Published 15th century | ||
Genre Bhajan, devotional poetry | ||
Vaishnava Jana To is one of the most popular Hindu bhajans, written in the 15th century by the poet Narsinh Mehta in the Gujarati language. The bhajan was included in Mahatma Gandhi’s daily prayer. The bhajan speaks about the life, ideals and mentality of a Vaishnava Jana (a follower of Vishnu).
Contents
Lyrics
Lyrics of the bhajan:
Influence
This bhajan has inspired many people, and was one of the favourite bhajans of Mahatma Gandhi.
In 1999, this song was rendered in a single album by top artists such as classical vocalists Gangubai Hangal and Pandit Jasraj, pop star Remo Fernandes and also including Sarod maestro Amjad Ali Khan, Pandit Narayan on the sarangi, flute maestro Hariprasad Chaurasia and santoor exponent Shivkumar Sharma played an instrumental rendition. Along with "Raghupati Raghava Raja Ram", the song is also sung regularly by Delhi's best known western classical choral groups — The Capital City Minstrels at their annual Peace Concerts coinciding with Gandhi Jayanti. Carnatic guitarist Baiju Dharmajan created an instrumental guitar version of the prayer in 2013.
In Popular Culture
Elements of the hymn were included in the Hollywood film Gandhi (1982), in Bollywood films like Water (2005), Cheeni Kum (2007) and Road to Sangam (2009), and Kollywood film Hey Ram (2000). The hymn was also used as a title song for several Indian films. In the Telugu movie Prathinidhi (2014), the first stanza of the song is used during the climatic scene. In the Malayalam movie Indian Rupee (2011), the first stanza of the song is used in the climatic scene and sung by Bombay Jayasree. The song also appears in the Gujarati biopic of the author Kunvaar Bhainu Mameru.
An instrumental rendition of the song was featured in the strategy video game Sid Meier's Civilization VI as the musical theme for the Indian civilization.