Understanding Secularism Test - 3

• Communalist is an individual who is interested in one's own minority or ethnic group than in society as a whole. 
• Secularist believes that religion should not be involved with the ordinary social and political activities of a country. 
• Casteist discriminates against people based on their caste. 
• Feminist believes that women should have the same rights, power, opportunities as men and be treated equally. 
  

A secular state is a concept of secularism, whereby a state is or purports to be officially neutral in matters of religion, supporting none of the religions.  A secular state also claims to treat all its citizens equally regardless of religion and claims to avoid preferential treatment for a citizen from a particular religion or no religion. Secular states do not have a state religion although the absence of a state religion does not necessarily mean that a state is fully secular. However, a true secular state should steadfastly maintain national governance without influence from religious factions and vice versa

In all the nations India stands out as the only secular state having no state religion and no single officially patronized religion. Religion-State relations in this country are in fact unique in every sense of the term.

Freedom of religion- All persons are equally entitled to freedom of conscience and the right freely to profess, practice and propagate religion.

Group Rights- Every religious denomination or any section thereof has the right to manage its religious affairs; establish and maintain institutions for religious and charitable purposes; and own, acquire and administer properties of all kinds.

Secularism in India means equal treatment of all religions by the state. With the 42nd Amendment of the Constitution of India enacted in 1976, the Preamble to the Constitution asserted that India is a secular nation. However, neither India's constitution nor its laws define the relationship between religion and state. The laws implicitly require the state and its institutions to recognize and accept all religions, enforce parliamentary laws instead of religious laws, and respect pluralism.

Secularism is a philosophy that provides for embracing and tolerance of all religions. A secular state is one that remains neutral towards the religion and does not favor any religion thus the state has no religion and it gives equal respect to all religions while favoring none like India.

The idea that constitutes one of the foundation of our country is Secularism. Secularism in India means equal treatment of all religion by the State. Secularism is nothing but the belief that religion should not play a role in government, education or other parts of public society.

There is no official religion for the Indian state. Our Constitution does not give a special status to any religion. The Constitution provides to all individuals and communities freedom to profess, practice and propagate any religion, or not to follow any. The Constitution prohibits discrimination on grounds of religion. 

India is a secular country. It simply means the Stae does not promote, support or go against any particular religion. Every individual is given the freedom to practice and profess any religion of his or her choice. We have minorities in our country. The Muslims, Sikhs, Jains, Parsis, etc. constitute the minority population in the country. They are given special protection under the Indian constitution. 

The secularization thesis expresses the idea that as societies progress, particularly through modernization and rationalization, religious authority diminishes in all aspects of social life and governance.

Right to equality consists of Art 15 which states that no person shall be discriminated on the basis of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth.