Secularism and Secularisation of the State: Decoding Gandhian Philosophy in Contemporary India DR NARENDER NAGARWAL 1 ABSTRACT Endeavour of this paper is to examine dichotomy surrounded on secularism and secularisation constructed through Gandhian philosophy of secular state. In this chapter, attempt has been made to scrutinize the Gandhi’s controversial religious experiment with secularism and how it differs with classical description of the Western bravura of tolerance, coexistence and pluralism since Gandhi was not considered as secularist in the common western sense of term. The classical western interpretation of “Secularism” and “Religion” almost negating to each other due to some historical events which created two opposing centres of power vested in the political organisation and the ecclesiastical order respectively. Gandhian political thought on secularism and minorities rights really astonishing where he paradoxically distinguishes between state and religion but insist on secularism with good blend of religion and spirituality. Gandhi believed that it is irrelevant to divorced the religion from politics, in Indian context as both have concomitant effects. That unique interpretation of secularism where religion play a pivotal character in state politics put him an illustrious philosopher of our time who described the secularism virtually in different arena. Gandhi proudly claimed that I can’t see politics without spirituality and religion nonetheless he also pitched for the secularisation, multiculturalism and diversity of Indian society, hence stalwartly advocates the protection of religious and cultural rights of minorities. In such peculiar contradictory thoughts, it is desirable to decode the Gandhian view of secularism and how his philosophy relevant under current scenario. Key Words: Secularism, Truth, Communalism, Non-violence, Minorities 1. Introduction Contemporary thought on secularism appears as an embattled ideology considering the sustain attempts being made to construct a narrative smearing the terms like secularism, multiculturalism and tolerance in India. Although the present analysis is not entirely without foundation and it would be fraud with consequences if we ignore the rising graph of chauvinistic conflicts. It must also be said that this is not the first time that secularism is being questioned, nor will it be the last. 2 Notably those questioned the secularism have also questioned its celebrated epitomes viz tolerance, non-violence and multiculturalism propounded by Mahatma Gandhi. In “Discovery of Truth” Gandhi made a strong defence of tolerance, non-violence and multiculturalism and termed these principles as essential components of secularism. 3 A section of 1 Dr Narender Nagarwal, Assistant Professor, Campus Law Centre, Faculty of Law, University of Delhi, India, the author can be contact at: narender.nagarwal@gmail.com 2 Panikkar (1983). 3 Gandhi (1984).