In a 5 years study, Harvard professor Robert D. Putnam has proved that multi-cultured societies harbor a greater amount of mis-trust than homogeneous societies. Taking as an example the Mexican society, he states with examples that Mexicans trust no one outside their own immediate family. Mexican society is divided into three distinct sects – The elite whites, who run most of the industries and are in govt., the middle class browns and the destitute blacks. One group blames the other for its state and the society never progresses beyond a certain extent.

Are problems in India also due to the same reason? Is the common place corruption, over populaton and under-achivement also due to the prevalent mis-trust among us? Politicians and nationalists have gives us slogans painting a picture of unified India, the land of ’unity in diversity’! Are we actually that? How many of us Hindus trust Muslims? How many Muslims trust Hindus? Even in Hindu communities there are marked divides on trust factor. In Bengal, we dont trust the Biharies or the Marwaries as they will supposedly rob an honest, hard working Bengali.

Maybe the corruption in the govt. corridors is due to the fact that the people in govt. do not trust the judgement of their voters. Maybe they have deceived the voters while contesting for the position. Deceived someone because they do not trust him/her with their carrier.

The mistrust among the society is very painfully visible during evil things like religious riots. Normal trustworthy people are slaughter based on a set stereotype, hence inducing more mis-trust among them.

India has a diversified society. The only thing that we seem to agree upon is the universal love of cricket! Excluding that we have no commonality. Each of the different communities has different outlook on things. In south, elections are driven by political orientations of Movie stars; in east, its driven by muscle power and totalitarian parties. South Indians have build in image of a North Indian as being a corrupt, incompetent person; while harboring a superior view of themselfs. North Indians have also cultivated a mental picture of South Indians as Anti-nationalist people who will stay in their own group, eat their own peculiar food and will take the first flight out of this country.

Is there a way we can start improving our trust quota? Can we start turning all the wheels of Indian society in a coherent manner? Presently no Indian political party can come up with an overall national manifesto. Each of the political parties has to write different manifestos for different regions and communities. Can we outgrow this mis-trust amoung ourselfs? Can we stand-up and say to the world:

“Look at us, we have ‘unity in diversity’”