Religious Equality and Secularism in India: A Critical Review of the Ayodhya-Babri Mosque Judgment

Religious Equality and Secularism in India:

A Critical Review of the Ayodhya-Babri Mosque Judgment

Dr M Jashim Ali Chowdhury*

Jubaer Ahmed**

Dr Md. Abdullah Al Mamun***

The Chittagong University Journal of Law Vol 25 (2020) Published in April 2024, pp 75-96.

For the full text please visit: 

https://www.academia.edu/118808781/Religious_Equality_and_Secularism_in_India_A_Critical_Review_of_Ayodhya_Babri_Mosque_Judgement 

Abstract

In the 1950s, India’s founding fathers spent considerable time secularising its national identity. Later in 1976, a constitutional amendment placed ‘Secularism’ in the Preamble of the Indian Constitution. The Indian Supreme Court showed a strong reverence for Secularism from the 1970s to early 1990s. However, the post-1995 Supreme Court got swayed away by the rise of extremist Hindu nationalism, craftily limited the ambit of Secularism, and endorsed an alternative definition of religious tolerance based on the teachings of ancient Hindu texts. We argue that while the mid-1990s’ Hindutva judgments of the Indian Supreme Court have permanently damaged the face of Indian Secularism, the later decisions of the Court, including the recent Ayodhya-Babri Mosque judgement, show an unprecedented disregard for constitutional equality for India’s religious minorities, particularly the Muslims. This critical evaluation of the Ayodhya Babri Mosque Judgment shows that almost all of the legal and historical arguments offered by the Indian Supreme Court there are either wrong or deeply flawed. The paradigm shift in Indian Supreme Court’s jurisprudential commitment to secularism and religious equality could only encourage more anti-minority onslaught in the days ahead.