Caste Ended His Love Story. He Got A PhD And Explains Why He's Backing BJP

Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh: When he was a college student in Varanasi, Rahul Singh fell madly in love with a Rajput girl. "She had beautiful eyes and, well, it was paagal-pan (madness)." His last name suggested to her that he was from the Kshatriya caste like her - which is what he believed as well.

Rahul's father, a teacher who runs the Adarsh High School in his village, had read stories of Rajbhar valour and given his children books that traced the history of the Rajbhars to Kshatriya origins.

Rahul's love was reciprocated by the girl, and the two became inseparable. As young love does, they planned marriage and dreamt up names for their children. She told him that while her parents would have preferred to arrange a match, they'd finally approve as Rahul came from a "good family" and the same caste. "The evening I was supposed to visit her parents, I spent the day in front of the mirror, rehearsing lines to impress them with," he said.

Minutes into that fateful meeting, the girl's father swiftly led the conversation to Rahul's background and caste. "Kshatriya was not a clear enough response. They wanted the exact caste name and gotra (sub-caste). I told them proudly I'm a Rajbhar, but the moment the word came out of my mouth, I knew something was wrong."

Rajbhars in Uttar Pradesh are one of the more backward of the OBCs (Other Backward Castes) of Uttar Pradesh. The girl's family accused Rahul of lying to them about his Kshatriya status, and within days, his girlfriend distanced herself from him.
 "I always thought I was a Kshatriya, from the warrior caste. In fact, Thakur Virendra Singh's father has written many books on Rajbhars and their Kshatriya history." A former minister, Virendra Singh, is the current BSP candidate from Shivpur, one of Varanasi's eight assembly constituencies and Rahul's home. Virendra Singh's popularity with the Rajbhars is based precisely on the reason Rahul gives: Virendra Singh's father, Jagdish Singh, wrote books on Rajbhar history packed with references to the them as upper-caste warriors, descendants of the Nagvanshi dynasty.

Confused and stunned, Rahul says he was, at first, inconsolable, "For the first few months after she left me, I behaved like Devdas, I drank, thought I'd become a monk, even contemplated slitting my wrists. Then one day, my friend told me why don't you go back to your village and find out what it means to be a Rajbhar - and I did."

Rahul journeyed across villages in eastern Uttar Pradesh which have large Rajbhar populations. Although the percentage of the Rajbhars in the state is small, roughly 2-4%, (exact figures are impossible to come by), the community is concentrated in eastern Uttar Pradesh and can shift electoral balances in up to a hundred assembly constituencies. His travels led to a much deeper engagement with his community. "I was broken by caste - and it was my caste that cured me," is Rahul's dramatic line, though delivered unemotionally. What followed was higher education, a PhD which he is currently pursuing from Banaras Hindu Unviersity with a thesis on denotified tribes. The British had listed the Rajbhars as a criminal tribe, a legacy that Rahul says accounts partly for the historic backwardness of his community. But in the past decade, Rahul argues, there's been a distinct caste awakening - the Rajbhars have become aware that they lack political representation, especially in comparison to other castes. "Take these elections. People talk of the Yadav vote, of the Jatav vote, even of the Passis, but no one mentions the Rajbhars. Take my constituency, when it is analyzed, people write 40,000 Yadavs, 35,00 Maurya, even the Prajapatis are listed, but the Rajbhars are not counted. So anyone who can give my community a sense of caste pride, that above all will get them our vote."

The BJP has played this sentiment expertly. Using its familiar strategy of appropriating historical characters and caste icons, it began to champion the 11th century king Suheldev, claimed by both the Rajbhars and the Passi Dalit community. The BJP introduced a section on Suheldev in eight grade history textbooks. In February last year, Amit Shah unveiled a statue of Suheldev in Bahraich, and the BJP government also named a superfast train after the king. "BJP candidates never forget to remind the Rajbhars of all they have done for Raja Suheldev when they campaign in our mohallas (neighbourhoods). To create rifts between communities, the BJP leaders would add that "Mayawati has spoken of Suheldev as a king more of the Passis, not of the Rajbhars." (In the complex micro-sociology of caste, Rajbhars and Passis are linked, with hyphenated Rajbhar-Passi surnames in some places like Shravasti, but wanting to be defined separately and distinctly in other places like Varanasi.)
 The BJP's choice of Suheldev over other Rajbhar icons is obvious - Suheldev in Hindutva colours is cast as a Hindu warrior who fought and successfully stopped the army of a Muslim invader, Salar Masud or Ghazi Miyan, a nephew of Mahmud Ghaznavi. "Amit Saheb with full conviction and passion tells the story of how a Rajbhar Raja with an army of just 5,000 vanquished a Muslim army of five lakhs," recounts Rahul as he analyses the phenomenal impact of this on his community. "Suddenly, the Rajbhars see the same Hindu groups that once cast them aside now accept them and speak of a Rajbhar king as a Hindu hero. They attribute this to the BJP so they feel they should support the party." But Rahul is personally angry with this divisive narrative. "You see this history easily carries to the present - when a Rajbhar is told Suheldev Raja fought the Muslims, he feels he should also be anti-Muslim, but Raja Suheldev's history is not this." Rahul then goes on to tell us of how Suheldev is tied to far more inclusive Jain and Buddhist narratives.

History apart, popular culture doesn't support the BJP-RSS version of this story either. Ghazi Miyan's shrine in Bhairaich is visited by both Hindus and Muslims, and as historian Shahid Amin points out in his '"Conquest and Community: The Afterlife of Warrior Saint Ghazi Miyan", in popular folklore Ghazi Miyan is even hailed as a cow protector.

We're standing a kilometre away from the Sarnath stupa. "You know, the Buddhists believe Suheldev to be a great hero as well, which is why statues of Suheldev are found near Buddhist stupas. But all these narratives are being replaced by very communal ones." As he speaks, Rahul turns to point to the statue of Raja Suheldev at a park named after him in Sarnath. Cast in metal, riding a horse, brandishing a sword, Suheldev's statue could easily be mistaken for Rana Pratap riding Chetak into the Haldighati battlefield. The statue is surrounded by a neat row of saffron flags. "Raja Suheldev wore a yellow pagri (turban), our temple flags are yellow, the colour of our  political party is yellow, our temple flags are yellow but look at the colour of those flags - they've become saffron."
 Rahul's distaste for the BJP's Hindutva politics is emphatic. He comes from an old BSP family, his father was close to Kanshi Ram, and he's become somewhat of a community leader. His personal ambition is to set up a movement that unites backward castes across the country and to push for Scheduled Caste status for the Rajbhars, which would entitle them to more jobs and college seats. "I know what you'll ask me - that I take pride in Rajbhars having Kshatriya origins while pushing for Schedule Caste status - well, that's our development need," he said. It's this articulate charisma that has made him a popular youth leader. Rahul's organization Bharshiv Navganshi Rajbhar is attracting many young people from his community, but he says when the BJP asked him to join the party, he firmly rejected their offer.

Then comes the big surprise. "Not just me, my father, my entire family, my village, we will all vote the BJP this time as it has allied with a Rajbhar Party and given a Rajbhar a ticket from my constituency," he said. This is what the BJP was counting on in its pre-poll alliance with Om Prakash Rajbhar's Suheldev Bharitya Samaj Party, part of its wider social engineering to work the non-Yadav OBC vote, which adds up to almost 30% in the state.

After Varanasi voted on Wednesday, Rahul called to tell me that it had been a tough fight. "I don't like politics of religion or of caste. We, who are on the lowest rungs of the caste hierarchy desire nothing more than to break the hold of caste, but we are not allowed to, not in any aspect of our lives. Our only hope, then, is to find our voice and dignity through caste consolidation."

Rahul now lives with this reality. His Facebook page that once read Rahul Singh now reads Rahul Rajbhar.