Jai Shri Ram is a Hindi expression, translating as "Glory to Lord Rama" or "Victory to Lord Rama". The proclamation has been used as an informal greeting or as a symbol of adhering to Hindufaith or for projection of varied faith-centered emotions, by Hindus in recent past. The expression was used by the Indian Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party which embraced the slogan in the late 20th century, as a tool of increasing the visibility of Hinduism in public spaces and went on to use it as a war cry, for perpetration of communal atrocities against people of other faiths.
Origins
Religious
Photojournalist Prashant Panjiar wrote about how in Ayodhya, female pilgrims always chant "Sita-Ram-Sita-Ram", while the older male pilgrims prefer to not take Ram's name at all. The traditional usage of "Jai" in a slogan was with "Siyavar Ramchandraji ki jai". A popular greeting invoking Ram is "Jai Ram ji ki" and "Ram-Ram".
The worship of Rama increased significantly in the 12th century, following the invasions of Muslim Turks. The Ramayana became widely popular in the 16th century. It is argued that the story of Rama offers a "very powerful imaginative formulation of the divine king as the only being capable of combating evil". The concept of Ramrajya, "the rule of Ram", was used by Gandhi to describe the ideal country free from the British. The most widely known political use of Ram began with Baba Ram Chandra's peasant movement in Awadh in the 1920s. He encouraged the use of "Sita-Ram" as opposed to the then widely used "Salaam" as a greeting, since the latter implied social inferiority. "Sita-Ram" soon became a war cry. Journalist Mrinal Pande states:
Transition
In the late 1980's, the slogan "Jai Shri Ram" was popularised by Ramanand Sagar's television seriesRamayan, where it was used by Hanuman and the monkey army as a war cry when they fought the demon army of Ravan in order to free Sita. The nationalistic organisation Vishva Hindu Parishad and its Sangh Parivar allies, including the Bharatiya Janata Party, used it in their Ayodhya Ram Janmabhoomi movement. Volunteers at Ayodhya at the time would write the slogan on their skin, using their own blood as ink to signify their devotion. The organizations also distributed a cassette named as Jai Shri Ram, containing songs like "Aya samay jawano jago" and "Ram ji ki sena chali". All the songs in the casette were set to the tunes of popular Bollywood songs. Manushi, a journal edited by academic Madhu Kishwar described how the Sangh Parivar's usage of "Jai Shri Ram", as opposed to "Sita-Ram", lies in the fact that their violent ideas had "no use for a non-macho Ram." This also mobilised more people politically, since it was patriarchal. Further, the movement was exclusively associated with Ram's birth, which had occurred many years before his marriage to Sita. The Hindu nationalist portrayal of Ram is warrior-like, as opposed to the traditional "tender, almost effeminate" Ram that has been in popular perception.
Usage in violent incidents
In 1992, during riots and Demolition of Babri Masjid, the same slogans were raised. In June 1998, 300 copies of the New Testament were taken from the students of a Christian school in Rajkot and burned amidst shouts of the slogan. In January 1999, the slogan was heard again when Australian missionary doctor Graham Staines was burned alive with his two children in Manoharpur, Orissa. The victim in the 2019 Jharkhand mob lynching was forced by the mob to chant "Jai Shree Ram" and "Jai Hanuman". It was alleged that the perpetrators of the Gargi College molestations were chanting the slogan. During the 2020 Delhi riots, rioters were reported to have kept chanting "Jai Shri Ram" while beating their victims. The police were also found to join in the chant while siding with the Hindu mobs. The Muslims were told Hindustan me rehna hoga, Jai Shri Ram kehna hoga. Indian journalist Rana Ayyub, writing in Time, commented that the slogan had become a "racist dog whistle" against Muslims during the riots.
