Why are secularism and socialism in the Constitution's Preamble an eyesore to Hindu nationalists

By Ram Puniyani*

The RSS General Secretary, Dattatray Hosabale, who holds the second position in the RSS leadership hierarchy, recently stated that the words "Secularism" and "Socialism" were inserted into the Preamble of the Indian Constitution during the Emergency. He further claimed that these words were not present in the original Preamble drafted by Dr. Ambedkar and, therefore, should be removed.

This is not the first time such a demand has been raised from Hindutva quarters. When the BJP government came to power in 2014, in the following Republic Day of January 2015, the government issued an advertisement featuring a picture of the Preamble in which these words were missing, under the same pretext that they were not in the version released in November 1949. A significant debate ensued, and a case was filed in the courts demanding the deletion of these words from the present Constitution.

Multiple petitions were filed on the eve of the 75th anniversary of the Constitution on November 25, 2024. The Supreme Court rejected and dismissed all petitions challenging the inclusion of the words "socialist" and "secular" in the Preamble. The justices held that the addition of these terms could not be objected to solely on the ground that the original Preamble did not contain them at the time the Constitution was adopted.

It's not just these two values that Hindu nationalists are against; they oppose the Constitution as a whole. During Constituent Assembly debates, many leaders had expressed apprehension that secularism would be undermined and emphasized the need to guard against this to the utmost. As a representative example, Sardar Patel's statement needs to be recalled: "I made it clear that this Constitution of India, of free India, of a secular State will not hereafter be disfigured by any provision on a communal basis."

As per the Constitution, Hosabale’s argument is on weak ground, as the very provisions of the Constitution spell out these words. According to the fundamental rights enshrined in Article 25, which deals with the freedom of conscience and free profession, practice, and propagation of religion, the word "secular" is explicitly mentioned under clause (2)(a).

Due to electoral compulsions, the BJP speaks in many tongues. It began with "Gandhian Socialism," which was abandoned in 1985 in favor of the caste-hierarchy-based "integral humanism." In the BJP's Constitution of 2012, it stated its objective as aiming for a party that "...shall bear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution of India as by law established and to the principles of socialism, secularism and democracy and would uphold the sovereignty, unity and integrity of India."

The core agenda of RSS-BJP is to strive for a Hindu Nation where the Manu Smriti will be the guiding principle. Right after the Indian Constitution was implemented on January 26, 1950, the RSS mouthpiece, Organiser, published an editorial heavily criticizing the Constitution. It stated on November 30, 1949, "The worst [thing] about the new Constitution of Bharat is that there is nothing Bhartiya about it… [T]here is no trace of ancient Bhartiya constitutional laws, institutions, nomenclature and phraseology in it." This implies that the Manu Smriti had been ignored by the makers of the Indian Constitution.

At the same time, the ideologue of Hindu Nationalism, V.D. Savarkar, stated that "Manu Smriti is that scripture which is most worship-able after Vedas for our Hindu Nation and which from ancient times has become the basis of our culture-customs, thought and practice. This book for centuries has codified the spiritual and divine march of our nation. Even today the rules which are followed by crores of Hindus in their lives and practice are based on Manu Smriti. Today Manu Smriti is Hindu Law. That is fundamental."

[V.D. Savarkar, ‘Women in Manu Smriti’ in Savarkar Samgra (collection of Savarkar’s writings in Hindi), Prabhat, Delhi, vol. 4, p. 415.]

In the decade of the 1990s, three major statements and actions again demonstrated its deeper and real affinity and goal of a Hindu Nation. In 1993, Rajju Bhiayya, the then Sarsanghchalak of RSS, stated that "Official documents refer to the composite culture, but ours is certainly not a composite culture… this country has a unique cultural oneness. No country, if it has to survive, can have compartments. All this shows that changes are needed in the Constitution. A Constitution more suited to the ethos and genius of this country should be adopted in the future."

In 1998, the BJP came to power as part of the NDA. One of the major things it did was to appoint the Venkatachaliah Commission to review the Constitution, asserting that it had become old and needed revision. The Commission did submit its report, but there was huge opposition to it, and so the implementation of its recommendations was put on hold.

Undeterred by all this, in the year 2000, when K. Sudarshan became the Sarsanghchalak of RSS, he stated that the Indian Constitution is based on Western values and should be scrapped and replaced by one based on Hindu Holy books (i.e., Manu Smriti).

Many BJP leaders have kept echoing this line on and off. Anant Kumar Hegde of Karnataka explicitly stated that they are in power precisely for changing the Constitution. In the light of the "400 par" (beyond 400 parliament seats) slogan of the BJP, many of their leaders reiterated that they need these many seats so that they can achieve their goal of changing the Constitution.

The BJP's tactical flexibility was on display when Mr. Modi said that even if Babasaheb Ambedkar were to return, he could not change the Constitution. In the backdrop of the 2024 elections, Rahul Gandhi made a major issue around the Constitution by carrying a copy of it in his hand. There was no overt opposition from the RSS-BJP camp, and Modi even bowed to the copy of the Constitution.

The RSS-BJP strategy is multipronged: to try to tamper with the Constitution through various steps and, at the same time, to adopt policies that bypass the ethos of the Constitution when in power. That’s what we have been witnessing for the last decade or so. Hosabale’s statement is a calculated move to test the waters, to march further in their agenda of doing away with democratic, secular values and equality.
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