by Ashgar Ali Engineer, Chairman of the Centre for the Study of Secularism in Society, editor of the Indian Journal of Secularism, and director of the Institute of Islamic Studies, Mumbai, India
Secularism in India has unique implications and meaning. In the Indian context the word secularism has never been used in the way in which it is often used in Western countries (i.e. a purely this-worldly approach, rejecting other-worldly beliefs).