Religion is still an important factor in Indian politics. Discuss. (2017, 15 Marks)
Religion and politics have been entangled in every civilisation; India is distinctive because it pursued a secular state inside a deeply religious society. What matters is not whether religion is present but what work it does. Bipan Chandra defined communalism as the ideology that treats worldly interests — jobs, land, representation — as flowing from religious membership. On that test religion remains important — arguably more central than in the 1950s — though it now works alongside caste and welfare rather than alone.
A secular design in a religious society
- Unlike Pakistan, founded on religious nationhood, India adopted a constitution of equal citizenship. Jawaharlal Nehru carried the Hindu Code Bills (1955–56) over orthodox resistance, practising what Rajeev Bhargava calls principled distance — the state intervening to reform religion, not keeping aloof from it.
- The containment rested on Congress dominance. When that eroded, religion became the cheapest instrument for assembling a majority.
How religion returned to the centre
- Double appeasement in the 1980s: after the Shah Bano judgment (1985), the Muslim Women (Protection of Rights on Divorce) Act 1986 placated orthodox opinion, and the Ayodhya locks were opened the same year.
- Mandal versus Mandir: V. P. Singh’s 1990 decision to implement OBC reservation split Hindus by caste; the BJP answered with the Ram Janmabhoomi campaign and L. K. Advani’s Rath Yatra, a cleavage cutting across caste. The BJP rose from two seats (1984) to 182 (1998) and led a coalition government from 1998.
Where religion operates today
- Party system: Suhas Palshikar describes a second dominant-party system and a bid for ideological hegemony, in which Hindutva is fused with development and nationalism. It produced single-party majorities in 2014 and 2019.
- Law and policy: the CAA rules (March 2024), the Waqf (Amendment) Act 2025 — partly stayed by the Supreme Court on 15 September 2025 — the Uttarakhand UCC (January 2025) and a spreading wave of anti-conversion laws all make religion an axis of legislation.
- Violence: Paul R. Brass’s institutionalised riot system explains why riots cluster near elections; Delhi 2020 and Nuh 2023 are recent cases, even as violence shifts from riots to lynching and punitive demolitions.
- Secularism debate: T. N. Madan and Ashis Nandy call secularism an alien imposition; Christophe Jaffrelot (Modi’s India, 2021) sees an emerging ethnic democracy; Bhargava replies that the aim is de-politicising religion, not banishing it.
Limits of the claim
Religion is necessary but not sufficient. In 2024 the BJP fell to 240 seats: the Samajwadi Party’s caste coalition, jobs and the “Constitution in danger” message outweighed Hindutva in Uttar Pradesh. Kerala and Tamil Nadu remain resistant, where regional and welfare idioms dominate. Asghar Ali Engineer reminds us that communal conflict is about resources — religion supplies the boundary, not the content.
Conclusion
Religion is still an important factor, but as a political resource rather than a matter of belief — shaping party competition, legislation and violence. Its reach depends on how it combines with caste and welfare. The constitutional challenge is to keep religion public without letting it become the currency of power.