Scotland: The Division Bell

External Affairs Minister is by no means the only foreigner to view the possibilit
y of a possible secession of Scotland from the United Kingdom with a measure of
disbelief. The dissolution of long-established national boundaries has invariabl
y been preceded by civil strife and bloodshed: Biafra, Bangladesh, East Timor an
d South Sudan being recent examples. Where separation has been relatively peacef
ul, though not necessarily devoid of bitterness, there has been a near-unequivoc
al assertion of the popular will. Ukraine, often regarded as the alter ego of Ru
ssia, for example, broke away from the Soviet-established Union in 1991, after nea
rly 88 per cent of its citizens voted for independence.

Going by the opinion polls, the referendum in Scotland on September 18 is likely
to be much more fiercely contested. Some six months ago, the likelihood of Scot
land voting for the independence that the Scottish National Party sought was remot
e. However, recent polls suggest that the SNP has successfully closed the gap an
d that the Yes vote could even enjoy a slim majority. Earlier, the British media
was referring to SNP leader Alex Salmonds foolhardly gamble; now they are talkin
g about the disarray in the No camp with former Prime Minister Gordon Brown unde
rtaking a last-minute rescue act.

Since much of the debate over Scottish identity and its supposed incompatibility
with British identity centres on readings of history, it is tempting to compare
the panic that has overtaken the establishment in London with the panic of 1745
, the last occasion when the creation of a independent Scotland seemed possible.

In that year, the Young Pretender Bonnie Prince Charlie, grandson of the Stuart Ki
ng James IIalso, simultaneously, King of Scotlandwho had been ousted by the Glorio
us Revolution of 1688 for his Catholicism, landed in western Scotland from Franc
e with a few hundred loyalists. Initially, very much like todays No campaign, the
Hanoverian court didnt take the threat very seriously. However, after Edinburgh
fell and the Jacobite army started moving into England that panic set in. The ri
ch merchants of London, fearful of their future, poured in finances to prop up a
n English army with formidable artillery power. When the two armies met at Cullo
den, there was a one-sided massacre of the Jacobite army, made up in the main of
Scottish clans from the Highlands.

It is possible that had the vain and dissolute Young Pretender confined his ambi
tions to Scotland and not ventured into England, the political union forged by t
he accession of James I to the English throne would have not endured for four ce
nturies. But regardless of the romantic myths around the Jacobites, the exiled S
tuarts never enjoyed total support within Scotland. Just as the No campaign, the
English army at Culloden had a large contingent of Scots.

Yet, received history doesnt depend on the actual complexities of what really too
k place but more on how subsequent generations believe events unfolded. The perc
eption that Scotland always got a raw deal from England and was the victim of in
tense cultural condescension have struck deep roots among resident Scots. This m
ay have been truer of the Irishforever the butt of Paddy jokesthan the Scots. Yet th
e stereotype of the rustic Scot, so well portrayed through the eyes of the opini
onated Rhodesian mining engineer Richard Hannay in John Buchans best-selling The
Thirty-Nine Steps (later immortalised on celluloid by Alfred Hitchcock) somehow
persisted.

For a lot of us, born in the aftermath of Empire, the British Isles was never th
e United Kingdom: it was always England, and that included Scotland. At the same
time, even till the mid-Seventies, travelling to Scotland (Edinburgh apart) was
akin to travelling to the Continenta place that was different. Sometimes the exper
ience fitted the stereotype. I recall a visit to a remote village in Skye in 197
9 and being plied with drink by an overwhelmed local in a pub. It seems he had s
erved in India during the War and I was the first Indian he had encountered sinc
e being demobbed more than three decades ago. An Indian face being a novelty in
the late-1970s would have been unimaginable in any other part of the UK.

In pure historical terms, however, the notion of Scotland being left behind by G
reat Britain was pure fiction. The British Empire was the source of unparalleled
prosperity at home. However, the plethora of opportunities that the far-flung p
ossessions accorded to the peoples was not confined to England. The Empire, and
certainly in India, was in many respects a Scottish Empire and even the Scottish
Enlightenment was underwritten by Britains thriving overseas trade. From the devi
ls in skirts who brought terror to the natives during the suppression of the 1857
revolthilariously caricatured by that great slapstick comedy Carry on up the Khy
berto the Scottish stranglehold over the boxwalla community of Calcutta, Scotland
benefitted disproportionately from the Empire and, by implication, the Union.

It was Scotlands inability to retain its competitive edge in the aftermath of Emp
ire that began the process of disillusionment with Westminster. Scotland, in par
ticular, felt the pain of Margaret Thatchers realignment of the British economy m
ost acutely. By the mid-1980s, with the possible exception of Edinburgh, the sce
nes in urban Scotland often resembled the gloom and doom of the post-1929 Depres
sion. Before its dramatic facelift in the Blair years, Glasgow was a distinctly
riotous and even dangerous city at night.

Anger against a government shouldnt, ideally, translate into a larger anger again
st an entire political dispensation. However, the electoral geography of the UK
carried its own lessons. Scotland disavowed the Conservative Party quite emphati
cally after 1979 whereas southern England embraced it. With the Labour defeat in
2010, the perception grew in Scotland that the region had been permanently dise
nfranchised. This was untrue since the Scottish Assembly enjoyed considerable di
scretion in determining government expenditure and, in any case, Scotlands govern
ment expenditure was always significantly higher than its revenue collection. Th
e rest of UK was, in effect, subsidising Scotland.

Unfortunately, politics doesnt depend on cold facts. The consummate politician th
at he is, Alex Salmond has been successful in converting the anger against the b
elt-tightening approach of the Cameron government into a larger revolt against W
estminster. The anti-English undercurrent that used to surface at football match
es and over the flying of the Union Jack has found a new focus with the achche d
in of independence.

I am on of those who feel that the last-minute panic over an uncertain future ma
y actually see the wavering voters opt for the status quowhat with the promise of
even greater devolution. However, just in case cussedness prevails, Scotland wi
ll provide a classic case study of how the clever manipulation of history and lo
ss of British romanticism under a contrived multicultural dispensation destroyed
a political arrangement that many of us believed would endure indefinitely. If
Scotland falls off the map of the UK, there will be an immediate knock-on effect
in Northern Irelanda part of the UK that was emotionally abandoned by England af
ter the Good Friday agreement of 1998. I dont believe that we are witnessing the
last gasp of the green and pleasant land that is England. But we could be experien
cing the formal announcement of Britains loss of political power, a process that
began in 1939 and whose first casualty was the British Empire.

Regardless of the September 18 verdict, Britain will have to redefine itselfjust
as Germany did after the loss of territory that followed the defeat in 1945as a c
reative zone that is at the same time proud of its cultural moorings. Maybe ther
e could be a happy ending in adversity.