Bombay High Court has said the government cannot compel any person to declare his religion in any document, form or declaration.
Hearing a PIL filed by three individuals, a bench of justices Abhay Oka and AS Chandurkar ruled that every citizen in India, which was a secular democratic republic, had the right under the Constitution to state that he or she does not belong to any religion and does not practice or profess any religion.
The Centre and Maharashtra Government had stated that 'No Religion' filled up in official forms cannot be treated as a religion or a form of religion.
Referring to Article 25 of the Constitution which guarantees right to freedom of conscience, the bench held that such a right conferred on a citizen includes a right to openly say that he or she does not practice any religion.
"India is a secular democratic republic and there is complete freedom for any individual to decide whether he or she wants to adopt or profess any religion," the judges said in their judgement on Tuesday.
"If a person is practising any particular religion, he or she can give up that religion and claim that he or she does not belong to any religion," the bench observed.
It held that no State authority can infringe upon a person's right guaranteed under Article 25 of the Constitution i.e freedom of conscience and freely practising, professing or propagating any religion.
The petitioners - Dr Ranjit Mohite, Kishore Nazare and Subhash Ranware - had approached the State printing press seeking issuance of a gazette notification that they belonged to 'No Religion' . The State had rejected their application, following which they approached the high court.