Walking through the streets of Viman Nagar, one would never imagine a rapper standing guard at a housing complex. Meet Rahul Namdev, a watchman by day, and a rapper by night with a following of 8,000 people on Instagram – grown in just 6 months. With lyrics that are inspired by his own personal struggles, his raps reflect life as he has seen it. From talking about when he could not afford more than one meal a day, to how cruel people can be, Rahul, aka MC Betwa, does not shy away from heavy topics. His favourite rap, he says, is the one he wrote about his mother after her passing. The 24 year old left his village in Uttar Pradesh to escape poverty and came to Pune eight years ago in search of employment. Since then he has been working as a watchman while also doing other odd jobs like sweeping and washing cars. He was introduced to rap about five years ago. His friends were closely following Emiway and Raftaar’s diss tracks, and would keep telling him about it. Rahul, who had never heard rap before, was immediately hooked. MC Stan, whom he knew from before he was famous, is the inspiration for deciding on his own “hatke” stage name as he calls it - MC Betwa. “Betwa” is the term of endearment his father uses for him. “After all, who would listen to Rahul?” he laughs. His passion for rap made him go through hours of carefully analysing YouTube videos, till he learnt how to write and perform. Five years of practice has led him to where he is now – even celebrities with millions of followers have been interacting with his videos. Since then he has been learning to write and rap from YouTube videos of other artists. Rahul is a fan of Tupac and Eminem (even though he doesn’t speak English) who he calls “bhai” in one of his own raps out of gratitude for all that they’ve unknowingly taught him. Even though his rap has been well received, he hasn’t recorded a single song though he desperately wants to. Doing so is expensive, and the lack of monetary support has made such an idea impossible. In the meantime, he will continue posting on Instagram. When receiving praise for his achievement, he says with a smile, “8,000 is nothing, we still have to go up to 4, 5, 10 million!”
10 Mar 2022
Sophia Navagaonkar
