Instances that Involve Relationship Between Religion & Politics.
- Gandhiji believed that politics must be guided by ethics drawn from religion
- Human rights groups demanding the Government to take special steps to protect religious minorities
- Women’s movements want Government to change family laws to make it equitable
HOW CAN RELIGION INFLUENCE POLITICS
- Mahatma Gandhi Believed that politics must be guided by ethics drawn from all religions
- Ideas, ideals and values drawn from different religions should play important role in politics.
- People should be able to express in politics their needs and demands as a member of a religious community.
- Those who hold political power should be able to prevent discrimination on the basis of religion.
MEANING OF COMMUNALISM
- Communalism is a situation when a particular community tries to promote its own interest at the cost of other communities.
WHEN DOES COMMUNALISM PROBLEM BECOME ACUTE?
- Religion is seen as the basis of the nation.
- When one religion and its followers are discriminated by others.
- When people start believing that belief of their religion is superior than other religions.
- When the state power is used to established the domination of one religion over the others.

MAJOR BELIEFS OF COMMUNAL PEOPLE
- The followers of a particular religion must belong to one community.
- Their fundamental interest should be same.
- people who follow different religions can not belong to the same social community
- If the followers of different religions have commonalities these are superficial
IDEAS OF COMMUNAL POLITICS FUNDAMENTALLY FLAWED
- Most of these beliefs are not true.
- People of one religion don’t have the same interests and aspirations in every context.
- Everyone has several other roles, positions and identities.
- There are many voices inside every community.
- All these voices have the right to be heard.
