Communalism is a term used to denote attempts to construct religious or ethnic identity, incite strife between people identified as different communities, and to stimulate communal violence between those groups. It derives from history, differences in beliefs, and tensions between the communities.
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Explanation:
Communalism, in a broad sense means a strong attachment to one’s own community. In popular discourse in India, it is understood as unhealthy attachment to one’s own religion.
It’s an ideology that, in order to unify the community, suppresses distinctions within the community and emphasizes the essential unity of the community against other communities.
In this way it promotes belief in orthodox tenets and principles, intolerance and hatred of other religions and thus, divides the society.
Positive aspect of communalism stands for the affinity of an individual towards his own community involving efforts for the social and economic upliftment of his community.
However, in negative connotation, it is an ideology which emphasises the separate identity of a religious group in relation to other groups with a tendency to promote its own interests at the expense of the others.