Secularism

Secular states are usually understood as states that treat religion purely as a private matter, refusing it any public or official recognition. Under the mainstream, Western conception of secularism, this means the 'mutual exclusion' of state and religion: both are expected to stay out of each other's internal affairs entirely — the state must not intervene in religious matters, and religion must not dictate state policy or influence how the state conducts itself. On this Western reading, religion and state must be strictly separated, on the reasoning that states which lend support to organised religions only make those religions more powerful than they already are, at the expense of individual religious freedom. Although the word 'secular' was not initially written into the Indian Constitution's text, the Indian Constitution has always in substance been secular. But India departed from this Western model of strict mutual exclusion, and did so in two distinct ways, each responding to a different feature of Indian conditions — the recognition of rights for religious groups, and a real (though limited) power for the state to intervene in religious af …