Managing India's diversity — the recurring fault lines, and the constitutional response to them.
Communalism refers to the politicisation of religious identity to the point of viewing other religious communities as hostile or inferior — historically linked to colonial-era "divide and rule" policies and separate electorates, and continuing to manifest in periodic communal violence in independent India.
Regionalism is excessive attachment to one's own region, sometimes manifesting constructively (demands for statehood, protection of local language/culture) and sometimes destructively (sub-nationalist movements, "sons of the soil" agitations against migrants from other states). India's linguistic reorganisation of states (States Reorganisation Act, 1956) was itself a response to regional/linguistic sentiment.
Indian secularism, sometimes called "principled distance" (a term from political theorist Rajeev Bhargava), differs from the strict Western separation of church and state — the Indian state maintains equal respect for all religions and can intervene in religious practice for reform (e.g., abolishing untouchability, regulating temple management) rather than maintaining total non-interference.
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