I see a lot of confusion in this sub and elsewhere regarding Rahul’s lack of self confidence and general attitude.
Coming from a Bengali middle class household i fully sympathise and understand his behaviour.
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In most Indian middle class households, you genuinely do not get to truly understand your self worth for a while. Perfection is so pushed upon you right from childhood that you do not escape that until and unless you find a life partner who makes you understand your self worth.
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Indian males traditionally will not cook/bake in such an average middle class background as Rahul has. It will be up to the women and/or your daily help/cook to think about food. Until i went to uni and had to fend for myself I never knew how to cook nor did I have any interest in it. (Upper middle class households in India are changing with access to cooking shows, but middle class is still the same). Therefore it is perfectly understandable for him to be still very weary of his baking/cooking skills even when he is making absolutely traditionally bengali fillings like Ghugni, Posto and Lamb Curry,
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Like a lot of people who I know from a similar background he expresses himself better when writing. If you see his instagram posts its much more articulate and keyed to what he is feeling/what he wants to express. In a lot of middle class Indian households truly expressing who you are is frowned upon unless it is socially acceptable.
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The first episode, his first skype call with his parents his parents are asking him to shave. I get that atleast once every month from my own parents during a videocall.
Edit: I will add another point as I explained it below. I completely understand the almost fearful expression he has even when his bake is excellent and has been told so. In school even when you did almost near perfect, any tiny fault was immediately pounced upon by teachers and you get reprimanded in front of the whole class for it. This stays with a lot of people and you genuinely sometimes fear that the hammer is going to drop and someone will say something negative to humiliate you and decrease your self worth