Scotland: Yes or no?

THERE was an old lady in Dhaka in 1950s. She was believed to be over 100 years old! Obviously, she was born during the reign of Queen Victoria and lived a good part of her life during her time. Her fovourite possessions included a comb and a bottle of hair oil. She hardly complained about anything unless there was a delay in getting her meals, her bottle of hair oil was empty or her comb got broken or lost! No matter what was the reason, her complaint was very simple and straight forward: “What is happening to the reign of Queen Victoria?”

Even in 1950s, she believed that Queen Victoria had been alive and ruling India and nothing could go wrong under her rule. There was indeed a time when the sun never set on the British Empire. At its heights, it was covering almost a quarter of the Earth's total land area and one-fifth of the world population.

With time things changed. One after another, the British colonies and protectorates became independent and the size of the British Empire shrank. The United States declared independence in 1776. Canada got dominion status after 1867. Australia and New Zealand got similar status after 1900, followed by South Africa in 1910 and the Irish Free State in 1921.

A large-scale decolonization started after the World War II. Though the allied forces emerged victorious, the British practically became bankrupt. They gradually granted independence to most of its colonies in Asia and Africa through peaceful negotiations. Thus India, Pakistan (including Bangladesh) became independent in 1947, Sri Lanka in 1948, Nigeria in 1960 among others.  Between 1945 and 1965, the number of people under the British rule outside the UK fell from 700 million to 5 million, three million of whom were in Hong Kong. Most of the former British colonies and protectorates later joined the Commonwealth of Nations, a voluntary association of 53 independent states.

Even though independence was granted to almost all British colonies and protectorates, nobody ever thought that Scotland, a constituent part of the United Kingdom since 1707, would ever seek independence. A referendum is due to be held on September 18 to determine whether Scotland should be an independent state or not. If the Scots vote in favour of independence, it will be a severe blow to the pride of the United Kingdom, a power that dominated the world for several hundred years.

The old lady of Dhaka is no more but many people are echoing the same question she asked more than sixty years ago, “What is happening to the reign of Queen Victoria?”

The writer is a former chief engineer of Bangladesh Atomic Energy Commission