How do communal divisions affect democracy

Communalism started becoming a threat to Indian democracy due to the tendency of political parties to exploit communal feelings to gain electoral advantage.
1. Certain parties incite  Hindu majoritarian sentiments. Such parties create the feeling among Hindus that they are being discriminated  in India and minorities are being unduly favoured. This creates resentment among the majority Hindu community against minorities. An example of the consequences of such communal politics is the destruction of the Babri Masjid in 1991 and the communal riots that followed in several parts of India.
2. Certain other parties exploit minority sentiments and encourage extremist elements within minority communities to seek votes from those communities. Soon, however, those extremist elements turn violent and start creating problems between the majority and minority communities. An example of such politics is the pandering of extremist Sikh elements by the ruling party in the early 1980s which led to nearly a decade of violence in Punjab.