How sword has emerged as a tool of historic and caste pride. An extract.
Brahma Prakash
In democracy, their (Kshatriya) honour can be violated any time. One takes out the sword when sentiments are hurt, when one feels wounded and victimized. The connection between the sword and the Kshatriya is well known. The sword has been one of the most significant cultural objects of honour and valour. It is perceived as an object of pride, an object of sacrifice. What we see in the return of the sword is the return of the idealized Kshatriya. The figure of the Rajput warriors and their fascination with war and kingdom. The Kshatriya’s image is also about clan feeling, not necessarily about caste feeling, though the two cannot be separated. It is about the clan feeling of the upper castes that brings them together. There is an attempt to foreground combative and fierce pasts and selective narratives. There is an attempt to ritualize the kingdom and warfare. A sword is an objective that creates an image of Kshatriyahood.
Actors who hold the sword carry the symbol—the sign and social pride of Kshatriyas. The connection is so strong that you take a sword and feel like a Kshatriya. You feel like a Rajput. One gets possessed by the power of swords. Who can capture this psyche of the sword better than novelist Phaniswarnath Renu? He writes in Maila Anchal:
The blood of Rajput youths boils after getting a shaft, spear and sword in their hands. That day, Hargauri was saying, ‘Sanyojak ji! I do not feel anger toward those Yavanas. I want to blow the neck of those Hindus who take the side of Yavanas.’ Sanyojak ji stood away; otherwise, Hargauri would have used the sword in a way that his neck would have been separated from his body… Aaryavarta… The name of Meriganj has perhaps changed to Aarjabrat [Aryavrata is my insertion].