Marathi Wikipedia

The Marathi Wikipedia (Marathi: मराठी विकिपीडिया) is the Marathi language edition of Wikipedia, a free and publicly editable online encyclopedia, and was launched on 1 May 2003. The project is one of the leading Wikipedia among other South Asian language Wikipedia's in various quality matrices.[1] It has grown on to become a wiki containing more than 90,000 articles. As of 27 April 2024, it has 96,156 articles and 162,320 registered users.[2] Among the most visited Marathi-language websites, the Marathi Wikipedia is ranked tenth by Alexa.[3]

Favicon of Wikipedia Marathi Wikipedia
Screenshot
Screenshot of the Marathi Wikipedia home page
Type of site
Internet encyclopedia project
Available inMarathi
OwnerWikimedia Foundation
URLmr.wikipedia.org
CommercialNo
RegistrationOptional, but required for certain tasks including
  •  editing of protected pages
  •  non-talk page creation (autoconfirmed for articles) 
  •  page moving (autoconfirmed) 
Users162,320 as of 27 April 2024
Launched1 May 2003; 20 years ago (2003-05-01)
Content license
Creative Commons Attribution/
Share-Alike
3.0
(most text also dual-licensed under GFDL)
Media licensing varies

History

Beginning

The Marathi Wikipedia was available in the wikipedia.org domain from 2003 May 1. 'Vasant Panchami'(वसंत पंचमी)[4] (Vasant Panchami) and 'Audumbar' (औदुंबर (कविता)), a poem by the poet Balkavi[5] were the first articles created on Marathi Wikipedia on 2 May 2003.

Initial growth phase

The Marathi Wikipedia picked up growth from 2006 onwards. On 13 January 2006 Marathi Wikipedia had 1500 articles.

On 27 February, Marathi Day is celebrated.

Progress [6]

Articles
DateCount
22 September 200820,000
2 July 201030,000
24 April 201133,333
27 February 201440,000
11 September 201644,444
22 December 201750,000
21 August 202060,000
24 December 202066,666
30 July 202177,777
23 September 202180,000
29 December 202288,888
12 February 202390,000

Users and editors

Marathi Wikipedia statistics
Number of user accountsNumber of articlesNumber of filesNumber of administrators
162320961561142410

Community and events

The Marathi Wikipedia has various events organised by volunteers from all over the state. Some of the notable events include,

  1. Marathi Wikipedia Vachan Prerna Saptah
  2. Wikipedia Asian Month
  3. Marathi Bhasha Gaurav Din etc.

Media coverage and increased growth

Marathi Daily news paper Maharashtra Times was the first to cover and recommend 'Marathi language Wikipedia' on 27 July 2006.

Fonts and input methods

One can use ULS "अक्षरांतरण" (Transliteration) or "मराठी लिपी" (Inscript) typing options to search or edit Marathi Wikipedia articles as shown in this video clip; One can click on the 'cc to change the subtitle languages to Marathi, English, Sanskrit, Kokani, Ahirani languages.

Any one of Unicode Marathi fonts input system is fine for Marathi Wikipedia. Some people use inscript. Majority uses either Google phonetic transliteration or input facility Universal Language Selector provided on Marathi Wikipedia. Phonetic facility provided initially was java-based later supported by Narayam extension for phonetic input facility. Currently Marathi Wikipedia is supported by Universal Language Selector (ULS), that offers both phonetic keyboard (Aksharantaran, Marathi: अक्षरांतरण) and InScript keyboard (Marathi: मराठी लिपी).

See also

References

External links