Rahul is a popular male name in

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

and has a variety of meanings. The earliest meaning found in the

Upanishads The Upanishads (; , , ) are late Vedic and post-Vedic Sanskrit texts that "document the transition from the archaic ritualism of the Veda into new religious ideas and institutions" and the emergence of the central religious concepts of Hind ...

is "conqueror of all miseries." Later use of the word is attributed to the

Buddha Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha (),* * * was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism. According to Buddhist legends, he was ...

, who named his son '' Rahula'' as he felt that family ties could be an obstacle in the path to renunciation and

nirvana Nirvana, in the Indian religions (Jainism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Sikhism), is the concept of an individual's passions being extinguished as the ultimate state of salvation, release, or liberation from suffering ('' duḥkha'') and from the ...

. Buddha uttered Rahul when he first saw his son and gave a new meaning "relationship" and "bondage" to this name. Rahul means ''Moon, Able/efficient'' in

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; stem form ; nominal singular , ,) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in northwest South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cultural ...

and

Pali Pāli (, IAST: pāl̤i) is a Classical languages of India, classical Middle Indo-Aryan languages, Middle Indo-Aryan language of the Indian subcontinent. It is widely studied because it is the language of the Buddhist ''Pali Canon, Pāli Can ...

. Rahul also means "Traveler" in

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

People named Rahul

Arts

Rahul Banerjee (actor) Arunoday Banerjee (born 16 October 1983), better known as Rahul Banerjee, is an Indian actor who works in Bengali language films and television Television (TV) is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. ...

(born 1983), Indian Bengali actor * Rahul Bhatt (born 1982), Indian fitness trainer and actor * Rahul Bose (born 1967), Indian Bengali actor, director, screenwriter, social activist * Rahul Deshpande (born 1979), Indian classical singer * Rahul Dev (born 1968), Indian actor and model * Rahul Dev Burman (1939–1994), Indian composer and music director * Rahul Dholakia, Indian film director, producer, and screenwriter * Rahul Khanna (born 1972), Indian Hindi actor * Rahul Kohli (born 1985), English actor * Rahul Madhav, Indian Malayalam actor * Rahul Nambiar, Indian singer * Rahul Pandey, Indian Bollywood musician * Rahul Raj (born 1980), Indian composer * Rahul Ram, Indian musician * Rahul Ramakrishna (born 1991), Indian actor, writer and journalist * Rahul Rawail (born 1951), Indian film director * Rahul Roy (born 1968), Indian Hindi actor, producer and model * Rahul Vaidya (born 1987), Indian singer

Politics

* Rahul Daulatrao Aher (born 1975), Indian politician from Maharashtra * Rahul Gandhi (born 1970), Indian politician * Rahul Mahajan (politician) (born 1975), son of Late Pramod Mahajan, a prominent Indian politician

Science

* Rahul Mukerjee (born 1956), Indian academic and statistician * Rahul Pandit (born 1956), Indian physicist * Rahul Potluri (born 1983), Indian-British physician and researcher * Rahul Sarpeshkar, American bio-engineer

Sports

* Rahul Banerjee (archer) (born 1986), Indian archer * Rahul Bheke (born 1990), Indian footballer * Rahul Chahar (born 1999), Indian cricketer * Rahul Dravid (born 1973), Indian cricketer * K. L. Rahul (born 1991), Indian cricketer * Rahul Kanwat (born 1974), Indian cricketer * Rahul Sanghvi (born 1974), Indian cricketer * Rahul Yadav (cricketer) (born 1989), Indian cricketer * Rahul Yadav Chittaboina (born 1998), Indian badminton player * Rahul KP (born 2000), Indian footballer

Other fields

* Rahul Bajaj (born 1980), industrialist * Rahul Chandran (born 1976), policy analyst * Rahul Easwar, Indian author and activist * Rahul Ligma, fictional ex-employee of

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

played by an amateur actor * Rahul Mahajan (blogger), noted American blogger and author * Rahul Roy (accountant) (1963–2009), Indian accountant * Rahul Sankrityayan (1893–1963), Indian historian, religious scholar, philosopher, writer and polymath * Rahul Sood (born 1973), Canadian business executive * Rahul Yadav (born 1988), Indian entrepreneur

Multiple people

* Rahul Kumar (disambiguation), several people * Rahul Prasad (disambiguation), several people * Rahul Sharma (disambiguation), several people * Rahul Singh (disambiguation), several people