A rendition of “Hanuman Chalisa” has become the first Indian video on YouTube to cross three billion views, music label T-Series said.
In brief
The video features the melodious voice of singer Hariharan and T-Series founder Gulshan Kumar in the video.
The 9:41-minute video is the most popular version of the Hindu devotional hymn by Tulsidas, dedicated to Lord Hanuman which is familiar to devotees around the world.
The achievement was announced by the official Twitter handle of T-Series. “The celebrations have begun as the devotional music of Hanuman Chalisa has made a home in 3 Billion hearts.
Thank you so much for making it the First Indian Video to hit 3 Billion+ views on YouTube!” the tweet read.
Behind “Lakdi Ki Kaathi”- 3.3Bn
In India, it is the second most viewed video after the childhood rhyme Lakdi Ki Kaathi with 3.3 billion views.
Hanuman Chalisa touched one billion views on the platform in 2020 and became the first devotional song on YouTube to do so.
Then in October 2021 the track had hit 2 billion views.
Hosting Langar as per tradition
Commenting on the achievement, T-Series Chairman Bhushan Kumar said, “People turn to and recite the Hanuman Chalisa during their low phase.
With the COVID-19 pandemic, we are all in the midst of a challenging situation, and the Hanuman Chalisa helps us to deal with pain and hardship and gives us the courage and strength to face problems”.
Celebrating the same, the producer hosted a langar organized by Bhushan Kumar along with his mother, Krishan Kumar, Tulsi Kumar and Khushali Kumar.
When it reached the 2 billion mark in 2021 the company also organized a langar for his producer and director friends and the entire T-Series family.
Besides the record breaking number of views, the video also has over 12 million “likes” since it was uploaded on YouTube in May 2011.
Most popular channel
The T-Series YouTube channel is the most followed on YouTube with over 238 million subscribers, according to Statista, Germany-based consumer data and market insights company.
The T-series channel uploads various tracks encompassing genres including Bollywood music, pop, devotional and classics on its 29 channels catering to different Indian languages such as Hindi, Punjabi, Bhojpuri, Telugu, Tamil, Haryanvi, Kannada, Marathi and Gujarati.
The channel surpassed the 200-million subscribers mark in December 2021.
Reacting to it, Bhushan Kumar said, “We are thrilled to be the premiere Indian YouTube channel to hit such a massive subscriber base”.
It is now followed by Pewdiepie (Felix Arvid Ulf Kjellberg) and Mr Beast (Jimmy Donaldson).
Bhakti Sagar channel
T-Series’ subsidiary channel, T-Series Bhakti Sagar, with more than 58 million subscribers, is ahead of Tips Industries, Sony Music, YashRaj Films, SonyMusicIndiaVEVO, and even Shemaroo; all channels home to India’s chartbusters.
Globally, it is amongst the top-30 channels by subscriber count.
Bhakti Sagar has over 25,000 videos and close to 28 billion views, a number that puts it in the top-50 channels globally in terms of viewership.
Notably, most of these devotional songs racking in hundreds of millions of views were recorded by the late Gulshan Kumar and one of the greatest singers of the 1990s, Anuradha Paudwal.
Building a digital ecosystem
They have been remixed for enhanced sound quality.
Further, most video descriptions contain streaming hyperlinks for Gaana, Wynk Music, Amazon Prime Music, Apple Music, Hungama, Spotify, Google Music, iTunes, and many such services.
Put simply, an entire digital ecosystem of devotional music has been cultivated.
This should bring hope to those critical of the popularity of Bollywood songs in recent times.
