Bhubaneswar, November 25, 2025: The Odia Wikimedians User Group, in collaboration with the Wikipedia Asian Month User Group, successfully organized a meetup and offline edit-a-thon in Puri town on Saturday. The event was aimed at capacity building, community bonding, and expanding Asian content on Odia Wikipedia as part of the ongoing Wikipedia Asian Month 2025 edit-a-thon.
The program was coordinated by Odia Wikimedian Sangram Keshari Senapati, with on-ground support from fellow Wikimedian Aliva Sahoo. Experienced Wikimedian Chinmayee Mishra joined the event as a trainer, guiding newcomers and supporting participants in understanding Wikipedia policies, editing techniques, and content creation workflows.
Seven new trainees — Abhishek Srichandan, Tanmaya Kumar Nayak, Kiran Kumar Bharati, Sonali Barik, Kiran Bala Maharana, Omm Biswajit Pradhan, and Subham Barik participated in the edit-a-thon with the objective of learning how to contribute effectively to Odia Wikipedia. Community members including Chirashree Chinmayee Chaine, Dinesh, and Dibyadarsi Nayak were also present, contributing to discussions and mentoring participants throughout the session.
Abhishek Srichandan, the new participant shared an inspiring personal story. He recalled how, during his school days, he used to visit cyber cafés to download information about eminent personalities of Odisha for his school projects. He mentioned that he never imagined that one day he would be able to contribute to the same movement that once served as a resource for him. Abhishek expressed his happiness at being part of the event and learning new things about Wikipedia, calling the experience both meaningful and motivating.
About Wikipedia Asian Month
Wikipedia Asian Month (WAM) is an annual, international Wikipedia campaign designed to promote and celebrate Asian content across various language Wikipedias. Launched in 2015, WAM encourages local communities to organize month-long edit-a-thons every November, focusing on creating or improving articles related to Asia on a particular theme. Participation is open to all global communities, not just those within Asia.
Since its inception, the initiative has grown significantly in both scale and diversity. Each year, more Wikipedians from around the world join the effort, leading to thousands of new articles and improved cross-cultural understanding.
Odia Wikipedia’s Active Participation
Odia Wikipedia has been part of Wikipedia Asian Month since the very beginning. Over the years, the Odia Wikimedian community has contributed consistently by creating quality content, organizing activities, and engaging new editors to highlight Asia’s cultural, historical, and contemporary significance through the Odia language. This year, since the beginning of this edit-a-thon on November 1, more than 150 articles have already been created in the Odia language. Among them, Harihar Prasad Satapathy alone has contributed over 100 articles. Other contributors include Raj Kishore Mahapatra, Dr. Subas Chandra Raut, Sangram Keshari Senapati, Aliva Sahoo, and Pritiranjan Tripathy.
Community Growing Stronger
The 2025 Puri meetup reflects the community’s ongoing commitment to outreach and collaboration. By conducting offline edit-a-thons and training workshops, Odia Wikimedians continue to strengthen digital knowledge representation in Odia and empower new contributors to join the global Wikimedia movement.
The Odia Wikimedians User Group expressed gratitude to the Wikipedia Asian Month User Group for their continuous support. Special thanks were extended to Santhosh Notagar, the WAM South Asia Ambassador, for his guidance and encouragement in making this meetup and edit-a-thon successful.
