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A former WWE champion finally opened up about the origins of his iconic nickname.
One of the most surprising releases of the year was Jinder Mahal, who announced his departure from WWE on his official X account on April 19. Mahal has to serve a 90-day no-compete clause before he officially becomes a free agent.
During his recent appearance on Insight with Chris Van Vliet, the former WWE Champion was asked about the origins of "The Modern Day Maharaja" nickname. Mahal explained that he got it from his cousin Raj Singh, who currently performs on TNA Wrestling as Champagne Singh.
"Like the Grand King, a raja is the king and the maha means like even bigger like the Grand King. King of Kings in a way. (Did you come up with The Modern Day Maharaja?) I kind of stole it. So my cousin is also a wrestler, Gama Singh is my uncle. His son, Raj Singh, he wrestles in TNA. He said it like back in the day when we were tag teaming on the indies like before I even came to WWE... He said it first but I made it popular," Mahal said. [From 25:24 to 26:04]
Check out the video below:
Former WWE RAW GM thinks AEW should hire Jinder Mahal ASAP
Before Jinder Mahal got released, he went viral earlier this year due to a mini-feud with Seth Rollins for the World Heavyweight Championship. Tony Khan took a shot at Mahal on social media, and it blew up to the point where people thought The Modern Day Maharaja would beat Rollins.
Now that Mahal will be a free agent in three months, will Khan bring him to AEW? Erich Bischoff thinks it's a great idea and should be something TK and his team should do.
"If I was Tony Khan and if Jinder is available and this isn't a storyline, I'd hire him so fast. Going back to the comments that Tony made about Jinder that started the whole thing. It was awesome and it was fun to watch. Take advantage of that, Tony. You can get kind of a built-in incident to start from, a spark of an idea to do something fun. Have Jinder come in, Tony, and make you fear for your life," Bischoff said.
When Mahal was released by WWE in 2014, he worked on the independent circuit. He wrestled for promotions such as Reality of Wrestling, World Wrestling Council, Qatar Pro Wrestling, All Star Wrestling, and Inoki Genome Federation.
It will be interesting to see what the future holds for The Modern Day Maharaja.
