Secularism: An Overall View - Essay, UPSC MAINS | Course for UPPSC Preparation - UPPSC (UP) PDF Download

Secularism: An Overall View

structure

(1) Opening    —    India has to pass out from “a sacred society” to “a secular society”.

(2) Body    —    Historical perspective.

    —    The Indian Constitution adopted a secular outlook.

    —    Quote Donald Smith, Luthera.

    —    A society in which religion controls all aspects of life is not congenial to innovation and change.

    —    Problems of Indian society.

    —    Secularisation has affected the notions of pollutions and purity in Hinduism.

(3) Closing    —    People have not yet become secular in their outlook.

    —    People should adopt a secular approach to the problems of ethics in stead of looking upon morality as something based on religion.

    —    Not only a secular state, but also a secular society.

One of the fundamental changes which the Indian society has to under- go is a part of the change which an agricultural society, that is traditional., has to make when it changes to a modern industrial society. It is well known fact that members of the Indian society, irrespective of the creed to which they belong, are highly religious in their, outlook. It is this intense religious outlook that led to “communal representation” in 1909 and the “communal award” in 1932 against which mahatma Gandhi protested by resorting to a “fast,” which is but another manifestation of the religious outlook and to which the entire Indian society responded.

Historically, India has been a land with powerful religious sects. So, religious tolerance has been one of the traditional social values in the country, since without it any ordered society in the country would have been impossible. Asoka was the first great emperor to announce that the state would not persecute any religious sect, as early as third century B.C. In his twelfth Rock Edict, Asoka made a passionate appeal not only for the toleration of all religious sects but also to develop a spirit of reverence towards them. He pleaded for restrain of criticism of other religions and sects. He enjoined the exponents of different religions to assemble together and discuss the problems. He asked people to become proficient in the scriptures of other religions. The religious tolerance expressed by Asoka more than 2,300 years ago has been one of the cherished Indian social values though there were religious persecutions now and then. Asoka’s secular outlook is one of the landmarks not only of Indian civilisation but also of human civilisation itself. Another great landmark in the development of the secular outlook in human civilisation is the declaration by Jesus Christ: “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s”.

While Asoka’s declaration laid the basis for the aspect of tolerance in secularism, Christ’s declaration laid the basis for the separation of the state and the church, another aspect of secularism. The two other aspects of secularism may be traced to modern times with the renaissance and reformation in Western Europe in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and the Industrial revolution in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The renaissance led to a humanistic outlook with an emphasis on “this worldliness” as against the emphasis on “other worldliness” which was the characteristic feature of the middle ages in Europe. The Industrial Revolution emphasised science and technology, the growth of knowledge and its application to the problems of life, leading to increased productivity as a result of the construction of machines and the use of energy from sources other than the human and the animal.

The East India Company followed the social values of tolerance among the various religious groups in India and non-interference in their affairs. When it obtained the grant of Diwani in 1765, which marked the beginning of its political poser in India, the Company maintained strict neutrality which was dictated by prudence as well as the commercial interests even though the Christian missionaries were eager that the Company should support them. The company’s administrators were also influenced by the liberal political principles of Edmund Burke.

However, the policy of non-intervention was set aside by William Bentinck who was influenced by the prevailing public opinion among the Hindus spearheaded by Raja Ram Mohan Roy to abolish sati in 1829 and to introduce secular education through the medium of English in 1835. Thus, it was from the time of William Bentinck that the state intervened to bring about social reform at the instance of the public opinion of the new middle classes.

These two traditions, that of tolerance towards all religious groups and that of intervention when the need for social reform was keenly felt by the society, have been the characteristic features of the modern Indian state since the beginning of the 19th century.

The Western educated Indians,  who estab

lished the Indian National Congress in 1885, were secular in their outlook and continued to follow the leadership of Ram Mohan Roy in their social and political outlook. However, with the partition of Bengal in 1905, the Indian leaders like Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Aurobindo Ghosh became more Hindu in their outlook. While the agitation against the bengal partition started the movement of direct action it also gave birth to the Muslim League in 1906 which was religious and communal in its outlook and which led to the innovation of the communal representation principle in 1909 and finally to the two-nation theory and the partition of the country in 1947 and the establishment of the Islamic state of Pakistan.

Though Mahatma Gandhi was very secular in his outlook and was responsible for many fundamental changes in Indian society like the abolition of untouchability, the breaking down of the barriers between the various castes, and the promotion of equality among the sexes, he was deeply religious in his outlook. However, his religious outlook was basically tolerant towards all religions. It is well known that his prayer meetings, which attracted tens of thousands of people of all creeds in the various parts of the country, included recitations from the scriptures of various religions.

Though 80 per cent of the population of India consisted of the followers of Hinduism, the Indian Constitution adopted a secular outlook because of the tradition of religious tolerance from the time of Asoka, the tradition of a secular outlook among the members of the new middle classes who in the 19th century were eager to establish a secular democracy in the country based upon the principles of liberalism, the humanistic outlook of great Indian leaders, and finally the intense desire to usher in a new economy by industrialisation so that the standard of living of the masses of people could be raised. All these four trends of the Indian society are expressed in unequivocal terms in the Indian Constitution adopted by the Constituent Assembly in 1950. This is the reason why a “tradition-bound, caste-ridden and authoritarian society” like India adopted secularism as a basic principle of the Indian state and the Indian society.

Donald Smith defines a secular state as one “which guarantees individual and corporate freedom of religion, deals with the individual freedom of religion, deals with the individual as a citizen irrespective of his religion, is no constitutionally connected to a particular religion, nor does it seek to promote or interfere with religion.’ There is no doubt that the Indian state satisfies all these criteria. It guarantees individual and corporate freedom or religion by articles 25., 26 and 30 of the Constitution. It deals with the individual as a citizen irrespective of his religion according to articles 14, 15 and 16. Further, it is not constitutionally connected with any particular religion nor does it seek to promote or interfere with any particular religion.

However, Luthera contends that the Indian state is not secular since it does not clearly demarcate between the State and the church in the manner in which, for example, the United States of America does. This confusion arises out of the fact that neither the Hindus, who form 85 per cent of the population, nor the Muslims, who form nearly 12 per cent of the population constituting the biggest religious minority in the country have any organised Church. As a result, it is impossible to expect a clear demarcation between the State and the Church in India.

Another charge put forth by Luthera and also endorsed by Smith is that the Indians taste in spite of the constitutional guarantee for the liberty of the individual and the liberty of the corporate religious bodies, intervenes in religious matters.

There is no doubt that some provisions of the constitution and some of the laws passed do interfere with the religious customs and practices of the Hindus. For example, Article 17 of the Constitution prohibits the practice of untouchability and the 1956 Act provides for the punishment of the practice of untouchability, and also enables the Harijans to enter the temples. All these are illustrations of the active intervention of the state in matters pertaining to religious customs. Similarly, the various laws of social reform passed before and after independence are specific illustrations of state intervention. Similarly the laws enabling the state government to set up department of religious endowments and to administer the temples also illustrate the state intervention in religious matters. There is no doubt that article 48 of the Constitution directing the state to prohibit cow slaughter and the rules passed by the State Governments banning the slaughter of animals and the sale of meat on certain days looked upon as sacred by the Hindus, and prohibiting the playing of the band while a procession passes by mosque are all not really secular. It is also true that the state has sponsored the celebration of religious occasions such as the 2500th anniversary of Buddha, the birth centenary of Swami Vivekananda, etc. Finally, it is relevant to point out that the All India Radio broadcasts early in the morning devotional songs of Hinduism and other religions of India.

However, it must be borne in mind that the various laws of social reform like the abolition of untoucbability, etc. were passed because of the lack of an organised Hindu church which could have undertaken to modify these practices, and at the expressed desire of the Hindu community to bring about these reforms. As Smith has noted, “Most of the Hindu legislators regard temple entry laws as simply measures of social reform motivated by humanitarian considerations and concern for social justice. They fail to appreciate the predominant religious aspect in this area of reform.” On the other hand, Gajendragadkar looks upon this as a recognition of the principle that personal law as a secular institution has to be based on rational and secular considerations. The enactment of these laws may be looked upon as a vindication of the secular spirit that law is not made by religion but is an independent institution of social control. As a matter of fact, Gajendragadkar goes to the extent of asserting that the characteristic feature of Indian secularism is its determination to adopt a rational approach to the solution of socio-economic problems and traces this tendency to the ancient notion of dharma which is based not only on Shruthi and Smriti, but also on sadachara (the rule of good man) and that which is agreeable to oneself and desire born of due deliberation. Thus, the intervention of the state in the realm of personal law is not an encroachment on religion but is rather an indication of the secularisation of law. It is only to be hoped that the Muslims in India will recognise this aspect and enable the country to have a uniform civil code according to article 44 of the Constitution.

An attempt may not be made to state the other aspect of secularism in relation to a humanistic outlook and rationalism and empiricism. As Dame rightly points out, general emphasis is laid on the problems relating to state and law when there is a discussion regarding secularism. Hardly any emphasis is laid on the aspect of secularism relating to rationalism, empiricism, etc.

A society in which religion controls all aspects of life is not congenial to innovation and change. On the other hand, when the influence of religion is restricted to the relation between man and God, or man and the universe and when the influence of religion on other aspects of life becomes less pervasive, there is scope for innovation and change because there is a greater confidence in man’s ability to control the forces of nature as well as the social institutions. This problem is basically, as noted earlier, a problem of changing the society from the traditional agricultural society to a modern industrial one. The basic problem of Indian society is the promotion of a humanistic outlook so that poverty and suffering in any individual is not tolerated and those individuals who are better off exert themselves to render help to those who are steeped in poverty, ignorance and superstitution. Another basic problem facing the Indian society is the improvement of the standard of living of the masses in the rural areas and in the slums of the cities by increasing productivity with the help of science and technology. Secularism in the context of economic development involves the abandonment of the concept of cyclical time and cosmic causation and their replacement by the notions of linear time and physical laws and natural causation. This will help man to develop the confidence and ability to master the environmental forces, physical as well as social, and abandon the tendency to appeal to supernatural forces or the propitiation of occult powers. The broad outlines of the future society and contained in the directive principles of state policy which have the stamp of liberal humanitarianism. Article 38 of the constitution asserts that the state shall strive to promote the welfare of the people; Article 39 asserts that the citizens, men as well as women, have the right to an adequate means of livelihood and that children of a tender age are not forced to enter a vocation unsuited to their age or strength. article 41 requires the state to make effective provisions for securing the right to work, to education and to public assistance in cases of unemployment, old age, sickness and disablement. Article 43 requires the state to secure a living wage and a decent standard of living for all the citizens. Article 45 requires the state to provide compulsory education to all children until they complete the age of 14 years. Article 46 requires the state to promote with special care the educational and economic interests of the weaker sections of the people—all these clearly show the concern of the Constitution for the welfare and well being of children as well as adults, manifesting the humanistic outlook.

The emergence of a “this worldly” outlook can be traced to Ram Mohan Roy who emphasised in the first quarter of the 19th century that a secular education providing a knowledge of modern literature, modern philosophy and positive sciences is necessary both for the growth of the individual and for the growth of society. Since independence, there has been a greater concern to bring about economic growth so that there is increased productivity in agriculture and industries to enable people to improve their standard of living by means of community development projects and the successive Five-Year Plans.

Secularisation has affected the notions of pollution and purity in Hinduism. Though untouchability persists in the rural areas it may be stated that in general the notion of pollution does not operate in the Hindu society today. Similarly the traditional ideas of purity have given place to rules of hygiene. Further, many of the religious festivities have now become secularised as for example, the Dashahara festivities in Mysore and New Delhi and other places. Festivals like Ganapathi and Ramanavami have now become cultural festivals celebrated with musical programmes for over a week.

In spite of the directive principles of state policy and the changes that have taken place in the social and cultural spheres, it must be recognised that people have not yet become secular in their outlook. It is only with the development and expansion of education and exposure to mass media deliberately designed to develop a “this worldly outlook”, and programmes which inculcate a rational and empirical attitude and help in the development of an attitude of problem-solving that a secular society can be built up. Further in the rural areas as well as in the urban areas the traditional hierarchical society must yield place to a new society based on achievement giving full scope for the individual to improve his status on the basis of his own achievements and also promoting a reconstruction of the social order in which caste-membership-should not be a factor in determining one’s social prestige. The whole society must be ready to foster innovation and change not only in the economic sphere but also in that of social institutions and social organizations. Above all, the people should adopt a secular approach to the problems of ethics in stead of looking upon morality as something based on religion. Thus, the aim should not merely be the establishment of a secular state which tolerates all religions or even a state which is non-interventionist in the religious field but the development of a society with people having a secular attitude towards the solution of economic and social problems facing them and facing the country.