9 highlights
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In the ensuing discourse, while the members agreed on the nature of the Indian state adhering to secular principles, the word ‘secular’ was dropped from the preamble. It made an appearance though, about three decades later, when the Indira Gandhi led government included it in the document, as part of the 42nd Amendment of the constitution.
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“Secularism, the theory that governments ought to have no religious connection, nor indeed anything to do with matters of religious belief or ritual, is manifestly a Western intervention, specifically a product of the Protestant Reformation and the Enlightenment,” writes historian Ian Copland.
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The connection between secularism and effective functioning of democracy had been well established in Europe, and since India was to follow the ideals of democracy, secularism was deemed absolutely essential.
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However, debates in the Constituent Assembly made clear the ambiguity inherent in the terminology when applied in the Indian context.
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In the decades that followed, secularism in the Indian constitution has been appreciated by some but has come under criticism by several others who have repeatedly pointed out to the foreign origins of the words, the inapplicability of it in the Indian context and the problematic ways in which it has been applied in India as well.
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Vice president of the drafting committee H C Mookherjee, on the other hand, stated that “are we really honest when we say that we are seeking to establish a secular state? If your idea is to have a secular state it follows inevitably that we cannot afford to recognise minorities based upon religion.”
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said Lokanath Misra in the debate on December 6, 1948. “Do we really believe that religion can be divorced from life, or is it our belief that in the midst of many religions we cannot decide which one to accept? If religion is beyond the ken of our State, let us clearly say so and delete all reference to rights relating to religion,” he went on to state.
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They understood that ” since ‘Enlightenment Secularism’, with its core principle of separation, founded on the Protestant conception of religion as essentially a private concern with which states had no legitimate business, was never going to work in a country where rulers and religious publics had been interacting from time immemorial, it was better not to use the term at all, than to use it fraudulently,”
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Making clear his stance on the State following the spirit of secularism, while avoiding its inclusion in the Preamble, Ambedkar said “what should be the policy of the State, how the Society should be organised in its social and economic side are matters which must be decided by the people themselves according to time and circumstances. It cannot be laid down in the Constitution itself because that is destroying democracy altogether.”