A name that defined an era in India's religious and political landscape returned to the centre of public memory on Sunday, 27 September 2026, as Rajasthan Chief Minister Bhajan Lal Sharma paid homage to Ashok Singhal, the towering figure behind the Ram Janmabhoomi movement, on his birth anniversary.

Sharma's tribute, posted in Hindi on X, hailed Singhal as the 'principal architect' of the movement to liberate the Ram Janmabhoomi site and offered him koti-koti naman — reverence in the millions. The post described Singhal's contribution as one that 'will be remembered across ages' for awakening Sanatan culture, uniting society, and transforming the resolve to build a grand temple of Prabhu Shri Ram into a mass movement.

The man who mobilised millions for Ayodhya

Ashok Singhal served for decades as a senior leader and former international working president of the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP), the Hindu nationalist organisation established in 1964 that became the organisational backbone of the Ram temple campaign. Under his stewardship, the VHP channelled enormous grassroots energy — brick-laying ceremonies, nationwide processions, and mass rallies — into what became one of independent India's most consequential socio-religious movements.

The legal and political journey culminated in the Supreme Court's landmark verdict of November 2019, which awarded the disputed Ayodhya site for the construction of a Ram temple. The temple's consecration followed in January 2024, an event that tens of millions of devotees across India watched as the symbolic fulfilment of the movement Singhal had championed for decades.

BJP's consistent commemorative pattern around the Ayodhya cause

Sharma's tribute fits squarely into a well-established pattern: BJP leaders at state and national levels have consistently marked the birth and death anniversaries of movement figures, threading those commemorations into an ongoing narrative about cultural heritage and temple-linked governance. The Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Teerth Kshetra Trust, set up to manage the temple complex, keeps Ayodhya in active institutional focus — giving such tributes a living, not merely archival, resonance.

For the BJP-governed state of Rajasthan, invoking Singhal's legacy is also a reminder of the grassroots mobilisation capacity that figures like him built — a capacity the party continues to draw on in state-level outreach to Hindu devotees and VHP-affiliated networks.

Ashok Singhal's birth anniversary may arrive once a year, but the movement he shaped re-enters the present tense every time the temple at Ayodhya opens its doors to a new morning's worshippers.