The Ṇamōkāra mantra (Sanskrit: णमोकार मंत्र, Tamil: ஐவர் வணக்கம்), also variously referred to as the Navakār Mantra or the Namaskār Mantra or the Pancha Parameshti Namaskār , is the most important mantra used in Jainism. While reciting this mantra, the devotee bows with respect to humans who have cleared their gathi karmas (arihants), fully liberated souls (siddhas), spiritual leaders (acharyas), teachers (upajjhayas) and monks.

In this prayer there is no mention of any names, including that of the Tirthankaras. Jains do not ask for any favors or material benefits from the Tirthankaras or from sadhus and sadhvis. This mantra simply serves as a gesture of deep respect towards beings they believe are more spiritually advanced and to remind followers of the Jain religion of their ultimate goal of nirvana or moksa.

Digambaras and Sthanakvasis regard the first five lines as the main mantra, the following two lines are explanatory.

A 162 BCE inscription, the Hathigumpha inscription mentions the Namokar Mantra and Jain monarch Kharvela.

Lata Mangeshkar (born September 28, 1929) is a singer from India. She is one of the best-known and most respected playback singers in India. Mangeshkar's career started in 1942 and has spanned over six and a half decades. She has recorded songs for over a thousand Hindi films and has sung songs in over thirty-six regional Indian languages and foreign languages, though primarily in Hindi. She is the elder sister of singer Asha Bhosle, Hridayanath Mangeshkar, Usha Mangeshkar and Meena Mangeshkar. She is the second vocalist to have ever been awarded the Bharat Ratna, India's highest civilian honour.

Mangeshkar was featured in the Guinness Book of World Records from 1974 to 1991 for having made the most recordings in the world. The claim was that she had recorded approximately 25,000 solo, duet, and chorus-backed songs in 20 Indian languages between 1948 to 1974. Over the years, while several sources have supported this claim, others have raised concerns over its veracity, claiming that this number was highly exaggerated and that Mangeshkar's younger sister, Asha Bhosle, had more song recordings than she had. In 2011 Guinness officially acknowledged Bhosle as the most recorded artist in music history.

Anuradha Paudwal is a popular playback singer in Bollywood in India. She has sung songs in Hindi, Marathi, Oriya, and Nepali.

She studied at Xavier's College in Mumbai. She was married to the late Arun Paudwal, who worked with music director S. D. Burman as his assistant. Her singing career started in 1973 with the movie, Abhimaan, (starring Amitabh Bachchan and Jaya Bachchan) in which she sang a Shloka (a Sanskrit verse). In the same year she also made her Marathi film debut with "Yashoda" (music by Datta Davjekar). In 1974, she brought out a record of Non-film Marathi songs or "bhav geeten" which became very popular.

In 1976, she got her break as a playback singer in Hindi films with Kalicharan (starring Shatrughan Sinha and Reena Roy). Her first solo was in the movie, Aap Beati, (starring Hema Malini and Shashi Kapoor). Laxmikant-Pyarelal were the music-composer duo for that movie. She also occasionally sang songs for composers Rajesh Roshan (Des Pardes), Jaidev (Dooriyan, Laila Majnu), Kalyanji Anandji (Kalaakar, Vidhaata), and Usha Khanna (Souten, Sajan Bina Suhagan).