 2c. - Sitush (talk) 15:28, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

It has been more than a week since the issue was raised and we have not recieved even a single response. Shall we act now or should we wait more? --Nair (talk) 03:00, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

Not that I'm in charge of it, but I would suggest that we do as mentioned above: if the pic is germane to "Nair" at large but has a misleading caption, the caption and position in the page should be corrected. If it is not germane to "Nair" at large, I see no objections to removing it. Do you feel confident that the Legislative Museum has not previously served as the Nair Brigade HQ? If so, definitely remove it, or if it was previously so, clarify in the caption. Thanks for reminding us about this ongoing issue. MatthewVanitas (talk) 06:18, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

Ok, now I am going to remove both the images. Since you can't prove a negative, it is up to them (supporters of the use of these images here, if any) to prove the positive. We always have the option of re-adding the images once we have sufficient citations. Thanks. --Nair (talk) 08:19, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

Add some polyandry pics, since the Nair wikipedia page is all about polyandry. Cheers. Nairs are people who practice polyandry. And that nair brigade image is nothing but the place where they practice polyandry. Have fun now and hope you live in peace. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.202.42.194 (talk) 05:17, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Koyas

Will it be a bad idea that this article should have a section about the Muslim Nairs, i.e, Koyas? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 49.137.139.236 (talk) 17:55, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps an entry in the See also section? Including anything more substantive would likely be awkward since the Koyas are a distinct group, are not Hindu and have their own article. Whether the See also mention is valid depends a lot on how accurate the Koya (Malabar) article is with regard to the claims of Nair origin. If there is a certainty of relationship then there might be scope for a paragraph explaining how the two groups diveged, but nothing much more. Well, that is my opinion at any rate. - Sitush (talk) 19:17, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Having now looked at the article in question, I note that it was replete with copyright violations and statements that were not supported by the cited sources. I do not yet know enough about the Muslim communities of southern India to fix these issues but clearly as things stand there is little to justify any inclusion here. I thought it was odd that despite all my reading around the Nair subject I was unable to recall a mention of the Koyas! Of course, the common origin may still be correct but it would need some decent verifying sources. - Sitush (talk) 19:44, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Koyas do not have any connection with Nairs. Koyas are Brahmin converts. Koyas never practiced Sambandhams. They never allowed other castes to have sexual relations with their women. They were landlords and merchants, not servants like Nairs. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 101.212.73.128 (talk) 17:57, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

They practised sambhandam with the arab merchants from yemen.Koyas were muslim converted from nairs,they practised marumakkathayam as a sign of it.They conversions were supported by zamorin.These men fought wars like nairs and were called koyas(curropt form of khwaja meaning 'leader',nair also means the same).Nairs belong to warrior clan of kerala called malayala kshatriyas. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.213.50.48 (talk) 08:55, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

The evidence of mohemadans practising sambandam relationship in ancient times can be obtained from the book "A New account of east indies" by Alexander hamilton who visited Malabar in late 16th centuary. I dont know from where do these people get information that nairs were mere servents.No community can achieve nobility by doing servile jobs. Also There's no evidence for your comment "koyas are Brahmin converts",cite sources if you have any or else remove it.Even Arakkal kingdom,the only muslim kingdom in malabar had nair origins(http://books.google.co.in/books?id=9mR2QXrVEJIC&printsec=frontcover&dq=malabar+manual&hl=en&ei=IoWUTsDfN8bYrQeqp8yuBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCwQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=arakkal&f=false). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.213.49.3 (talk) 18:08, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

I think that you are confused. The article does not mention the Koyas at all. Let's just drop this subject, shall we? The inclusion of Koyas in this article is not going to happen any time soon, and probably not ever. If you want to discuss Koyas then do so at that article, not here. - Sitush (talk) 18:23, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

koyas are one of the oldest muslim ethinic group,their history date back to 13th century(Battle to capture thirunavaya temple,kozhikode koya was one of the commander of zamorins army in that mission).cited from malabar manual. The things mentioned by me is supported by strong evidences,doesn't craft history(like sadasivan fans' do).I personaly know certain koya families in calicut who follow marumakkathayam(koottukudumbambam as it is said now),where girls remain at their home even after their marriage.Nairs left marumakkathayam 100 yrs ago,koyas are still practicing it.marumakkathayam was not practised by brahmins(expect some families in palakkad). Koyas of calicut& Bunts of tulunadu are two ethinic groups which have historic connections with nair.Article bunt mentions 'bunt relations with nairs of malabar' and it will not be a bad idea to include section bunt in the article

Your personal experience(s) count for nothing in Wikipedia articles, I am afraid. Nor does mine. Bunts were mentioned in this article at one point but the source was hopeless, the point was tangential and the content was removed. I've dabbled with the Bunt (community) article but have not yet given it a really good clean up - it needs one. Unless there was a really close linkage - for example, the communities shared a caste association or they would intermarry but beyond the Bunt-Nair-Koya triumvirate - then I still do not see the point. If someone wants to read about Koyas or Bunts then they can go to the articles for those communities; if they are interested in who followed a particular marriage practice then they can go to ... etc. - Sitush (talk) 13:13, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from , 12 October 2011

These nairs besides being all of noble descent have to be armed as knights by the hand of the king or lord with whom they live and until they have been so equipped they cannot bear arms nor call themselves nairs but they enjoy the freedom and exemption and advantages of the nairs in many things In general when these nairs are seven years of age they are immediately sent to school to learn all manner of feats of agility and gymnastics for the use of their weapons First they learn to dance and then to tumble and for that purpose they render supple all their limbs from their childhood so that they can bend them in any direction And after they have exercised in this they teach them to manage the weapons which suit each one most That is to say bows clubs or lances and most of them are taught to use the sword and buckler which is of more common use among them In this fencing there is much agility and science And there are very skilful men who teach this art and they are called Panicars 1 these are captains in war These nairs when they enlist to live with the king bind themselves and promise to die for him and they do likewise with any other lord from whom they receive pay This law is observed by some and not by others but their obligation constrains them to die at the hands of anyone who should kill the king or their lord and some of them so observe it so that if in any battle their lord should be killed they go and put themselves in the midst of the enemies who killed him even should those be numerous and he alone by himself dies there but before falling he does what he can against them and after that one is dead another goes to take his place and then another so that sometimes ten or twelve nayrs die for their lord Reference-book "A description of the coasts of east africa and malabar by Durato Barbosa page 128. Devaprathap (talk) 17:03, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Barbosa is mentioned in the article but only "in passing". His is far too old a work to be used as a main source for information. You would need to present much more recent reliable sources in order to verify your point. Feel free to do so, of course. - Sitush (talk) 17:10, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from , 16 October 2011

The Nairs are known for their martial history, including their involvement in Kalaripayattu and the role of Nair warriors in the Mamankam ritual. The Nairs were classed as a martial race by the British, but were de-listed after rebelling against them under Velu Thampi Dalawa, and thereafter were recruited in low numbers into the British Indian Army. Only Nairs were recruited into the Travancore Nair Army, until 1935 when non-Nairs were admitted. This State Force (known also as the Nair Brigade) was merged into the Indian Army after independence and became the 9th and 16th Battalions of the Madras Regiment.

The Samanta Kshatriya Kolathiri and Travancore kingdoms were originally of the Nair caste The Zamorin Raja was a Samanthan Nair and the Arakkal kingdom of Kannur, which was the only Muslim kingdom in the Kerala region, also had Nair origins. Nair feudal families such as the Ettuveetil Pillamar of Travancore and Paliath Achan of Kochi were extremely influential in the past and exerted great influence on the ruling clan.

116.203.248.111 (talk) 15:25, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Not done: please be more specific about what needs to be changed. What is this? Where do you want it to go in the article? Having said that, some parts definitely can't be added--everyculture.com is not going to be a reliable source, the last sentence is unverified puffery, and I'm not sure about the reliability of the keralapolicehistory site (though others may say it's okay). Is this section supposed to replace something else, or just add more info? Qwyrxian (talk) 23:58, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I did not find any way to mention where it should be added . Anyways you can chuck some lines. But there are lines above which hold value. I want you to replace the start line aout the unitary group. If you wont replace then you could add these lines. 180.215.224.150 (talk) 06:19, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

It looks to me as if you are suggesting that we revert the lead of the article back to a much earlier version. Would this be a correct interpretation of your request? Why would we want to do this when the entire issue has been discussed extensively over recent months? - Sitush (talk) 06:29, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Who discussed it ? And why ? Can you mention the details please ? This was the old interpretation. I want kalaripayattu mentioned over here, since it holds a great historical value and is a significant point to be mentioned. I dont think hypergamy and nambudiri part is of any importance here. There are many more important points that should be added instead of this. Why do you hesitate adding these points ? Please don't be biased since it is not good hurting the feelings of a group of people just for momentary fun. 116.203.250.125 (talk) 20:58, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

@Qwyrxian

Please go through below request. I have removed those references. It still doesn't matter much since there are ample or references as well. I am anyhow making this as a new request. Please do the needful.

The Nairs are known for their martial history, including their involvement in Kalaripayattu and the role of Nair warriors in the Mamankam ritual. The Nairs were classed as a martial race by the British

The Samanta Kshatriya Kolathiri and Travancore kingdoms were originally of the Nair caste The Zamorin Raja was a Samanthan Nair and the Arakkal kingdom of Kannur, which was the only Muslim kingdom in the Kerala region, also had Nair origins.

180.215.240.98 (talk) 22:18, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, if you're asking to change the lead, then I must personally decline. I take a pretty strict stance on WP:LEAD (stricter than some editors), and believe that info in the lead should only represent what is in the actual text (with only trivial exceptions, like mentioning a birth date on a bio page). I also do not believe that there should be citations in the lead, except in very limited circumstances--in general, citations belong in the article, because the lead should do nothing other than summarize the article. However, looking at it now, the current lead is, in my opinion, not good. It spends too much time discussing specifically marriage practices, even though that only covers part of the article. If I have time, I will try to propose a new lead; since this article can be contentious, I'll propose it here on the talk page rather than just put it in the article. Qwyrxian (talk) 02:03, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Why did you people change the original content anyways ???? You could have removed lines that didnt have reference and locked it. Instead you deleted everything and put up some crap description and then lock it ??? and I wonder why are so many people interested in this article ???? What the hell is going on ? It seems like a hot cake to me.

Aryan Nayar . Please restore the original description which was very correct, informative and descriptive as well. 116.203.37.176 (talk) 21:03, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

In your opinion that information was correct...but reliable sources disagree. We must include what reliable sources say. Again, hoping to get to this lead sometime soon. Qwyrxian (talk) 00:45, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi Qwyrxian When you say the source is not reliable, I would like you to mention which source is not reliable and also exlain why it isn't reliable.

Greetings, Vineet Nayar.

Vineet Nayar (talk) 16:15, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from , 22 October 2011

Here is an old painting pertaining to Nayars viz king of cochin on the elephant. The pic depicts the nayar's as mentioned in the below tagline (refer painting). I would like this to be added into the article. You can add it where it would serve its purpose. http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pritchett/00routesdata/1700_1799/malabar/cochin/prevost2.jpg

180.215.240.98 (talk) 22:00, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Not done: In order to add a picture to an article, it first needs to be uploaded to Wikipedia. To do so, you can go to WP:Files for upload and follow the instructions there. For both copyright and technical reasons, Wikipedia cannot link pictures from other websites. I only very rarely deal with images, so I don't have enough knowledge to help; I'm not sure how to deal with the copyright issue in this, for instance, since this is obviously an old, out of copyright painting, but I bet that Columbia claims copyright on the website itself...In any event, they should be able to help at WP:Files for upload. Qwyrxian (talk) 02:08, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

This image is worth adding. Since it is obviously an old painting, no copyright issue arises and any X or Y cannot simply claim such right over a drawing solely for having uploaded it to their website. So I will consider uploading the image to Commons once I get time. But the appropriate description will never be "The Nayar king of cochin riding elephant". The image itself has descriptions in two languages, French and Dutch. French caption is "Le Roy de Cochin sur son Elephant accompagné de ses Nayres" (Translation: The King of Cochin on his Elephant with his Nairs) while the Dutch text reads: "De Koning van Kochin op zynen Elefant, verzeld van zyne NAIROS (Translation: The King of Cochin upon his Elephant, attended by his Nairs.) In short, it is not "Nair King" but "King with his Nairs". It does not say the King himself is a Nair. Thanks. -Nair (talk) 03:20, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

The way that I did it can be seen for the painting reproduced at Isaac Perrins, an article I wrote some months ago. Click through to the image licence etc & if the situation for this suggested image matches that one then it is ok - I got it cleared by the copyright people (User:Moonriddengirl, IIRC). - Sitush (talk) 09:44, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

I have found a similar but better painting named "The King of Cochin riding on an Elephant, attended by his Nayros" here. This is of better quality, no copyright/source ambiguity and comes with a detailed description and source information here. It is a work of Dutch Protestant merchant, traveler and historian Jan Huyghen van Linschoten and if we trust their description, "this iconic image of the King of Cochin seated atop his elephant with his fearsome warriors was one of the best known images of India in western Europe for the better part of two centuries." The original copperplate engraving is on auction, but no IPR issues arise, as per Commons:COM:PDART. ← Nair (talk) 19:27, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

 Uploaded to Commons:File:The King of Cochin riding on an Elephant, attended by his Nairs.jpg. ← Nair (talk) 08:52, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Are you sure that you can copy/paste the image description at you have done for the upload? It smacks of copyvio to me. Also, are you sure that the "Nayros" are the same group as the Nairs? Obviously, there is a similarity but it is not a spelling that I have seen before. - Sitush (talk) 16:27, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the warning, I have changed the description in commons. I didn't think about the copyvio. Anyway "Nayros" is "Nair", there is no question on it. - Nair (talk) 18:49, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from Samiksha Varma removed

Sorry, Samiksha Varma, but I had to remove your "edit request". When you make a request, you need to state specifically the change you want made, not just copy whole chunks out of the text. Editors need to be able to see quickly and easily what the difference is. In addition, it's essentially impossible to respond to an edit request covering 5 separate sections of the article. Instead, please start with one request. As the edit request for says, please state your request in terms of "Please change X in the article to Y". Don't recommend removing an entire paragraph and inserting a whole new one--that's too complex for an edit request. If that's the kind of change you want to make, just start a regular talk section, then explain in detail what is wrong with everything in the paragraph (i.e., why we should abandon all of the references currently there), then explain why your proposed version is better. Qwyrxian (talk) 01:50, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Arbitrary Heading

This article does not reflect the great Nair history and their influence on Kerala. In fact most of the customs, arts, practices in Kerala are connected with Nairs. It is true that some portion of nairs were soldiars in King,s Army. But many were Kings as well as rulers of small kingdoms. This article is mainly highlighting the negatives, which has no clear proof. Need to be edited properly; highlighting the positives of the community. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 221.158.173.36 (talk) 00:04, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

All the pictures are of 16th century showing some portrait. This is may be true; but as I already said "all nairs were not army men". They were also the army leaders, ministers, local kings and some cases King himself. Why there is no picture on current status of nairs.... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 221.158.173.36 (talk) 00:09, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

THIRUVATHIRA

Thiruvathira was one of the important artform/ritual/festival associated with Nair mainly for women.This is seen nowhere in this article.Description of this can be obtained from Travancore state manual by 'nagam aiyya' VOL 2 section NAIR-festivals page no.365.(http://books.google.co.in/books?ei=6l2uTuuAGY-HrAe_m9ywDA&ct=result&id=9DJuAAAAMAAJ&dq=travancore+state+manual+vol+2&q=tiruvatira#search_anchor) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vinu707 (talk • contribs) 08:39, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

You can do it yourself as well as expanding stub article Thiruvathira. Btw, Thiruvathira is a day/star/festival while the dance/art-form/ritual is called Thiruvathirakali. I believe this article needs further expansion to the areas such as art and literature - Nair (talk) 04:06, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from 116.203.27.249, 3 October 2011

" I like to see these nairs who never care their lives who lead an army of similar people even against mighty ocean of enemies and fight to win like a hell-fire " - Lord Wellington

Nair Indian (Kerala): Hindu (Nayar) name denoting membership of the Nayar community, which is from Malayalam nayar ‘leader’, ‘lord’, ‘soldier’ (from Sanskrit naya(ka) ‘leader’ + the honorific plural ending -r). The Nayars were regarded as protectors of the land.

Nair The Keralolpathi(The origin of Malabar / http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keralolpathi), which is a compilation of myths, mentions that Varuna had gifted land in Kerala to Nagas and the Nairs descended from these Naga ladies and Brahmin men. The affinity of the Nair community to Serpents and Serpent worship is indisputable and might have given rise to their reputed Naga origin. Naga worship might have also given rise to the mythical version of Nairs being Kshatriyas belonging to the Serpent dynasty (Nagavansham) who removed their sacred thread and migrated south to escape the wrath of a vengeful Parasurama. According to Chatampi Swamigal who interpreted old Tamil texts, the Nairs were Naka (Naga or Snake) Lords who ruled as feudal lords in the Chera kingdom. A Nair Lady, by Ravi VarmaOne finds mention of the Nairs during the reign of the King Rama Varma Kulashekhara (1020-1102) of the second Chera dynasty, when the Chera Kingdom was attacked by the Cholas. The Nairs fought by forming suicide squads (Chavers) against the invading force. Nairs gradually lost their supremacy over the land after the collapse of the second Chera kingdom

Aaryan Nair (talk) 07:49, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

Not done. Wellington's comment does not seem particularly significant, nor do you provide a source for it. Similarly, you provide no source for your proposed definition of Nair, whereas the article already has sourced etymology. The Keralolpathi is a primary source and therefore is not reliable to verify statements in this article. Sorry. - Sitush (talk) 07:57, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

Like sitush is going to add that. bring some hypothesis like nairs where once cherumans who stayed inside house & became fair skinned & say its from sadhashivan. thats all you want to make sitush 'seriously considering it' .Sesshomaru666666 (talk) 07:01, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

So what are you suggesting? Nairs originated from snakes? We all know that Keralolpathi is a heap of blunders and historians assume it ZERO historical value. Chattambi Swamikal is not a reliable source since he was a Nair with POV and most of his assumptions were based on legends and ballads.

Even though you stated in a ridiculing manner, the possible Cheruman origin of Nairs is not altogether impossible. Although all those blunders such as 'Serpent' race/dynasty theory, Kshatriya origin, arrival from Ahicchatra, etc were much talked, no serious discussions regarding the scientific origin of Nairs have taken place, since this article is yet to have a separate section concerning the "Theories of Origin". Many historians are of the opinion that Cheruman is a root caste from which many of today's castes have originated. They believe that Cherumans are the real descendents of ancient Chera people. Marriage with Brahmins may be a reason for some of those Nairs having fair skin, but majority of Nairs have same skin color as that of other castes. --Nair (talk) 02:32, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Mr Nair. Your username being Nair and you being interested in defaming Nairs. You are not Nair that i'm pretty sure of. I saw how desperate you were to remove those images related to Nair Brigade. Dont tell me you have video tapes of polyandry in your Machine. Every group and surname have their own wikipedia description but they never have problem of other people interested in its description and that too with such enthusiasm as if your whole life depends on it. What problem do you have if someone includes a good point about Nairs in wikipedia. I cant know how you locked that page but we have a huge community and we are very close to registering a case against these defaming tactics. I have ample of descriptions that state that Nairs were very bold proud and marital people. If there is a book called Marital Races of Undivided India and i take excerpts from it you directly reject it. I dont understand what you people gain from this. Anyways this is a clear case of jealousy and treachery. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aaryan Nair (talk • contribs) 06:07, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Please don't accuse other editors of "jealousy and treachery". It's not allowed per our policy against personal attacks. Second, the article is protected because unregistered editors were regularly adding unsourced information or removing unsourced information simply based on their own opinions about what is or is not "true", which is not how Wikipedia works. Third, could you please explain what you mean by "registering a case"? Do you mean a case here on Wikipedia? If you mean a legal case, I have to tell you that you are not allowed to edit Wikipedia while pursuing a legal case, and all threats of creating a legal case will result in your account being blocked, per WP:NLT. Qwyrxian (talk) 07:17, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Whatever. If you have protected the page in order to moderate the changes that people make in this page, why don't you let people make changes that have a reference to support the particular addition/changes ? As far as I have seen you guys bluntly say that this book/reference is not primary or should I say 'I don't like this book, hence not acceptable!' ? Is it so ? If I add something along with a reference of a book or article, will you let me make the changes ? i don't think that fair moderation would serve your purpose.

And about accusing other editors, I know that editor 'Nair' is not actually a Nair. This itself proves the intention of the so called editors. Removal of Nair brigade image with so much enthusiasm. http://www.keralapolicehistory.com/trvpol.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nair_Brigade (Now please don't screw that page too) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aaryan Nair (talk • contribs) 08:44, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

I have removed the first four characters of your message - please use English on en-WP talk pages. The website keralapolicehistory does not appear to be anything special - can you provide any evidence that it is a reliable source? Your other link is to another Wikipedia article and as such is circular. - Sitush (talk) 08:49, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Would you rely on this link ?

http://www.defence.pk/forums/india-defence/65661-travancore-nair-infantry.html

defence.pk has already been used in wikipedia as a reliable source in many places Aaryan Nair (talk) 10:34, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

It looks like a forum. Have you read our reliable sources policy? - Sitush (talk) 09:28, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Actually, given your edits subsequent to my message immediately above, it would appear that you have not read the policy. Please could you do so. Forums are not reliable sources, nor is it particularly relevant that the same forums may have been used as references in other articles - see WP:OSE. Much as it would be nice to check all articles on English Wikipedia, there are getting on for 4 million of the things and it is beyond the ability of anyone to cope with that. - Sitush (talk) 10:49, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Dear Aaryan Nair,

Removal an image (so-called Nair Brigade HQ) does not come under the definition of 'defaming'. I have removed two images for not having proper citation. I did it after discussing in this page. I am always open for re-adding the images once we have sufficient references. No addition or removal is final in Wikipedia.

Who told you that I must be a Nair to have this username? "Nair" does not always mean Nair caste. Do you know there are many north Indians like Mira Nair (director of film "Kama Sutra: A Tale of Love") who use this as a surname. There is also a popular hair removal product by the name "Nair".

Now, let me make it clear that I was not the one who added matters you (or other Nairs) accuse as 'defaming'.

• Dog legend - Not by me, neither do I support Sadasivan's reliability.
• Polyandry - Not by me
• Sudra status - Not by me

I do not understand your notation "jealousy and treachery". It is just your imagination that other communities might be jealous towards Nairs. In fact most of the other communities in Kerala are financially and socially much more forward today as compared to Nairs. Sorry, I don’t see anything enviable in Nair caste. ← Nair (talk) 17:47, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

@ usernam Nair,

So you dont envy Nairs. Fine by me. Why are you having a userid named Nair ? Is it like you made a username specifically for this article ? I dont expect so much dedication since you dont seem like a god sent. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vineet Nayar1 (talk • contribs) 12:01, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Nair page- A perspective from the past!

The entire article on Nairs portrays only 'How/What/Who nairs were?' and it often misleads the reader and makes him/her believe that nairs belong to the pre-independent period only. For instance, no nair woman wears the attires given on the page. This certainly represents the past which can be dated a 100 years back. So please update it accordingly and try to give a present point of view if possible. Or please mention under the images that this doesnt represent the current nair costumes, the current images defenitely sends out wrong impression.

Thanks Midds109 (talk) 06:01, 3 November 2011 (UTC) Midhun

Present day Nairs dress like other Indians. Today's Nair girls wear Churidars and boys wear jeans and shirts. There is no point in adding images to show these garments. Attire section narrates what their traditional dressing was. Thanks. --Nair (talk) 13:00, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Sadasivan

There have been some legitimate doubts raised regarding Sadasivan, in connection with another article. Three citations in this article refer to his book & so I have tagged them as being dubious. In fact, I am pretty sure that there are not dubious or even controversial, & that the info exists elsewhere. The tags will at least act as an aide memoire while I go hunting for alternative sources. Obviously, anyone else is welcome to go hunting also but right now I see no reason to actually remove the statements. - Sitush (talk) 09:29, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Raja Ravi Varma

Before the Raja Ravi Varma image is added (again) it might be worth reviewing the previous discussion about this image at Talk:Nair/Archive_17#Chekon_vs_Rajkris_-_images. - Sitush (talk) 10:47, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually the entire edit to the lead section here is problematic. It is a restoration of an older version of the article. Some of the sources are clearly unreliable for the points made (eg: the autobiography), others have been superseded by more recent works (& are contradicted or substantially modified in the body of the article), yet others were simply not available for review & had little support via GScholar etc. As far as the "martial race" claim goes, no-one has ever been able to provide a source saying that they were classified as such (although my gut feeling has always been that they probably were).

I think that there is a general awareness that the lead is inadequate but this is not the way to go about fixing it. The lead has to summarise the article - see WP:LEAD - and yet what this edit does is something quite different. - Sitush (talk) 11:08, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

To clarify something for the contributor of the above edit, it is not usually necessary to provide citations in the lead precisely because it is a summary. Therefore, the justification for the edit - "...replacing old statements without any reference" - is misguided. - Sitush (talk) 11:30, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Sitush,

The image is taken from wikipedia itself and has no copyright issue. The image clearly is a work of the king himself and there should be no reason for its removal.

Moreover the points in the lead polyandry and stuff which would only be specific to some areas is not such an important point to be mentioned in the lead. I have stated this before cant writeas well. I had instead suggested a better writing along with a reference which was not accepted.

Did not sign in Shashi karayayi. 180.215.240.34 (talk) 13:55, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Nair polyandry is probably the aspect of Nair life that is most frequently covered in reliable sources, and it is so because of its significant & almost unique manifestation (with hypergamy etc). Therefore, it should be in the lead. with suitable provisos as appropriate. This has all been discussed several times over the course of the last few months.

Nobody has said that there is a copyright issue with the image. Well, not that I can recall anyway. I am not sure what your point is here. - Sitush (talk) 14:22, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

the point he made is that if there is not copyright issue? what is your issue ? Why do you remove that painting ? Cause it looks good ? If it were some woman from stone age showing her cleavage you would have put it on the top. You are lame Sitush. Very lame. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.203.33.9 (talk) 17:27, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

And the polyandry thing is specific to only a particular area. You cant summarize it since its not a general fact or tradition. If u trace back to history this has been very common. Be it Draupati in Mahabharata, Greek civilization, Tibet anywhere. You cant mention that in summary since its not general/traditional and it is not at all specific to the Nair's. And moreover since its Marti-linear, the woman had the right to do so if she wishes. It was not a tradition that they had to follow. The woman had the right to dismiss anyone if she doesn't wish to. Taking sentences out of context is being very low of you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.203.33.9 (talk) 18:32, 26 November 2011 (UTC)

After revisiting this page since 2010, I am appalled at the changes made to a once proper article. For starters:

1. The template of famous Nairs have been deleted (Which is almost a de-rigor for communities/peoples related articles on wikipedia). 2. Has been replaced by an amateurish medeival looking cartoon with no historical authenticity whatsoever, other than projecting the perspective of a colonial trader. The King of Cochin holds a fletched! spear with no mahout controlling the elephant, large earrings, loincloth all of which have no historical accuracy. The rulers of Cochin never led battles from the frontlines. If the picture is authentic, it would have been drawn in Europe by someone who actually never saw this with his own eyes. I do not believe that this would be a proper introduction to depict a live, vigourous and thriving community. 3. List of surnames used among Nairs have been deleted. 4. Dubious statements have made their way into the article projecting the writers point of view or agenda (typically smacking of Marxist Historiography). 5. Etymology. Much has been written by various authors on the etymology and origin of Nairs. Virtually none has been provided, old references have been deleted. 6. The results of Genetic Studies and Haplogroups have been deleted. 7. The theories of the origins of Nairs have been deleted. No reference to the commonality of Serpent Kavu or the Matrilinear (not Matriachial) system followed by the Bunts. Note that Serpent Kavu or the Matrilinear system is not pratised among Dravidians or any other castes in Kerala.

I would like to highlight some of the dubious statements: a. "The worship of snakes, a Dravidian custom,[4] is so prevalent in the area that one modern historian notes: "In no part of the world is snake worship more general than in Kerala" The fact is that snake worship is not a sole Dravidian tradition and is common in all parts of India. The form of snake worship which is what the author should focus on is common only between Nairs and the Bunts of Tulunadu. Even the archetype Dravidian Tamils do not have the Serpent "Kaves". b. ".. 1st-century AD is thought to have been governed by the Chera dynasty and which by the late 3rd-century AD had broken up, possibly as a consequence of a decline in trade with the Romans".. The historical fact is that the Cheras were decimated in continuous wars with the Cholas, Pandyas and finally the Kalabhras. c. Conjecture by foreign authors which may not have been accurate "Dumont took the extreme view that the Nairs as a whole could not be defined as a caste in the traditional sense, but Fuller believed this to be unreasonable as, "since the Nayars live in a caste society, they must evidently fit into the caste system at some level or another." d. The section " Attempts to achieve Caste Cohesion" there is a statement "It has been concluded by Fuller that..", how can Fuller conclude on some societal process that was and is currently ongoing. Is there no caste cohesion among Nairs in 2011. The use of citations from such authors are more misleading that narratives without citations. e. Excessive focus on the various marriage customs. Also the statement "the thali kalyanam legitimised the marital status of the woman in the eyes of her faith prior to her becoming involved in the amoral activities that were common practice". Is the author stating that this ceremony was the goahead for the girl to get engaged in amoral activities? Amoral to whose perspective. Clearly reflects the authors agenda.

I would like to go on..hope the author who developed the original article would come back and clean up the current mess. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Nalaiyath (talk • contribs) 07:22, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

If you read the extensive discussions on this talk page then I think that most of your queries and statements are answered therein. However, if there is anything that you wish to challenge then you will need to provide sources to verify your point. The "amoral" bit may be an issue, I agree: I will check the source later today. - Sitush (talk) 07:43, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Are you aware that "amoral" is not the same as "immoral"? - Sitush (talk) 08:13, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Manipulation of Indian History

Indian History has been manipulated and rewritten continuously by the following kinds of historians with their own agenda: 1. Missionaries - to prove that the north is completely Aryan and the south is completely Dravidian, to perpetuate the myth that the Hindu religion is Aryan for aims at conversion. 2. Colonials - to inculcate an inherent inferiority complex by highlighting the negatives. 3. Marxists - who used both the above as a tool to undermine the social structure to inculcate their own principles. The bane of modern Indian hisorical writings are the Marxists Historiographers and hence the current tone of the article.

K.M Panikkar writing under the colonial influence in 1918 has been referred to, at the same time authors like C Achyuta Menon and F Fawcett. In the same vein, K M Panikkar's mention of Buchanan's statement that Nairs are a race as opposed to a Caste is ignored. The records that state that Nairs migrated from the North with the Brahmins at the end of the first Chera empire is ignored. Sri Lankan history states that the Cholas and Pandyas involved in war were unable to send help to their respective client states in Sri Lanka. The Pandyas recruited mercenaries from the Chera regio to invade Sri Lanka where they committed numerous atrocities. This happened immediately after the decimation of the first Chera Kingdom by the Cholas. Where did these mercenaries come from?

None can deny that Nairs do not have Dravidian or Indo-Aryan blood, but the root of the Nair Society is from the Indo Scythians from where the polyandry and snake worship originates. Nalaiyath (talk) 08:04, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Look, it is becoming apparent to me that the sudden influx of contributors to this page over the last couple of weeks may be part of a group working from Orkut or some similar place. Nothing wrong with that, if it is correct, but please read back through the archives etc of this talk page before wasting everyone else's time. And remember: this page exists to discuss improvements to the article. Saying things such as you have above is (certainly in my case) telling me nothing that I have not already looked at or fail to understand ... but it continues to lack reliable sources. No source, no change. - Sitush (talk) 08:08, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Buchanan, by the way, is not terribly reliable. Take, for example, his statement that "No Nair knows his father, and every man looks upon his sister's children as his heirs". Do you really believe that no Nair knew their father? The issue of race vs caste was a huge debate around the end of the 19th century but Buchanan does not come out of it well. The article currently speaks in terms of a group of castes - rather than just one - and it is using modern sources to apply the terms that it uses. - Sitush (talk) 08:23, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Nairs come from the place called Ahichatra which is a part of indo-scythian region.The word Ahi means snake or Naga in Sanskrit. Nagas were a group of ancient people who worshiped serpents. The word khsetra means region in Sanskrit. This implies that Ahi-kshetra was a region of Nagas. This could mean that the region was populated originally by Nagas, Nairs and Bunts of Kerala and Tulu Nadu who claim Kshatriya descent from the nagas.Ahichatra is the utta panchala state where panchali was born.Panchali is the epitome of polyandry in India/mahabharatha. Kerala was ruled by AY kingdom during sangam period.The word Ay is derived from 'Ahi' meaning snake.Genitical studies also shows similarity with scythians.In epics it is said that Parasuama after his Kshatriya carnage realized his mistake and asked rest of the kshatriyas to remove thier sacrad thread and occupy ahichatra where he assured them safe living

I really do not care less what you think, sorry. No source, no change. - Sitush (talk) 09:10, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

@ Nalaiyath: It would really help if you would just study the rules thoroughly for some time, and then commence editing based on your knowledge of Wikipedia policies and guidelines, rather than arguing in a seemingly endless debate and wasting other people's time. I have sent you a welcome message, with a list of basic Wikipedia rules and guidelines. I hope that will be of help. Joyson Noel ^{Holla at me!} 09:19, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, JN, I should have done that. Thanks for filling that space. - Sitush (talk) 09:25, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

BTW, I agree that there are issues regarding Marxist historiography etc, just as there are issues with other forms of historiography. But being the product of a Marxist historian does not of itself make a source unreliable: we need to weigh it up and we should present other viewpoints where possible. However, going back to the widely discredited 19th century amateur ethnologists is not usually the way to rebalance things. I would be grateful if you have the time to list which of the sources currently used are in your opinion of Marxist orientation (be that history, sociology or whatever - they tend to merge together a lot). If you could also provide some alternatives to those sources then so much the better. I can tell you with certainty that Fuller, Gough, Nossiter and Panikker were not of the Marxist persuasion. - Sitush (talk) 09:44, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Diet sources

The following was recently removed from the articles and then reinstated by me.

Pork was also noted as one of their favourite foods, and even high-status Nairs were noted as eating buffalo meat.

The reason for removal was "Removed unsubstantiated information about diet since the sources were very recent studies and not reflecting the race of Nairs when they were a community" - see here

I reinstated because this article is about the Nairs generally and not specifically during any era. I cannot see the cited sources, and there may be room for someone who can see the things to improve the phrasing. However, prima facie, the statements certainly are not "unsubstantiated", as claimed in the edit summary, nor is a recent study (1965?!) necessarily a bad thing. - Sitush (talk) 16:10, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Is that how low you can get? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vineet Nayar1 (talk • contribs) 05:49, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

"Nairs were classified as martial and aristocratic group"

According to 1891 census of India nair community was classified under martial and aristocratic section I want this statement to be included in the lead.Reference is quoted from wikipedia itself so dont avoid it.117.206.48.245 (talk) 07:58, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually, that is precisely why we should avoid it. We should never use Wikipedia articles as a source for other Wikipedia articles. I'll go over there & see if there is a proper source that we can use.

By the way, you might want to adapt your tone a little: your message sounds a little bit rude, and no-one gets their own way here. - Sitush (talk) 08:01, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

The article to which you refer has a single source, which is this. Nairs are not even mentioned on that webpage. I think that perhaps you need to locate the correct page & then return here. - Sitush (talk) 08:04, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

come on sitush look here http://www.chaf.lib.latrobe.edu.au/dcd/page.php?title=&action=previous&record=1037 I think you can spot it correctly.Make changes accordingly. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.206.48.245 (talk) 09:00, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, that is a different page & so confirms my point that we cannot rely on other articles. We have been trying to find a source for this statement for months. Of course, the British Raj censuses were hopelessly unreliable & their definitions changes from one area to another but doubtless it can be fitted in somewhere. I'll need to read the entire section properly because one of several problems that rears its head with the censuses is that there are numerous regional reports and peoples could be classified as one thing in region A and something completely different in region B. If this were to be the case then we would have to qualify any statement, which means even more sourcing work, - Sitush (talk) 09:08, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Actually, it is immediately apparent that you have misrepresented that source. If you go back a page (p. 189) you will see that the tables are referring to the agricultural class as defined in 1891, which the census then split based on past history. Thus, "The agricultural class then contains nearly 30 per cent. of the population under three groups. The first, that of the military section, includes those castes and tribes which have risen to power at different stages in the history of their province. Amongst them the largest, that of the Rájpút, is spread all over India, but to a far less extent to the south than in the continental portion. The title is an extremely comprehensive one, as must have been seen from what has been said regarding the ..." I for one will have to have a think about this: it is vague in detail and will need some careful phrasing. In 1891 they were classed among the agriculturalists, who had at some stage been engaged in other occupations. Of course, we already discuss those past occupations, using far more recent sources than the 1891 census. - Sitush (talk) 09:17, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Ok,You just need to copy the statement 'nairs were classed as martial and aristocratic according to 1891 census'.census reports are government documents,you can get this report from different sources.since it recorded as a public document you dont have to suspect about its reliability.Ithink it is far more reliable than sadasivan and wikipedia. Even government of India uses these british documents to classify various communities into OBC,ST,SC etc till now (i think u are aware of government procedures).Still WHY do you find that unreliable,so then I have to believe that you are purposefully not editing it. Can i edit the lede in the article or their is any other way to do that.

Also who were classified as Agriculturists,I dont see jat ,rajput, gujjar maratha ....etc classed as agriculturists.Marathas,kallars ,maravars also were local tribe.Why should a cummunity be spread nationwide inorder to become martial.It is known to you that Nair battalion(9th,16th ,17th battalion of madrass regiment) still serves in Indian army. Census report 1891 is a government document,i dont find any reason for suspecting it.

No, you should not edit the article for this content yet. Your proposal seems likely to be inflating what the source says in a manner similar to numerous attempts to glorify various Indian communities here. Some of us have been trying hard to bring a sense of proportion and accurate representation to these articles and your would be a retrograde step. I am thinking about it, honest, but a big problem is likely to be interpreting what the census people meant. We are pretty much working with a primary source here and we are not permitted to interpret what they may or may not have intended. - Sitush (talk) 12:43, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

Are the full reports for the 1881, 1901 and 1911 censuses online, as per the 1891 that is linked to above? Rather than a GBooks snippet view etc. I would like to compare the entries (if it is at all possible - they changed the methodology pretty much every time). - Sitush (talk) 06:24, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from , 28 October 2011

I want to update the Etymology section currently. This is a better description.

The word Nair lends itself to two etymological interpretations. The first interpretation is that the word Nair is derived from the Sanskrit word Nayaka meaning leader. The Sanskrit word Nayaka appears in various forms in southern India (Nayak in Karnataka and Maharashtra, and Nayudu in Andhra Pradesh) and the word Nair has been suggested to be the corruption of Nayak in Malayalam.

PS: What are the dogs doing in the Etymology section. This sucks bigtime.

Vineet Nayar (talk) 16:09, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Not done: {{edit semi-protected}} is not required for edits to semi-protected, unprotected pages, or pending changes protected pages. — Bility (talk) 18:14, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

The Bunts of Tulunadu who have close relations with nairs of malabar uses surname NAYERA,MENAVA etc .These names have no connection with dogs.DONT trust Sadasivan.He is a big Bastard and a follower of SN guru.Etymology for nair can be obtained from malabar manual,travancore state manual,cochin population sensus etc .These are reliable sources.WHY then going for sadasivan,who was not even a historian.

At first I just removed Sadasivan, because there has been concern on a number of other articles that he is not a reliable source. Then, after looking at the rest, I don't really see any logic behind having any of them. If we really have no actual good idea, we should just state that the source is unclear, despite having a lot of different theories. So, I removed everything except for the first line. We might even want to remove that, or rephrase it to say "The etymology is unknown, as most proposed etymologies have been criticized by various scholars". Qwyrxian (talk) 10:01, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I agree, tentatively, about Sadasivan. The rage against his book on WP articles is considerable (not itself a reason for removal) and it seems that he was not primarily an academic historian/ethnologist/anthropologist/philologist etc (more of a reason, in the context of modern academic criteria). Elsewhere, someone has spotted what certainly appears to be a glaring contradiction in his book, which had nothing to do with this Nair issue, but exists nonetheless. I could only find one earlier source supporting the dog issue, and referenced it some time ago on this talk page. This entire issue has arisen out of a conflict situation, viz, "X says Y" and "I have found that A says B". Actually, at the outset of my involvement the "X says Y" bit was not even sourced, IIRC.

What I am not comfortable about is a blanket statement saying that "we do not know for sure" (or something similar). That strikes me as being uninformative. Much as I am not keen on the colonial sources, most of which were pseudo-academic from the POV of the standards of today, they were of their time & unless definitely questioned by more recent sources then they may have their place. At that time it was the best that was done and, indeed, were probably the first studies of such issues that was even remotely reliable. Sure, they were probably wrong but these sources are widely used even by studies such as the Anthropological Survey of India. AnSI is modern and in my opinion also not a lot of use, but such things are surely better than nothing. If we say that "it is unknown" then to support that statement we really need to cite something .... and that puts us back where we started, ie: we need to show that there are varying opinions. This is an awkward one and I have no easy solution to it.

I suspect that it is well known that I expanded James Tod and it seems highly unlikely that he could be described as reliable in a Wikipedia context. The same might be done of the likes of Russell, Thurston etc but at least so far I have found nothing much that directly "criticises" those writers, as much as my gut feeling is that they should have been criticised. Perhaps it is just that they are due an academic overview, but of course that is not our responsibility.

Compared to the Hitler Diaries farrago, this is childs-play. But,as HM The Queen said to me only the other day, "one should not name-drop". No, she didn't - just trying to lighten the tone. -

Basically, we either show all possible options, in context of their time, or we show none. But if we show none then we somehow have to get round how to explain that there are none. We need a source that says that. Is there one? This is a nightmare situation, unfortunately. - Sitush (talk) 00:42, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Gundert lists Nayar as etymologically related (as the hon. plural, so too Nayanar) to Nayan = leader (which he derives from Sanskrit Nayaka) in his Malayalam English dictionary. Given Gundert's Doctorate in philology and expertise in Malayalam, thats a reasonable source to site for an etymology, though of course not absolute. I am of the opinion that giving no etymology since there is dispute is not the right thing to do, giving an etymology from a reasonable source and mentioning of the non approval by others is a better way. Whether or not there is dispute, it seems plausible given the presence of related titles, mostly in SI. Naidu/Naicker in Andhra, Nayaka in Karnataka, Nayanar in Tamil, Nayar/Nayanar in Malayalam. PatNaik (Pada Nayaka) in Orissa also a related title. The endings in Tamil and Malayalam are characteristic way of showing respect, like Mooppar/Mooppanar etc. I would also claim 'Nay' is a Dravidian root meaning to lead from which 'Naya' = dog (that which leads, as in 'Nayaattu' for hunting) also came, but thats original research. Legolas95 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 07:26, 17 December 2011 (UTC).

When will this activity stop ???

I can see that editors claim a book/author unreliable. But still go ahead and use his quotes when it comes to adding a negative point ????

Vineet Nayar1 (talk) 07:22, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

Vineet Nayar1 (talk) 07:24, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

Add more pictures

Ancient pictures are available showing NAYRO,NAYRE,NAYR,NAYAR soldiers,it should be added.Also the main ritual associated with nair is serpent worship,photos of traditional 'sarpakkavu' should be uploaded.The section lack enough pictures.As we know,Pictures can speak louder than words. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.206.53.160 (talk) 19:16, 27 October 2011‎ (UTC)

Comprehensive Study about the status of the Nair community by the Indian Government

NCBC Document 1998 115.118.90.39 (talk) 13:33, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, the Indian government may be thinking that Nairs are forward but that is not a "reliable source" for the wiki editors, who are all set to prove that Nairs are aboriginals from Nilgiris. Sadasivan and Pullapilly are their only “reliable source” to prove this. So your inputs are not taken, if you have any half naked pictures, hate messages from missionaries and pictures of polyandry, you are most welcome. People are as good as their thoughts, you can depict a bull as a picture of power, at the same time it may be the bullshit that amuse a few, that’s what it go to do with the changed perception of this article. This article is a slap on the face of Wikipedia article's reliability — Preceding unsigned comment added by 148.87.67.211 (talk) 06:14, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

I beg your pardon! Did you actually read the article before your numerous, often poor changes to it? For starters, it does mention the forward caste position. The fact that you misrepresented that would itself make me doubt your edits but in fact I did go through them before reverting.

Now, feel free to discuss things calmly here, source by source if need be. As a tip, try to avoid making huge changes in one edit as it could be be the case that the good will get lost among the bad: unpicking a huge number of adjustments takes far too long for most people to contemplate, especially if they're overwhelmed by the bad, so they'll more likely just hit the "undo" link. - Sitush (talk) 07:47, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Calmly speaking, I think the doc referred to the Ministry of social justice and empowerment stating that Nairs are categorised as a Military Feudal Caste. Also most kings we Nairs who enjoyed Kshatriyahood.

A lot of references have been provided, maybe you can try reading it actually.

I dont think it's required to write a new letter to the govt, regarding clarifications stating that these facts are being misapproved by Wikipedia editors and hence a new reply is required from the govt.

Greetings, Vineet Nayar1 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vineet Nayar1 (talk • contribs) 07:05, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

My recent removal from the Religion section

I have just removed this. The first two paragraphs merely repeat that which is said in the paragraph that precedes them; the last paragraph - about Tip Sultan - is something that was removed from the article some months ago on the basis that it is specifically with regard to Tipu Sultan, who already has a perfectly decent article that is linked to from this one. Stuff about his sword is of no particular relevance to the subject matter here and the back and forth between India and London is primarily a nationalist issue (rather like the Elgin Marbles) & is out of place in this article. - Sitush (talk) 08:35, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

I know you removed the most important part. All thats included in that portion is that a lot of nairs were killed in a war. You dont allow the complete part i.e the outcome of the war how Tipu sultan was defeated. The Nair Dewan of Travancore Lord Raja Kesavadas again defeated the mysore army near aluva. I can understand your emotions anyways. Your grudges might be reasonable. But what you're doing in not ehical as far as I can understand. I would rather try to reove the entire article from Wikipedia itself.

Vineet Nayar1 (talk) 07:26, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

Well, I've removed your contribution again, sorry. You appear to be pov pushing in an attempt to glorify the community when there are perfectly good article dealing with these issues & which are already linked. For your info, I have never added any content to the Religion section nor, IIRC, the Military section. All I have done is try to keep things in order. I do not even understand why you want to add this stuff where you do - surely the military section would be more appropriate, if anywhere? - Sitush (talk) 10:05, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

• Vineet Nayar1: Please remember to avoid personal attacks and stick solely to Wikipedia:policies and guidelines, and why something is or isn't best for the article. It doesn't matter what our personal opinions. Please try to "assume good faith". Accusing someone of having "emotions" "grudges" or of doing something "unethical" are not helpful in a discussion on what should or shouldn't be included in an article. I'm not sure why you would want to remove the entire article just because you disagree with a few statements being removed by someone. That wouldn't solve anything. Please try to stick to the reasons you think that information should be kept, or propose a possible compromise that could enable you and Sitush to both agree on what should be done. Thanks. MsBatfish (talk) 10:09, 12 December 2011 (UTC)

Why was his contribution removed ? I saw he had all the references to prove it ???? Any comments? MsBatfish ?? sitush ? SItush has been pushing his pov which is clearly evident from the crap article that exists over here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.202.40.22 (talk) 19:34, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Reliable Sources

While most sources used are in accord with Wikipedia guidelines, the way some sources are deemed unreliable and some others reliable, atleast is not consistent. My edit (Dec 17 2011) on Caste System, citing Francis Buchanan-Hamilton's A Journey from Madras through the Countries of Mysore, Canara and Malabar was reverted with the comment that Hamilton is not a reliable source. In fact I was only providing a source for the statement made, and which seemed like POV pushing, making it sound as if it was only Brahmin's position, while the entire caste system including Nayars deemed so.

I would content Hamilton's is as or more reliable as James Hastings Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics. The work was recently republished by Cambridge University Press with subtext books of enduring scholarly value. Also Book of Duarte Barbosa is used as a source to make an important statement (to which it is no good a source as per WP policies). I even see many sources in the citations, by less reliable authors and random publishers, like Sadasivan. N, L.A Krishna Iyer's Social History of Kerala, an Encycolpedia of Political History among few others.

There is no reason to presume Hamilton was biased to provide such an account and it is in context and as per him from talks with 'prominent Nairs' of that region. Even Barbosa's account, used as reference in another place, gives the same account. Also there was no source to the statement made. I would like to revert the undo, unless there is a better reason.

I have a suggestion for the etymology section, which I had posted under another topic, Edit request from , 28 October 2011 a few days back. The etymology section is not much informative. Legolas95 (talk) 04:10, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

You missed the second, more important part of my edit summary, viz "the situation is far more complex than this, as the article already explained.". It took a long time to arrive at a version of the article relating to varna that appeared to be at once comprehensive and acceptable to various people, and your addition added nothing to that, I agree that some of the other sources used could be considered to be unreliable but a lot depends upon the context in which they are used. For example, Barbosa has a historical purpose and even modern writers accept that he is a better source than the native Indian histories of his period: sometimes we have to use the "best of a bad bunch". This is not necessary in the case of Hamilton, where they are plenty of other sources.

The etymology section was cut back due to continuing disputes. If you check the article history then you will see that it offered four or five possible etymologies, including one related to the dog theory which you refer to. I do not have a problem with reinstating that but others may do. - Sitush (talk) 10:15, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

You missed the point that there was no source for the statement. Implying it was only Brahmans position is POV pushing, particularly when you dont have a source.

Agree that Barbosa serves an historical purpose, but that is certainly not providing etymology in a footnote. There must be mention of possible etymologies even if you want to pass the judgement that the etymology is uncertain from a convenient source. Also what are the 'better sources' you have for a 19th century Kerala social life?

WP policy is to include the different point of views in case of disputes than to provide none. And just to make clear, I am not for including the dog story, which is just another of countless absurd Brahmanical myths. I was just referring to the possible related etymologies of the words.Legolas95 (talk) 20:46, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Actually, I did not miss any point. I merely referred you to the history and the recent consensus. We can't go overturning consensus every day - give it a few months and try again. - Sitush (talk) 20:51, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 31 December 2011

"On the coast of Malabar there lives a tribe called Nair. The male members of this tribe cannot have more than one wife, but the women are allowed to choose several husbands. Probably the reason is that the Nairs belong to a martial race and their profession is fighting and hunting. Just as we discourage the marriage of the soldiers in Europe so that it may not interfere with their profession of fighting, the Malabar tribes have also decided that, as far as possible, the male members of the Nair tribe should be excused from shouldering family responsibilities. As, owing to the tropical climate of the area, it is not possible to ban marriage totally, it has been decided that several men should have only one wife, so that they may not be heavily burdened with family responsibilities and their professional efficiency may not be affected." (Abu Zahir al-Hasan, Arab traveller)

Please include this quote as is in the "Polyandry" section. This gives a justification for the practice. Source: http://www.al-islam.org/womanrights/11.htm 49.137.120.185 (talk) 07:28, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Why is that a reliable source? He was writing 1200 years ago. How do you explain that the practice of polyandry occurred among other castes of the area who were not military? And how do you explain it applying to those subcastes of the Nairs who were definitely not military? And why have we so far not found a modern scholar who refers to this thesis? It makes little sense, IMO. - Sitush (talk) 07:34, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. --Bryce (talk | contribs) 08:09, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

The provided link is an online version of the book "Woman And Her Rights" written by Ayatollah Murtaza Motahhari.

Ayatollah Murtaza Motahhari (مرتضی مطهری; February 3, 1920 – May 1, 1979) was an Iranian scholar, cleric, lecturer, and politician. Murtaza Motahhari attended the Hawza of Qom from 1944–1952, and then joined the University of Tehran, where he taught philosophy for 22 years. Between 1965 and 1973 he also gave regular lectures at the Hosseiniye Ershad in Northern Tehran. Murtaza Motahhari wrote several books on Islam, Iran, and historical topics. As of mid-2008, the "Sadra Publishings" has published more than sixty books of Motahari and about 30 books written about Motahari or quoted from his speeches. Some of them are described below.

On May 1, 1979 Murtaza Motahhari was assassinated by gunshot by a member of the Furqan Group after leaving a late meeting at the house of Yadollah Sahabi. Ordibehesht 12 (1 or 2 May), the Persian date on which Murtaza Motahhari was assassinated, is celebrated as "Teachers Day" in Iran. Murtaza Motahhari is the father in law of Iran's former secretary of National Security Council Ali Larijani. It was by Motahhari's advice that Larijani switched from Computer Science to Western Philosophy for graduate school.

In honor of Murtaza Motahhari, a major street in Tehran (Takhte Tavoos--Peacock Throne in English) was named after him upon his death shortly after the Iranian revolution in 1979. Murtaza Motahhari Street connects Sohrevardi Street and Vali Asr Street, two major streets in Tehran. (Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morteza_Motahhari)

Ah. I did not realise that. Aside from the fact that it is probably a copyvio of Motahhari's work (not our problem, as long as we link to the book and not the website), I note that she merely relates the tale, as provided by Montesquieu: she appears to make no comment upon it & so the validity still looks dubious to me. However, as before, I won't mark your edit request as answered - let's have someone else look at it. - Sitush (talk) 08:34, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

 Not done article is not protected. --Bryce (talk | contribs) 13:14, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Mentioning marital history and kalaripayattu in the lead.

The Nairs are known for their martial history, including their involvement in Kalaripayattu and the role of Nair warriors in the Mamankam ritual. The Nairs were classed as a martial race by the British

Added the the above block. Please discuss if you find anything wrong with this. I think there should not be any problem with the above addition.

And pease dont delete this section. This is for discussion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vineet Nayar1 (talk • contribs) 20:06 A January 2012

I reverted your addition in the interval between you inserting the thing and posting the message above. The wording of the above amounts to a fait accompli, which is not a sensible way of dealing with an article which you know to be contentious. Best to discuss changes here first.

If you search the article talk pages & archives then you will see that issues such as having martial race in the lead section have been considered extensively - try this. There has been much consideration given.

You are welcome to propose new sources but if you are going to do so then you need to provide as much information as you can, eg: links to GBooks or ISBN numbers etc. In the event that those are insufficient to satisfy other people then you will need to be prepared to provide copies/transcripts of the relevant portions.

Finally, the phrase "The Nairs were known for ,,,", as used by you, needs clarifying. The very fact that issues such as kalaripayattu and martial race have been so awkward here suggests that these things are not in fact something that the Nairs were known for, when compared to the extensive coverage of other aspects of their lives. I am not saying that you are wrong, but rather that it would need careful examination and wording. - Sitush (talk) 20:21, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

There has been a huge discussion on these. And it seems like there are a lot of people opposed who would not like to have something good mentioned about Nair's. It's evident with users named Nair, Panikkar etc(Supposedly fake usernames) who claim ill about the nayars.

The only thing that could be done is editors/admins be fair, do their reserach and decide. Seriously you can still find people and books claiming/stating stuffs like Nayar for dogs and similar things. But I think people can clearly distinguish between what the truth is and add points and references that should be having an overall positive outlook.

Statements like dog origin are clearly understandable as personal attacks towards a community with grudges even if they cite a reference. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vineet Nayar1 (talk • contribs) 20:51, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

I have fixed the indents in your post above. I hope that you do not mind.

Wikipedia is not about showing "good" or "bad". If you approach it from that angle then you will most likely become dis-satisfied very quickly. It is about providing information that is verifiable using reliable sources, balanced in emphasis and neutral. Believe me, I am well aware that there is a lot of name-calling regarding this article: I am the one at whom most of it is directed, as you well know. I stress yet again that I have no connections with India at all, nor with any religion. Just about the only thing that someone might legitimately try to tar me with is ownership of articles, but that has been tried before at venues such as WP:ANI and has failed because it was abundantly clear that I was working within Wikipedia's policies and guidelines.

As I said above, if you have some decent sources - as your edit summary & insertion suggested - then please could you provide more complete information regarding them. I must say that it is pretty unlikely that I'll accept having the martial race theory in the lead because (a) it is discredited and (b) there is the awkward issue of Nairs being disarmed after 1857 ... but if you can provide verification then it could certainly be reinstated in an appropriate place within the article body. - Sitush (talk) 21:04, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

I got my rebellions mixed up above - I meant 1809, as the article says, not the Indian Rebellion of 1857. However, I have just spotted a rather serious concern relating to the removed contribution. It says:

The Nairs are known for their martial history, including their involvement in Kalaripayattu and the role of Nair warriors in the Mamankam ritual. The Nairs were classed as a martial race.

Which is a POV-pruned version of

The Nairs are known for their martial history, including their involvement in Kalaripayattu and the role of Nair warriors in the Mamankam ritual. The Nairs were classed as a martial race by the British, but were delisted after rebelling against them under Velu Thampi Dawala"

Now, the second of these quotes comes from a modern book, and therefore the POV-pruned example removed from the lead is a likely copyright violation. Worse still, that modern book is page 281 of the dreaded Tyagi, Vidya Prakash (2009), Martial races of undivided India, Gyan Publishing House, ISBN 9788178357751. Nothing published by Gyan is reliable ... but this example is particularly egregious.

I am afraid that you are going to have to provide us with copies/links to the sources that you used. Your copyright violation and your apparent deliberate misrepresentation (even though the source is terrible) has caused alarm bells to ring in my head. Have you read our basic policies? - Sitush (talk) 01:13, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Serpent worship

I recently reverted this edit, which had the summary "Removed the dravidian custom reference since the referenced book does not bear the statements that has been cited. Please do not revert without confirmation. The snake worship is a Nair custom and not a general dravidian custom."

I had not entered that statement or source but it took all of a minute to find that, whether or not the issue is mentioned on page 112 of the source (as originally cited), it is definitely mentioned on page 85. I cannot see page 112 to confirm or deny, so I simply reinstated the thing using the alternate page number. To be honest, I would have thought that someone as interested in Nairs as the remover clearly is would have known that this custom is not limited to that community. Other south Indian communities - including the Ezhavas that seemingly every Nair knows of - follow the practice. Sometimes it pays to do a little research on related articles, such as Snake worship, to see if citations can be found before deleting something from an article that has received extensive scrutiny over the last year or so. - Sitush (talk) 20:40, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

FYI, Romans worshiped serpents as well. My point here is that this section should be more about Nair's. If Nair's worshiped on a major account, it should be more about them. Why mention that it is a Dravidian custom? It's not a general thing. No other community worships serpents like Nair community. Its very peculiar. That is really unwanted.

Also the statement, 'The Nair were historically involved in military conflict in the region.' Seriously ? Out of the whole paragraph, you add only this line ? This is what's called exploitation.

Vineet Nayar1 (talk) 15:26, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

I had put a 'citation needed' tag for the statement snakes are worshiped as guardians of the clan by Nair families. Why was it removed? It doesnt suggest to me as a self evident truth. Legolas95 (talk) 02:29, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

British/Indian Government records to be given more importance rather than random authors.

Firstly to start with, I dont think the caste thing can be sorted out anytime soon.

(Nairs were considered kshatriyas by outsiders mainly due to their duties as a warrior and other features but Nabudiris didn't considered them as one. Now should this be decided by the description of duties they performed ?? Or should the consideration of Nambudiri's be taken into account noting the fact that the nabudiris even considered other brahmins as inferior to themselves.

PS: Going by Mahabharata it states castes on the basis of the duties performed viz Vaishya : trader Brahman : Worshipper mainly Kshatriya : Warriors and so on.)

Now, about the remaining facts IMO, the government records should be given more weight when opposed by random authors. I see a lot of govt research journals and documents which can be cited as a totally reliable source and can be added to the article.

I've found a lot of govt records like 'The Asiatic journal and monthly register for British and foreign....'. The content is total research most of which should be unbiased.

Who? Where? What? When? Why? This is all far too vague for me to make sense of, and right now it appears that no-one else is talking to you here. Please can you clarify.

Also, please can you sign your posts (typing ~~~~ is one way of doing it, and you have been advised of others previously). - Sitush (talk) 16:58, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Sorry but I didn't get you. I just made a point that it should be better to give more preference to govt records against random authors. I don't think it's difficult to decipher since i've used basic English to make my point.

Lets not use the 'have been discussed earlier' excuse to discard a source and actively participate unbiased to make the article better. Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vineet Nayar1 (talk • contribs) 07:02, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

You are not going to get your way unless you give some specific examples: commanding others to do this or that without supporting evidence - who? what? where? when? why? - is pointless and will end up frustrating both them and yourself. I would also appreciate some clarification of who these "random" authors are, and why you consider them to be "random". Furthermore, some clarification of which government's records you are referring to and why you think that those are superior sources to those already used in the article.

Finally, with regard to your comment that "Nairs were considered kshatriyas by outsiders mainly due to their duties as a warrior and other features but Nabudiris didn't considered them as one. Now should this be decided by the description of duties they performed ?? Or should the consideration of Nambudiri's be taken into account noting the fact that the nabudiris even considered other brahmins as inferior to themselves." Have you actually read the article? All of this is dealt with. If you think that it is unclear then please propose an alternative, with sources to support it. - Sitush (talk) 17:28, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

About Murky Origin and Irrelevant Statements

This probably would be the article that has ‘U’ turned in Wikipedia during last one year. Earlier the article was only about the glorification, now it is more like defamation ever since the new editors like Sitush has taken charge. I hope this would take a middle path sometime soon, and would reflect something closest to the Real. The article still has a long way to go. The murkiest section is regarding the origin. They are not able to put forward the findings of so many scholars who researched for decades on this subject. Instead they are making vague statements like Nairs were some tribes that originated from Nilgiris (though they have absolutely no source to cite this). In some other section of the article they quote the less known Pullaplilly as a source and says that Nairs originated from Ezhavas and in the main section they say it is an amalgamation of so many castes. What a contradiction. can anyone make an article more confusing than this. Nairs and Bunts of Tulunad are of same race and this is mentioned and documented in almost all ancient, medieval documents including govt gazettes. They are of indo-scythian origin. A few researchers like Zacharia thundiyil has mentioned Nairs as descendants of Newar who basically again are of indo-scythian origin. References are aplenty..here are a few ( Martial races of undivided india - Tyagi vidya parkash, census of india - office of the register general, The modern review - Ramanada chatterji, The scythian origin of Nairs , Ravunni Menon). At least Himalayan blunders like the origin and all references from Sadasivan and Pullapilly (which you editors yourselves have agreed as not reliable) should be removed first, for this article to get bear minimum reliability. Another most ridiculous statement goes like this “This Travancore State Force was instrumental in the suppressing of the 1946 Punnapra-Vayalar uprising, during which 7000 Ezhava youths were killed by the Force”..this is height of stupidity. What do the editors mean by this..it was Nair forces that killed the Ezhavas..come on, you are questioning the readers’ sensibility here. The famous Malayalam actor sathyanesan nadar (a.k.a Sathyan) was an inspector in this force like so many other Nadars and Tamils (travancore included many southern Tamil districts those days). Also how did they count the no. of Ezhavas..there were so many other community members including Nairs who were killed in Punnapray-Vayalar. In fact the founding leaders of the communist movement were from Nairs. ayways, what is the relevance of this statement in this article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vyasan (talk • contribs) 11:03, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

You mention Tyagi's Martial Races of Undivided India as a source. This clearly demonstrates that you have not even looked over the comments of the last few hours on this talk page, let alone the discussions that have taken place during the period that you consider to be an ill-founded u-turn. As such, I do not propose to respond further until you at least demonstrate some sort of appreciation regarding the lengthy process of examination that the "u-turn" has undergone. You might also wish to consider the fact that we need to present alternate views shown by reliable sources, with appropriate weight etc - this may explain your concern regarding apparent contradictions. - Sitush (talk) 11:19, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Hello Mr.Sitush, please don't run away and change topics when i'm specific on some points. You always tend to quit any discussion by citing some technicality or other. If you think whatever sources i have given are not 'reliable' and only Sadasivan and Pulappilly are 'reliable', then me too is not interested in having any discussion with you, because that tells me that you are prejudiced, anyway I have read what you have mentioned in the earlier sections, and my point was not about what was discussed there..It was about the origin section.Also I do accept your contributions to this article, but still has a long way to go. and i'm trying to help you in this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vyasan (talk • contribs) 13:07, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

There is no "Origin" section. And Nilgiris are not mentioned anywhere. - Sitush (talk) 13:40, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Pullapilly's publisher is reliable, as also is he. Sadasivan is not in the article & has not been for quite a few hours. When he was there, his stuff was tagged as "dubious". - Sitush (talk) 13:44, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

You may note that the stuff about the Travancore State Force regarding which you raise objections has cite requests tags next to it. If you take a look at the history then it is my bet that this info relates to the article as it was before the alleged "u-turn", ie: when it was massively pushing a point of view, and it was probably me who tagged it.. Not having been involved in writing the military bits, I would have left it for people who had been reading up on the subject. If I am correct - and I will check - then certainly it can be deleted now if nothing can be found to support the statement. I'll take a look. - Sitush (talk) 13:48, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Actually, the TSF stuff was introduced by User:MatthewVanitas and it was sourced to Sadasivan. I tagged those statements as dubious and then, 13 hours ago I replaced the "dubious" with full blown cite requests. We need to do some digging. - Sitush (talk) 13:56, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Nowhere does it say "that Nairs originated from Ezhavas". What it says is "Pullapilly has suggested that the Nairs may share a common heritage with the Ezhava caste." A common heritage is not the same as a common origin, and the bit about "common parentage" is clearly stated as being a theory. - Sitush (talk) 14:00, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

The Nair/Bunts issue has been discussed to death here - please search the archives and history if it still concerns you. I really do not care whether they are Indo-Scythian or Martian relations: there are dozens, if not hundreds, of I-S communities & so singling out the Bunts is undue weight. - Sitush (talk) 14:21, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Sitush also rejected my Encyclopedia citation. Trust me that's when you know someone wont allow you to correct the article.

Vineet Nayar1 (talk) 15:31, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Fixed your indenting again (well, actually, I've outdented it), sorry. I am unsure of what you are referring to here. Which encyclopedia? Where did I reject it? Can you give me a diff or the date/time of the message where I did so? And have you read WP:TERTIARY ? - Sitush (talk) 16:44, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Agree with Sitush here. Glorification or defamation is not the purpose here, but being objective is. Your concern that some origin theory is 'less glorifying/defaming' is rather childish and the sources you offer for your theory are not more reliable than hearsay. Most of the sources used here are confirming with WP policies, including Pullappilly, and is strictly stated as his opinion. Of course there will be other theories as there is no universal acceptance of any one view, but there should be reliable sources to vouch for those.

I do agree with your second position though. Not just that the statement made has no citations, but is totally irrelevant and transgressional to go into such claims and 'details'. I am removing that entire sentence and merging the two paragraphs into one, and I hope it would be discussed here before reinstating it. An uncited unwanted comment need to stay off untill its purpose and validity is made apparent.Legolas95 (talk) 02:04, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks a lot for deleting the irrelevent statements. It makes a lot of sense. Again I would say Pulapilly's 'suggestions' are not adding any value and he is just shooting in the dark. His observation of similarity between these communities to point to a common ancestry is totally absurd. Ezhavas are of paternal descend, are not martial and are not known for 'serpant worship'. The rituals during different life stages are common for all regional hindus who are of non-hindu background, not just between Nairs and Ezhavas. So this 'suggestion' is also a low point of this article. The origin section is important for any article, so please correct this too. There are better findings by many other academicians on this like G.M.Parinikker, Zacharia thundiyil, Malabar manual or the most reliable Madras manuals, Asiatic research etc. Most of these references point to a Newar/scythian mixture of Nagas as the origin. Malabar manual also cites vellala mixture with Naga tribes as origin. You could mention any of these or a couple of them in the origin section. Also Naga/sepent worship is not a dravidian custom, if then, it should've been more popular in places like Tamil Nadu. Nagas were a group of people who were spread all over india. Anantnag (Kashmir) Taxila (Sindh) Ananthpur (Andhra), thiru ananthapuram (Kerala) are all famouse Naga settlements. In south india, they are found in Andhra, tulunad and kerala. Also the 'Portugese Era' section says the portugese popularised the tern 'Nayar', this is again a dubious item, as it was not possible for anyone to change the caste status during that time when caste was the basis for anything and everything. Till the end of 18th C, kingdoms in these region strictly adhered to the caste based society and caste based occupation outlined by Sankaracharya, and it was impossible even for the kings, the clergy (azhvancheri) or even any other ruling force to change the caste of a person, though there were a few thiyas of n.malabar and kuruchiyas of wynad who could also carry arms like most of the Nairs. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vyasan (talk • contribs) 06:41, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

I couldnt find any reliable reference for your claims. Even Nagas as a people/tribe is poorly attested and seems more mythical than historical. Unless you are providing reliable sources to back your claims, this exercise is pointless, plus I think this issue has been discussed before. The Portuguese popularizing the term, which was till then just a title, is taken from the book cited (and the work it cites for reference is also reliable), although the wording is slightly different. The etymology of the word Nair as well as various Nair surnames suggest their role as titles, so I dont share your concern of extreme improbability over that. Matriliniality is not exclusive to Nairs, it was practiced by some Ezhava castes, Muslim families and even some tribal castes. Nor is it popular among Indo Scythian groups, and how much origins or socio political circumstances are behind it is debatable. If you are to provide reliable references to back your theory, it will be given due respect. Please have a look at Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources to help yourself decide what kind of sources are deemed reliable.Legolas95 (talk) 08:43, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

whatever is written above (regarding the origin) can be referred in Malabar Manual (citing Asiatic research) in the chapter called "people of malabar" sub section 'Nair'. BTW, noone can be candid about all these different versions of origins including whatever is mentioned as wikipedia rilable sources, and definitely if Pulapilly is such a great source as per Wikipedia, then i have no faith in this article getting corrected anyways. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vyasan (talk • contribs) 06:49, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

The Malabar Manual is not a great source. It is old and, as you infer, it relies on even older studies. Pullapilly is a modern professor, recognised by his peers and published by a reputable press. - Sitush (talk) 14:34, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

huh..you make me laugh...what do you mean by 'modern' research regarding the origin of an ancient community.did he have a time machine. He is just suggesting (on what grounds, did he conduct any genetic study or is he citing some other 'reliable source') .nothing is mentioned and you have so shabbily added his suggestions to the main section of this article. Suggestion is nothing but POV. I know you are hard pushing your POV here..but don't think that the readers are fools..There are many scholars who are more accepted than Pullapilly..this shows that you have no context of what people of Kerala are and is totally out of synch with the ground realities.This articles is not reaching anywhere..thanks to the neophytes.. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vyasan (talk • contribs) 16:16, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

I am glad that I am keeping you amused. Such things are always a bonus. Have you ever heard of the phrase "standing on the shoulders of giants"? Isaac Newton used it in order to illustrate how what we know, interpret and understand now can only be so because of the work of others who preceded us. This has an immense relevance to the notion that modern sources are likely to be better than old ones. The modern academics can assimilate all that has gone on before and bring to bear "new eyes", new ideas, new methods, new intelligence/information etc that extend or modify what is, after all, always a series of hypotheses rather than "truth" (no such thing as "truth", here or anywhere else). If you think that they are unaware of the people who wrote in the Asiatic Society Journal 150 years ago, or of the works of Barbosa etc then I am afraid that you are wrong: most modern academics do mention older sources etc such as these. Mind you, some of those older sources are truly dreadful even though some misguided people here at Wikipedia love them, a classic example being James Tod. He is a great means of demonstrating just how bad the so-called "greats" were and just why it is so dangerous to use them now. - Sitush (talk) 16:42, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

as usual you are beating around the bush..thanks for the lesson on modern approaches but you didn't tell how Pulappilly fits in there, and why and how you can push his suggestions which are mere POV into an important section of this article. Writing about a community cannot be done at a lab (for all whatever you say as modern today, will be proved as obsolete or wrong some time soon).you need lot of patience, passion and understand the dynamics of living in a certain area where this cimmunity existed and continue to exist, you need to read/see/feel many things yourself before you stand on someone's shoulder. Knowledge from books need to be compounded with experience to make it perfect. As far as i can see, you are just trying to push someone's agenda and is not keen on improving yourself or the quality of this article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Vyasan (talk • contribs) 04:47, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia is an imperfect project. One of its possible imperfections is that it takes no account of the personal experience of its contributors. Day-to-day life in Kerala etc is utterly irrelevant to us unless it is documented by reliable sources. I feel that you know that this is the Wikipedia way but do not like it. If so, then that is just your tough luck, sorry. I will not be responding further to your comments until you begin to supply reliable sources. - Sitush (talk) 10:06, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

My recent removal

I have just removed

Their social systems are very close to Bunts in Karnataka and Nagas..Nairs are classified as forward class both by kerala and India governments.

There are several reasons for this:

1. www.nairs.in is not a reliable source
2. Tyagi is not reliable (& it is Tyagi, not "Vidya Prakash" - those are just his first two names)
3. Forward caste issue is dealt with in the article body and the issue is complex. There is a consensus not to include varna & this sort of stuff in lead sections
4. the other sources are vague, and we know from the reliable sources in the article body that the Nair social systems are similar to groups other than these - how long a list do we provide?

- Sitush (talk) 17:26, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Portuguese/British admixture in Nairs

".. On the other hand, Hindu Nairs have been influenced by the western European gene pool based on high prevalence of alleles B*07 and Cw*07..." (A crypto-Dravidian origin for the nontribal communities of South India based on human leukocyte antigen class I diversity: R. Thomas, S. B. Nair, M Banerjee)

Leaving behind their historical explanations, this genetic study has a great anthropological importance. It is a clear evidence for the admixture of Portuguese, British and Dutch blood in today's Nairs. The Portuguese were the first Europeans to arrive. It was Portuguese who popularized the term Nair which was a mere title until then. Nair men served in Colonial armies as infantry soldiers. The Portuguese soldiers had numerous Nair mistresses and since the Nairs followed 'Marumakkathayam', the children born from these unions were classified as Nairs and were brought up in tharavadus.

Portuguese army (Parangi Pattalam) had its main barracks at towns such as Kannur, Thalassery, Calicut, Cochin, Quilon, Attingal, etc Nairs in all these areas are fairer than those in other areas. The Menons of Valluvanad are the only Nairs without European admixture. This is why the Valluvanad Nairs (Menons/Mannadiar) consider Travancore Nairs (Pillai) and Malabar Nairs (Nambiar) as inferior castes. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.0.9.53 (talk) 03:21, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Nairs of Kerala- Nairs of Kerala has a glorifying past. Most of them were rulers of a small areas often in connection with the kings. There were frequent marriages between Nairs and Brahmins. Of course, there are some Nairs within the caste were considered as backward class. But that doesn't mean Nairs are not a forward class in Kerala. Majority of the Nairs belong to this forward class without any reservation. No human can claim 100% genetic purity. But Kerala Nairs have mostly fair skin, peculiar face structure, special customs similar to other similar casts such as Thevars in Tamil Nadu, Blunts in Karnataka, Marathas in Maharashtra, Rajputs in Rajasthan, Jat from Punjab and Dogras from Jammu and Kashmir. Nairs social systems clearly identify themselves as Nagavamsi Kshetriyas. Regarding the comparison with Ezhavas, I am not against any comparison or mixing of the community, but the truth should prevail. Ezhavas and Nairs had very different customs and social status in Kerala. All Ezhavas are eligible to receive reservations as Other Backward Classes from India and Kerala Governments. Ezhavas outnumbered Nairs long back, now in Kerala there are less than 12% Nairs compared to 24% Ezhavas, 24 % Muslims, and 12 % Syrian Christians. Therefore the Politicians will not support Nairs anymore. Muslims, Ezhavas, and Christians can rule the state without Nairs. This is what is happening for the last few decades. The statement, Nairs of Kerala: A race destined to be refugees in its native land is becoming more and closer to the reality. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DebbarmaSi (talk • contribs) 14:11, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Concerns about page

Hi, I am person addicted to Wikipedia, I refer wiki for each and every doubt. Recently i went through the "Nair" page and found it completely changed from what i had seen few months back. Being a Nair myself, some of the sections did hurt my feelings. Few comments were unnecessary and uncalled for. Few authors are trying to highlight the dark side of Nair community, which i feel is not correct. Of course one should talk about both sides of the coin, but giving more weight to a particular side is a biased way of writing. This is my personal opinion though. Citing each and every line from a particular book/author does not add up to the quality of the page. Hope wiki administrators bring this to their notice.

Thank you! Manish Nair --Anjaanaatma (talk) 13:06, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

Actually, citing each and every line is exactly what should be done. The only thing that should be in this article is information taken from reliable sources. If there are other reliable sources with other information that you think should be included, please feel free to provide them. If you're not sure what a reliable source is, please feel free to post the sources here first and someone can advise. If you think something in the article should be removed, please explain, but note that we won't remove just because you feel it's negative or hurtful--again, we go by what the sources say, not based on feelings. Qwyrxian (talk) 14:07, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

Infobox Missing and For Gods Sake Whats Going on???

The last time I went through the article, It had an infobox. Now what happened to that? Why was it removed and for what purpose? Why only negative features about Nairs are updated in the article? The article has lot of weasel wordings and yet no tag has been put. And I do see some veteran editors behaving like rookies and constantly reverting the edits leading to edit wars. Now whats really going on here? arun talk 23:32, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

And may I know why this is_unreliable ? arun talk 23:53, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

That particular book is unreliable because it is published by Gyan Publishing. It has been established that often Gyan publishing takes material published by other places, including quite often Wikipedia itself, wraps it up into a bigger book, and sells it. Sometimes they check what is written, sometimes they don't; sometimes they even make alterations to previous texts without saying they're making alterations. Wikipedia itself can never be a reliable source for other Wikipedia articles, and that's true even if the info is "published" by another publisher. So, as a general rule, because we have strong reason to believe that Gyan does not have "a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy", which is a quote from WP:RS summarizing the key determiner for whether a source is reliable or not.

The infobox was removed because, after discussion here and at WT:INB, it was found that there was basically no reliable information that could go into an infobox for most cases. Since no official surveys have been conducted since the early 20th century, we couldn't include info about population, location, languages, etc. In many cases, the information was much too complicated to put into an infobox; "religion", for instance, cannot be summarized in a word or two for a caste like Nair (since it varies over time and region); similarly, for many castes, varna status is disputed and thus cannot be summarized there either. Once we really started to look at what we could verifiably state, there was nothing particularly useful that could be said in an infobox. As a side note, infoboxes are not used on the vast majority of articles on Wikipedia, and it's a mistake to think that articles "should" have them; they're really only appropriate where there are hard facts (things like population or official name for places, birthdates or spouses for living people, foundation dates and major products for companies, etc.)...for castes, there really are very few hard facts that can be done in a word or two that are current, accurate, and verifiable.

As for your bigger concern about the article, a lot of work has been done to make this article more neutral. Previous versions contained more positive statements, but they were unsourced or soruced with unreliable references. However, if there any specifics that you think should be changed, please bring them up here. If there are more reliable sources that we're not including, we should definitely consider including them. If there are currently included sentences that should be removed for being unreliable, or reworded for being POV, please bring those up. But please keep in mind that NPOV does not necessarily mean "positive"; it means "reflecting what reliable sources says, particularly the best quality academic sources". Qwyrxian (talk) 02:41, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Fine then. But see to it that the article gets a neutral tone. Will provide reliable resource asap. arun talk 03:30, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Is this link reliable? arun talk 03:36, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

I can only see it in snippet view. - Sitush (talk) 05:53, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

And what about this? This one establishes Nairs to be foremost warriors. arun talk 03:40, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

I cannot see any content at all for this one. - Sitush (talk) 05:53, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Is this source reliable? arun talk 03:54, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

No, in my opinion, unless you can explain why you consider it to be authoritative. To be honest, in a field as well documented as the Nair community, there should not be much need to rely on websites as sources. More generally - and this comment applies to the two other sources that you mention above - the status of Nairs as warriors is already in the article. There was much discussion here about the weight that should be placed on that aspect of the community's history, given that it did only form one element of the whole. A search of the archives for this page might assist you. There is an archive search box somewhere near to the top of this and I think that "warrior" or "martial" might be useful terms to try. Obviously, if you have new information that usefully expands on those discussions then please feel free to mention it here. - Sitush (talk) 05:53, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Kalaripayattu ???? anyone? 141.160.26.251 (talk) 08:11, 16 February 2012 (UTC) Sambhavi Kumari

It is mentioned in the article, yes. - Sitush (talk) 16:14, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Somewhere in a corner ? yes. and serpent worship ? a mere dravidian custom ? is that what its about ? u could well have written it as a human custom as well. It's full of ambiguity. 116.203.64.215 (talk) 21:06, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Hi 116. If you think part of the article is inadequate, you are welcome to suggest a replacement or addition backed by reliable sources. Just tell us what you'd like it to say, and provide your sources for it, and I'm sure one of the regular editors will help -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 22:06, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Kalarippayat is not included in the article. Inclusion as "Kalari" a word while saying about 'Desavazhi' does not seem to be sufficient. Kalarippayat is the base of history of Nairs, the clan is renowned with this military training expertise. I like to suggest that it requires a separate section to address this. Pprasadnair (talk) 11:47, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Sources? There have been many disputes about this issue in the past, primarily due to the involvement of Ezhavas in the same martial art. - Sitush (talk) 11:54, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

How come involvement of Ezhavas in Kalari make it untouchable for Nairs? Now what do you mean to specify here? Both Nairs and Ezhavas practised Kalaripayattu. Now, no one is demanding here that Nairs discovered Kalaripayattu. Nairs practised Kalaripayattu extensively like Ezhavas. arun talk 16:42, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Sources? - Sitush (talk) 16:44, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Check this out. Now dont say this one is fake! arun talk 16:51, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Yo might wanna check this as well! arun talk 16:53, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

This one will be good too! arun talk 16:56, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

This one is a snippet but it tells a lot! arun talk 16:57, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

I cannot see the first two that you mention; the snippet view is never acceptable, and the other book has been rejected previously because its primary subject is dance. - Sitush (talk) 17:06, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Why cannot you see the first two! I can see it from my system. Because you dont see it , does not mean no one can contribute from that book! Also every one is free to edit Wikipedia and contribute! The first two books are authentic! I do not know why the snippet view is not acceptable as it also provides authentic information and that too from authentic source. Dont bother about the other one but I am going ahead with the first two source! arun talk 17:12, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

The first two sources come from the author A. Sreedhara Menon. It cannot be neglected! arun talk 17:15, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

I did not say that we couldn't use the first two sources: I said that I cannot see them & therefore cannot comment further. Snippet views are never acceptable because they lack context. - Sitush (talk) 17:18, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

May be snippets lack content but they do provide information. They also hint that the topic is covered in the book. There is no problem in citing the book. That snippets got 4 sentence and 1 incomplete sentence. Those 4 sentence clearly mentions that Nairs did practice Kalaripayattu. So the authentic source accepts Nairs got military background! The first two sources also clearly mentions this. Also, the sources are from an authentic author! arun talk 17:32, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

No. We have been burned too often by stuff like this. - Sitush (talk) 17:35, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

BTw, if the point of this exercise is to verify that Nairs have a military background then you may want to stop now. The article covers this in depth and we have had numerous discussions regarding the issue. Some Nairs did, some did not. - Sitush (talk) 17:37, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

The second source clearly mention the martial arts practiced as Kalaripayattu. If you are unable to view it, kindly ask other wikimates to check the links and confirm! arun talk 17:45, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

I never said that it did not mention that subject. I simply cannot comment on something which I cannot see. I'll get a copy from somewhere, eventually. For that matter, you could provide one yourself. - Sitush (talk) 17:53, 22 February 2012 (UTC)