It is not the business of the state to impose religion, said a professor from Australian National University.

“You must shatter the monopoly of the religious class,” James Piscatori said yesterday during a seminar on religion and politics held at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia.

Piscatori, the university’s Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies deputy director, argued that Malaysia can function as a secular state to accommodate the multiculturalism of the nation if syariah laws were to be made separate from state laws.