“We The People Of India, (read the original preamble of the Constitution of India) having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a Sovereign Democratic Republic and to secure to all its citizens: Justice, social, economic and political; Liberty of status, expression, belief, faith and worship; Equality of status and of opportunity; And to promote among all Fraternity assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the Nation; In Our Constituent Assembly this twenty-sixth day of November 1949, do Hereby Adopt, Enact And Give To Ourselves This Constitution.”

Given that democracy is

1.  a system of government by the whole population, usually through elected representatives and

2. a classless and tolerant form of society (Concise Oxford Dictionary) one would assume that the Indian Constitution is both equitable and egalitarian in every conceivable way. Nevertheless, Indira Gandhi thought it otherwise and so got it amended.

The Statement of Objects and Reasons appended to the Constitution (Forty-fourth Amendment) Bill, 1976 (Bill No. 91 of 1976) which was enacted as The Constitution Forty-second Amendment) Act, 1976, avers that –

“A Constitution to be living must be growing. If the impediments to the growth of the Constitution are not removed, the Constitution will suffer a virtual atrophy. The question of amending the Constitution for removing the difficulties which have arisen in achieving the objective of socio-economic revolution, which would end poverty and ignorance and disease and inequality of opportunity, has been engaging the active attention of Government and the public for some years now.”

Be that as it may, without specifying “the difficulties which have arisen in achieving the objective of socio-economic revolution” in the said bill it was stated that -

“It is, therefore, proposed to amend the Constitution to spell out expressly the high ideals of socialism, secularism and the integrity of the nation, …” based on which the Constitution (Forty-fourth Amendment) Act, 1976 had sought to remodel India as "Sovereign Socialist Secular Democratic Republic".

Whatever, as neither the said bill nor the specified act defined what constitutes a secular republic; we may turn again to the COD that defines the hallowed but much abused word thus:

1.  concerned with the affairs of this world; not spiritual or sacred.

2.  (of education etc.) not concerned with religion or religious belief

3. a. not ecclesiastical or monastic.
   b. (of clergy) not bound by a religious rule.

Hence, with regard to the above –

1. Is not the spirit of our secular republic against the State subsidy of the Haj (which the Supreme Court ordered to be given up in a phased manner) as that amounts to its showing concern with the spiritual matters of the Muslims?

2. Is not the penchant of the Muslims for the madrasa education for their children that stresses upon religious belief against the spirit of our secular republic?

3. Is not the assertion of the mullahs that they are bound by the sharia, the rule book of Islam, tantamount to the negation of the secular ethos of our remodeled republic?

While it is Okay for the Indian intellectuals that the Muslims and other minorities hold on to their religious ways, they see the Hindus’ right to articulate their religious sentiments or cultural concerns in communal colors, and that’s perplexing.

One may also see that the fundamental duties the amendment imposes upon the citizens, rarely, if ever, are fulfilled by our rulers themselves.

1. While it is incumbent upon us “to promote harmony and the spirit of common brotherhood amongst all the people of India transcending religious, linguistic and regional or sectional diversities; to renounce practices derogatory to the dignity of women”, the electoral politics are shaped by the caste, communal and religious social divisions.

2. While it is the fundamental right of the citizen “to develop the scientific temper, humanism and the spirit of inquiry and reform” -
   
   a) The State had failed its Hindus to rein in the caste panchayats that tend to lynch the inter-caste couples and
   
   b) The politicians that treat the Muslims as a vote-bank had neither encouraged them to inculcate the spirit of inquiry nor provided them an environment conducive for reform.

It has been fashionable in the Indian political discourse to juxtapose secularism and communalism that is with a matching ignorance about the latter.

Communalism is “a principle of political organization based on federated communes” and given the ground realities, the parties run by Mulayam, Lalu et al are but communal, and it speaks about the paucity of Indian intellectuality that they are passed onto the public as secular parties for whatever that` means. What is worse, the only political party that espouses Hindutva (it is the fundamental duty of the Indian citizenry to value and preserve the rich heritage of our composite culture) is maligned as communal (without knowing the meaning of the word) that too in spite of the fact that the country’s Apex Court had no issues with its philosophy.

No wonder that even sixty-six years after its independence, India is still groping for its political direction in an ideological darkness.

Related Article:  Constitutional Amnesia