UNITED WE STAND, DIVIDED WE FALL

United We Stand, Divided We Fall

The maxim, ‘United we stand, Divided we fall’ contains pearls of truth. Human beings are social animals. They live in associations. This association may be as small as a family or as big as a nation. No individuals make achievements without co-operating with other members of their association. Actually, one cannot live isolated from one’s society. Due to this fact, we show unity and group altogether. It will be no exaggeration to say that the basic condition for survival is unity among us. It represents our state of co-existence.

We know the fable of the old man and his four sons. The moral of the story is very enlightening. The old man in the story brought the truth of the dictum by placing a bundle of sticks before his sons. He asked them to break the bundle but the sons failed to break it. But they broke each stick quite easily, when it was separated. His message was “Union is strength”. The bundle symbolizes unity. Thus, the old man taught them to be united. ‘If they lived together united, they would be strong. If they quarrelled among themselves, they would be weak.’ And then, peace and happiness returned to the family, bringing it prosperity and respect of all the neighbours. In fact, real strength lies in unity and earnest endeavours.

If we cast a cursory glance on our activities, we will observe that unity is needed in every walk of life. A family consists of two or more than two members must be in unity. Otherwise, it will be unable to find its qualitative as well as quantitative identity. A house divided against it, will disintegrate soon and will lose the splendour of a blissful life. Similarly, to be strong in a football or a hockey team, one must learn team-spirit. If each member plays his/her own game, he/she will lose the match. It is true for all situations.

Rabindranath Tagore conveys the importance of the unity in one of his national poems published in the Gitanjali. He writes, ‘Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls........into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake’. The poet prays to God to awake the country or his country men from the sleep of slavery. Tagore desires that in the ideal world his country should have citizens who are united. Narrow domestic walls means the division of the country according to religion, province and castes. They are the curse of the society because they create provincialism, casteism and communalism. People should be bound together by love and mutual understanding.

Actually, a nation raven by narrow domestic walls provokes troubles from foreigners. History bears testimony to the fact how foreign aggressors benefited from the disunity of India. When British came to India they understood that people were not united. So their task become very easy and they established their supremacy in India. They understand that if citizens would stand united, their position in India will not be secure. So they adopted a ‘divide and rule’ policy. It was that disunity that enabled The English to rule over our country for over two hundred years. It also resulted in political disunity of India and caused partition of the subcontinent into two states- India and Pakistan. There was no united front to check the diabolical and malevolence plans of alien authorities. But, once Indians were united, both the foreign oppressive activities and foreigners were thrown off. Only unity has led our country into the paradise of sovereignty.

What was behind the success of Napoleon as a conqueror? He knew the potential of unity. He, therefore, divided the friendly countries at first. Then, he attacked them one by one. All these are the evidences to prove the fact that strength and progress stem from the united effort, united self-control and united thoughts.

If truth be told, it is the principle of ‘Union is strength’ that is the foundation of society and nationhood. How did a nation evolve? Let us try to find out the answer in order to understand the importance of unity in life. When human beings originated on the earth, they were not organised. In course of time, they felt the need of co-operation of other human beings. At first they organised themselves into a family. They lived in their own separate families in ancient times. And the peace and happiness plus strength of each family depended on the unity among the members of the families. This required the members to stand by one another, even though this might require the sacrifice of some of their personal interests. But as the interests of these separate families often clashed, there were regular fights among them. It motivated several families to form a small group or tribe for attaining their common goals. But this was not enough. These groups or tribes were often at war with one another, or, they were comparatively too small to protect themselves separately against more powerful groups or tribes. So, several groups or tribes united themselves into a nation for greater security. This is the history of the escalation of nations. The evolution of nation is itself the evidence of the importance of unity in survival of an individual and a nation. One should remember that it was not the end of the process of evolution of the nation. A weak nation, however, remains an easy prey to stronger one. So, nations have begun to come together themselves into blocks for still greater security. The bilateral relationships among nations and the concept of globalisation support the need of unity. The whole world becomes a family due to the dependency. Disunity is always the other name of Achilles' heel whether it is in a family, an association or a nation itself. A united nation, a united family, a united team is strong. Hence, it is the wise saying-‘United we stand, divided we fall’.

It seems we have not learnt the lesson yet. We still quarrel among ourselves on questions of local or regional interest. Unless we give up these petty quarrels and unite with one another, the sad history of the past may be repeated. Each one of us is to endeavour sincerely to restore the unity and integrity of the country. The government, administration, judiciary, police and citizens all have to play their respective roles in removing the evil elements of disunity among us. Mass media and education institutions must propagate the ideals of tolerance, patriotism and beauty of our unified culture. When we unite, we stand firmly in every catastrophe.

Unfortunately, we do not always apply this lesson to our personal lives. We often quarrel with our relatives, which enables our enemies to ruin us all easily. As a nation too Indians have always suffered from want of unity among them. There was no dearth of great heroes at any time in this country; but they either quarrelled among themselves or remained aloof in one another’s difficulty. This is why the country could be easily conquered by one invader after another.