Socialism and Secularism

An unfortunate campaign has started in India recently demanding that the commitment to the precepts of socialism and secularism should be reduced and these words should be removed from the preamble of the constitution of India.

In truth, commitment to socialism and secularism is becoming more desirable in the changing world, not less.

The word socialism has sometimes been used very loosely, partly because some of those who were not able to realise its essence in real life also wanted to express their closeness to it for popular support.

However, despite its various versions being diluted, adulterated and distorted to various extent, for most people, socialism has continued to mean a system of high levels of social and economic equality and justice to workers, peasants and weaker sections. In addition, socialism is also identified as a system in which the state retains an important position in the economy with the aim of protecting the interests of common people instead of handing it over to be dominated by powerful corporate interests and billionaires.

Of course, in present times of increasing importance of environmental issues, the seriousness of environmental threats and the high costs and risks they impose on common people and their livelihoods and health, it is important to broaden this understanding of socialism with better and closer integration of justice and equality concerns with concerns of protection of the environment and biodiversity. Even though there are not many examples of this being realised with continuity in real life, this only increases the importance of making more efforts in this direction, particularly as the vision of environmental concerns has often been too narrow or even badly distorted in the capitalist framework.

Here, it is also interesting to note that the increasing urgency of the protection of the environment and biodiversity has further strengthened the case for greater equality, and hence for socialism. While earlier, any constraints on expanding production of material goods were discussed in a very limited context, now there is an increasing understanding of the constraints of a carbon space or environmental space. Since to avoid catastrophic environmental ruin, humanity must confine itself to this space or respect its limitations, it has become all the more important to prioritise meeting the basic or most important needs of all people, instead of indulging into much luxury consumption, which can be seen to be encroaching in very unjust ways on the environmental space required for meeting the needs of common people.

Hence, while there is a need for improving the concept and understanding of socialism, on the whole, in the changing world, the need for socialism has increased and not decreased.

The concept of secularism essentially means that the state does not adopt any discriminating or biased attitude in its consideration of various citizens; no favouritism and no hostility either on this basis. In the eyes of the state all citizens are free to practise their religions or faiths as well as to hold their religious beliefs and propagate and spread them, as long as this is not done in ways which spread hostility against anyone else or results in any other serious social harm. Only when such social harm or spread of hostility is seen, the state becomes justified in placing restrictions on such ways of propagating so-called religious beliefs.

If socialism and secularism have been included in the constitution of India, this is good for the country and its people.

It is difficult to justify any campaign against the continuation of these noble concepts in the constitution.

[Contributed by Bharat Dogra]

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Frontier
Vol 58, No. 6, Aug 3 - 9, 2025