Judicial Interpretation and Evolution of the Meaning of Secularism in the Indian Legal System

Abstract

The nation is not the land; it is the people, their families, and society. So, fundamentally, it is about an individual; each one of them holds and carries the nation within themselves. This gives rise to a fundamental question that needs to be settled: what is an individual? What does it consist of? The answer to this question will also suffice and help to understand the nation and nation building. Individuality has a lot of dimensions and factors to it, but to understand and take up the essence of it, there are these: heritage, customs, tradition, knowledge, geography, food, clothing, language; this list is not exhaustive and can go on, but these few that I’ve put here are enough to do justice for the purpose of this work. Where heritage includes our culture, memories, and traditions, each one of us walks, eats, and sits in a certain way that’s not as simple as it looks because we have it embedded in our genetics and it plays out throughout generations. Individuality is not part of our existence or survival; rather, it is far more than survival; it is dynamic and complex as it plays out. Law, being understood in so many ways, is also a language if we look at it from a point of view where we treat it as a language; it satisfies all the essentials of a language. As we have talked about, language is a significant part of an individual, which further applies to bigger arrangements, i.e., family and society, from a macro point of view. Law, as a language, becomes relevant and is expected to complement and synchronize individuality. In the above-mentioned context, if we look at law and its concepts such as "secularism," which as a word in the dictionary means "the principle of separation of the state from religious institutions," which goes back to its origin and history from where this word has been derived and came into existence.