When Danny Boyle, the director of Slumdog Millionaire, approached Rahman to compose its soundtrack, he included the song.
"Jai Ho" received widespread acclaim from music critics, who cited it as the best song on the Slumdog Millionaire soundtrack.
[4] Rahman composed "Jai Ho" in Logic Pro, a digital audio workstation and MIDI sequencer, using samplers to create the "trancey, arpeggiated" musical line.
[6] Vijay Prakash sang the portion with the words "Jai Ho", which takes a high pitch at numerous junctures of the song.
[7] Mahalakshmi Iyer sang the Hindi words between the "Jai Ho" chants and the portions of the verses not sung by Singh.
[10] The song contains a mix of "multiple motifs from the traditional pieces on the soundtrack" with "the big drums and blasting horns of the present".
[15] Tajpal Rathore of BBC Music gave the song a positive review, calling it a "quintessential Rahman track".
He described it as "two lovers consummating their long, winding courtship not with sex but a hand-waving, side-stepping, totally cathartic shimmy".
[17][18] In a review of the Slumdog Millionaire soundtrack, Joginder Tutej of Bollywood Hungama deemed "Jai Ho" the "flagship number" of the film.
Tutej complimented Sukhwinder Singh's vocals as being "energetic" and concluded that the singer "can comfortably add on another big chartbuster to his name".
He also stated that the song, while "boasting of an amazing mix of melody and rhythm" remains "Indian at heart" and is "instantly catchy".
Gulzar saab celebrates the spirit of love and life with 'Jai Ho' and infuses enough power in it that justifies all the nominations it is receiving today".
[1] According to Sean Daly of the St. Petersburg Times: "YouTube now has vids of babies and girlfriends doing this Jai Ho dance.
Rahman modified the song to "set it in sync with the live orchestra and make it suitable for a stage presentation".
"[30] "Jai Ho" was performed as part of a medley with "Jiyo Utho Badho Jeeto" during the 2010 Delhi Commonwealth Games opening ceremony on 28 August 2010.
An editor from Sify wrote that, during the performance of "Jai Ho", "the chant at Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium, many would swear, was magical".
[33][34] Harindra Singh, vice-chairman and managing director of the advertising firm Percept, told BBC that: "The tune of the song and the Jai Ho phrase have been used in the campaign.
[33] The version used in the campaign features altered lyrics sung by Sukhwinder Singh, who performed on the original song.
[36] "Jai Ho" was performed by Ravi K Tripathi, a Lucknow-based singer, at the closing ceremony of 16th Asian Games on 27 November 2010.
[38] After getting a green-light from Rahman, they asked Scherzinger, the lead singer of the Pussycat Dolls, to write an interpretation of the song.
Scherzinger was hesitant at first, stating in an interview that: "[...] I was scared to death to touch it [and] afraid for people to hear it before I even wrote it".
Newsround praised the song by saying "[Nicole Scherzinger] sounds right at home – making the most of her soulful R&B voice and hitting all the (incredibly) high notes on this Eastern-themed piece of pop!
"[43] Nick Levine from Digital Spy wrote that, "The Hindi original, which soundtracks the Bollywood dance routine at the end of the movie, is far more urgent and atmospheric, but this remake works nicely enough as a slick, shamelessly opportunistic PCD single.