Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Charles Pelly (civil servant)

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

The result was no consensus. After a couple of relists, the addition of some sources and a not inconsiderable discussion, no clear consensus has evolved as to whether the sources are sufficient to confer notability or not. -- Trevj (talk · contribs) 23:58, 19 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Charles Pelly (civil servant)

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Article says just about everything there is to say. A completely non-notable civil servant. Emeraude (talk) 17:02, 22 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of India-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 13:04, 23 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of United Kingdom-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 13:04, 23 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 13:04, 23 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Speedy delete Biography without ref. No proof of notability. --Redtigerxyz ^Talk 05:50, 24 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, NorthAmerica¹⁰⁰⁰ 10:07, 30 May 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Keep. His position is clearly enough to satisfy notability, as the senior financial official of an Indian presidency and a member of the Legislative Council. Although appointed and not elected, that clearly seems to meet the criteria of WP:POLITICIAN. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:07, 2 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of Politicians-related deletion discussions. Necrothesp (talk) 13:08, 2 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Keep - there seems to be enough information to fill out a decent stub on the subject. I started the process to rescue this. Bearian (talk) 21:56, 2 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The article only cites a single reference in its current form (which isn't enough to get a person past GNG, let alone any of the more specific inclusion criteria for any particular occupation), and fails to actually make any substantive claim of notability even with that source present. If it actually reaches a viable HEY by closure, then I'd be comfortable with keeping, but if it's still in its current form then it needs to be deleted. Bearcat (talk) 23:57, 2 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
- Funny, I would consider "revenue member of the Madras Legislative Council from 1862 to 1866" to be a pretty good claim to notability! That makes him chief financial officer of one of the three great presidencies of British India. -- Necrothesp (talk) 10:11, 3 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  - That's correct, a civil servant. I agree with Bearcat that there's a possibility of reaching the standard, but it's not there yet. Emeraude (talk) 15:46, 3 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  - Sure, if it were properly sourced (which it isn't). For one thing, it's not exactly clear what "revenue member of the Madras Legislative Council" even means in this context — that phrasing would normally imply a political officeholder, but the fact that he's described and disambiguated as a "civil servant" instead of a "politician" implies that he was an employee of a legislature in a non-political role. That's why better sourcing is needed: does "revenue member of the Madras Legislative Council" make him a politician (which would certainly qualify him for an article), or a bureaucrat (which might not)? And the only source in the article is a genealogy, which casts no light whatsoever on that problem whatsoever even if genealogies counted as valid reliable sources in the first place (which they don't). Bearcat (talk) 19:21, 3 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    - Thanks for that. It really sums up why I made the nomination in the first place. He may be notable; he may not. The article as it stood gave no justification for inclusion and AfD seemed a good way of getting it sorted out. Emeraude (talk) 20:06, 3 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
      - As a British territory, none of the officials of British India were politicians. They were all bureaucrats. Does the fact he was unelected make him any less notable? Of course it doesn't. As I've said, the Revenue Member of the Legislative Council was the chief financial officer of the presidency. The fact you don't know what it means doesn't make it an invalid claim to notability, now, does it? -- Necrothesp (talk) 12:31, 4 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        No, it doesn't. But, without meaning to sound rude, the fact that you do doesn't make it valid either. Is there some way of including this "fact" in the article that would satisfy this? Emeraude (talk) 17:08, 4 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
        
        No, but the fact that the claim isn't properly sourced does make it a potentially invalid claim of notability. Even Presidents of the United States, the textbook example of a role that automatically confers instant notability on every single person who held it, still aren't entitled by virtue of that role to keep unsourced articles — valid sources do still have to be present in the article. Bearcat (talk) 22:53, 4 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Delete...one reference is generally insufficient to establish notability.--MONGO 18:56, 10 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.

Relisting comment: Just for safety--Ymblanter (talk) 07:34, 11 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Ymblanter (talk) 07:34, 11 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, there are now two references. I think it's good enough, although barely. Lankiveil ^{(speak to me)} 12:47, 11 June 2014 (UTC).[reply]
Delete — Inclusion of a name in what is essentially a list of employees doesn't qualify as an RS for the purposes of WP:NOTE/WP:BIO. The sources provided are good as RS for information included in the article, but they do nothing to demonstrate that this person was in any way “worthy of note”. It's the equivalent of every person that has performed military service in the last 500 years; they all exist somewhere in an official government document or ledger, but that doesn't mean they all get WP articles about them unless there is some additional source to indicate that they did something of note during that time. Cheers — Who R you? Talk 18:12, 11 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
- He was not merely a functionary. He held a very senior position. That is worthy of note. -- Necrothesp (talk) 08:44, 12 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  - As you said before, to which I must respond as I did before: can this be demonstrated within the context of the article? You see, I think the argument could hold true that given his position he could be notable, but just saying so in an AfD discussion doesn't, in itself, suffice. The wording of the article does not suggest notability - which is why I nominated it for deletion - but I could be persuaded that the article could be rewritten/reworded to demonstate notability and would happily withdraw the nomination in hat case. But so far, I do not see this. Emeraude (talk) 20:43, 13 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
  - The head staff member of the City of Toronto city council's budget committee has a very senior position (whatever his/her title is), but he/she doesn't have a WP article. The head bureaucrat in the Canadian or American federal government responsible for budget and finances has a very senior position, but they don't have WP articles. The Chief Executive Officer of Chrysler under Lee Iacocca certainly had a very senior position, Iacocca couldn't have succeeded without him, but (to the best of my knowledge) he doesn't have a WP article. Same notability rules apply to all; essentially, if the mainstream media of the day didn't take note of them somewhere along the line, and nobody bothered to write major publications about them after their death, they don't make the cut. — Who R you? Talk 07:20, 14 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
    - Not having an article yet does not mean they will never have an article ever. Wikipedia is a work in progress. Does the top American finance bureaucrat really not have an article? The top British finance bureaucrat certainly does. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:19, 16 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
Keep -- This is not about a city council. British India was run as three Presidencies - Madras, Calcutta and Bombay. Above them was the Viceroy. There were no elected politicians, so that the Indian Civil Service were the rulers of India. The analogy with a City Treasurer is a false one. Effectively his was the Finance Minister of a colony. In a crown colony, he would probably have been number 3 after the governor and colonial secretary. We have articles on governors and many colonial secretaries, so that I do not see why we should not have them on Finance Members. If Madras was an independent state he would have been Finance Minister. The article cites its sources, though not through in-line citations: there should no objection on that count: The question is whether information is verifiable, not whether it is verified by in-line citations. Peterkingiron (talk) 10:13, 14 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]
I've added two more sources which mention him. I'm not entirely convinced that this person is notable. He was part of that privileged English society which wrote about itself, so there are sources which record his marriage and his post, but he appears not to have distinguished himself. Without independent sources which write directly about him in terms of what he did or why he would be notable, we are left with nothing substantial. He held some form of post, which we are unsure about. If we cannot even establish what he did, or that his occupation is worth writing about, I'm not seeing the value of the article. What he have is some papers which indicate he existed, but that by itself doesn't appear enough to show notability. On balance I am leaning toward delete, but I see no great harm in the article remaining on Wikipedia for a little while longer to see if more information can be dug up. SilkTork ^{✔Tea time} 23:47, 19 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]

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