On the 26th day of November, 2025, as we celebrated “Constitution Day,” two very opposed signals about the republic invited us to clear our heads about what it means to be a citizen of India, and what text it is that ought to guide the further exertions of our lawfully elected governments towards “development”.

On one side, the honourable Speaker of the Lok Sabha has in an admirably ringing declaration reminded us of the core values of the constitution, and said how only the constitution must be our guide to nation-building.

In an article appearing under his name today, Om Birla has recalled the three-years-long labour of members of the Constituent Assembly, enriched with feedback from hundreds of thousands of opinions from “we the people” in arriving at the exemplary compendium of values and injunctions which has guided the republic in its collective forward march over more than seven decades now.

Birla has emphasised the role of the Constitution in generating “inclusivity” and protecting and enriching the “diversity” of the peoples who make up the republican nation.

We have been reminded how “liberty, equality, fraternity” are the bed-rock ideals of the covenant which promises “justice, social, economic and political to all” citizens of the republic regardless of “caste, class, religion. region, language, gender.”

Birla says the Constitution must be our guide to achieve “viksit Bharat” “by 2047”.

Since in his article, the honourable Speaker also mentions how over the years the legal system gained the power of judicial review etc., it seems apposite to recall that in 1973, a 13-judge bench of the Supreme Court of India laid down that the Constitution comprised certain “basic features” which were too sacrosanct to be allowed to be amended by the legislature.

Among those features, the honourable court underlined “secularism” as one.

In the same issue of the Indian Express, however, also appears a detailed report on the saffron flag-hoisting ceremony held at Ayodhya Ram Temple one day previously.

There, in his address, the prime minister of the “secular” republic , after recalling how “wounds” many centuries old had come to be healed, suggested that it is the Suryavanshi Ram who must be the nation’s guide to achieve “viksit Bharat” by 2047.

As we know, it has been the view of the Hindutva right-wing that Ram is coterminous with Bharat and the Republic, insisting that all Indians, their diverse faiths and cultures notwithstanding, must either accept that view or consider themselves lesser Indians.

It seemed obvious that in underscoring the emblems on the saffron flag denoting Suryavanshi ancestors, the honourable prime minister had a clear racial/Aryan construct in mind.

That the claim of this construct to be all-pervading and unquestioningly privileged to rule India has never found country-wide acceptance is of course a recognised historical fact.

Even as the Constitution of India, so clearly enumerated by the honourable Speaker today, does not allow the state to link itself to any one religious faith, since such a linkage contravenes the “basic structure” of “secularism.”

Case in point

Tragically, the contention between these two views of, one, how India is constituted as a secular republic through the provisions of the Constitution which the nation celebrates today, and , two, that it is race and faith that actually define our nationhood and citizenship, continues to mar many an aspect of our collective “developmental” effort.

An agitation launched by the Sanatan Dharma Sabha in Jammu is protesting the results of a test conducted by the state for admission to the Institute of Medical Excellence of the Mata Vaishnavdevi University, Jammu & Kashmir.

It so happens that of the 50 candidates found eligible for admission, 42 are Muslims.

To note, the land for this university was granted by the state, and the university is not a minority institution under law.

The contention of the protesters is that since the shrine is a Hindu shrine, and donations offered by devotees have contributed towards the building of the university, only Hindus deserve to be admitted to the institution.

Also read: Contrary to Hindutva Claims, Vaishno Devi Medical Institute Got Rs 121 Crore in J&K Govt Grants

In seeking the scrapping of the admission results, the protesters have not alleged that the tests have been fraudulent, but that they are denominationally unacceptable.

Unsurprisingly, the chief minister of the Union Territory, Omar Abdullah, has responded by pointing out that “secularism” still stands enshrined in the Constitution, and that, not being a “minority” institution in law, religion cannot be a basis for conducting its admissions or governance.

Predictably, Abdullah has suggested that if the protesters wish to enforce their wish, they may first need to approach the courts for rescinding “secularism” from the Constitution..

Many citizens and opinion-makers may wonder, if the view of the protesters is to be held valid, why then, for example, should St. Stephen’s College in Delhi not be permitted to admit only Christians, or Jamia Milia Islamia in Delhi or the Aligarh Muslim University in Uttar Pradesh be allowed to admit only Muslims.

This case, just one among a plethora, may then, on this Constitution Day, suggest how fraught our contentions about the character of the nation and of the republic remain – sadly to the detriment of “development” that may meet the goals of “inclusivity”, “diversity” and “fraternity” that Om Birla has so eloquently underscored in his path-breaking article today.

May the Constitution remain sacrosanct.

Badri Raina taught at Delhi University.

This article went live on November twenty-seventh, two thousand twenty five, at forty-three minutes past nine in the morning.

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