Violence of Democracy tracks the rise of India’s divisive politics through close examination of decades-long interparty confrontations in Kannur district of Kerala. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork amongst workers of political groups in the region and extensive archival research, Ruchi Chaturvedi investigates the unique character of the conflict between the parties on the political left and the right. This conflict, she shows, contradicts all explanations centering on religious, caste, class or ideological differences. It offers, instead, new ways of understanding how everyday interparty competition can produce vengeful political communities.