Tahir Mahmood spent much of his childhood in Saudi Arabia, but is now the most prolific Urdu Wikipedian. In the process, I crossed the , edits milestone. This makes me happy. This statement highlights the intensely-spirited approach of Tahir Mahmood Qureshi , who has become the first Urdu Wikipedian to surpass , edits.
Though originally from Pakistan , Tahir spent most of his childhood in Saudi Arabia , and attended university in Cyprus. His background means he is familiar and comfortable speaking English, Arabic, and Greek. When it came to Wikipedia, though, Tahir chose to contribute mainly in Urdu. As one of his colleagues on the Urdu Wikipedia, I congratulated him on his remarkable feat.
I then took the opportunity to ask some questions to the man behind the username. I was surprised to learn that he works in a well-respected Saudi Arabian company, and is in charge of networking and operations. Yet Tahir still finds the time to edit the Urdu Wikipedia with great enthusiasm and dedication.
He credits his achievement to his family support, as well as the general atmosphere of the Urdu Wikipedia. The community is friendly and free from conflict. He started editing on the English Wikipedia as early as , but switched to the Urdu-language Wikipedia in when he discovered the project in his native language.
Adding knowledge in Urdu, that was freely usable by others, was a thrilling and satisfying experience. Soon, Tahir became a prolific contributor. He was eventually granted administrator and bureaucrat rights by the community, allowing him to perform more technical maintenance tasks.
