Secularism, Socialism in Constitution’s Preamble: Eyesores to Hindu Nationalists

The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) general secretary, Dattatray Hosabale, second in the RSS leadership hierarchy, on the eve of the anniversary of imposition of Emergency in 1975, stated that it was during the Emergency that the words ‘secularism’ and ‘socialism’ were inserted in the Preamble of Indian Constitution. He said these words were not there in the original preamble drafted by B R Ambedkar, so these should be removed.

This is not the first time that such a demand is being raised from the Hindutva quarters. When the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government came to power in 2014, on the following Republic Day, January 2015, the government issued an advertisement with the picture of the preamble, in which these words were missing, on the same pretext that these were not in the one released in November 1949. A lot of debate took place and a case was filed in the courts demanding 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 these and dismissed all the petitions that challenged the inclusion of the words “socialist” and “secular” in the preamble. The Justices held that the addition of these terms could not be objected just on the ground that the original preamble did not contain them at the time when the Constitution was adopted.

Not just these two values, Hindu nationalists are against the country’s Constitution as a whole. During the Constituent Assembly debates, many leaders had expressed apprehension that secularism would be undermined and there was a need to guard this. As a representative sample, what Sardar Patel stated 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 a weak wicket, as the very provisions of the Constitution spell these words. As per the fundamental rights enshrined in Article 25, which deals with freedom of conscience and free profession, practice and propagation of religion, the word “secular” is mentioned under clause (2)(a).

The BJP, due to electoral compulsions, speaks in many tongues. It began with Gandhian Socialism, which the party dumped in 1985 for the favour of caste hierarchy-based ‘integral humanism’. In BJP’s Constitution of 2012, it stated its objective as aiming for a party which “…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 Manusmriti will be the guiding principle. Right after the Indian Constitution was implemented on January 26, 1950, RSS mouthpiece, Organise,r came out with an editorial heavily criticising 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”. Meaning that Manusmriti has been ignored by makers of the Indian Constitution!

At the same time, V D Savarkar, the ideologue of Hindu Nationalism, stated that “Manu smriti is that scripture which is most worshipable 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.”

[VD 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 1990s, three major statements-actions again showed RSS-BJP’sdeeper and real affinity and the goal of Hindu Nation. In 1993, Rajju Bhiayya, the then sarsanghchalak (head) of RSS, stated, “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, BJP came to power as National Democratic Aliance (NDA). One of the major things it did was to appoint the Venkatachaliah Commission to review the Constitution, saying that it had become old and needed revision. The Commission did submit its report but there was huge opposition to it and so implementation of its recommendations was put in the freezer.

Undeterred by all this, in 2000, when K. Sudarshan became the RSS sarsanghchalak, he stated that the Indian Constitution was based on Western values, and it should be scrapped and replaced by the one based on Hindu Holy books (i.e. Manusmriti).

Many BJP leaders kept repeating this line off and on. Anant Kumar Hegde of Karnataka said that BJP was in power precisely for changing the Constitution. In the light of the ‘400 paar’ (beyond 400 Parliament seat) slogan of BJP, many of their leaders reiterated that they needed these many seats to achieve their goal of changing the Constitution.

BJP’s tactical flexibility was on display when Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that even if “Babasaheb Ambedkar comes he can’t change the Constitution”. In the backdrop of the 2024 elections, Congress leader 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 multi-pronged, to try and tamper with the Constitution by various steps and at the same time to adopt the policies to bypass the ethos of the Constitution when in power. That’s what we are witnessing from the last decade or so. Hosabale’s is a calculated move to test the waters, to march further in their agenda of doing away with the democratic, secular values with equality.

The writer is a human rights defender and a former professor at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay. The views are personal.