Iwent to England at the age of nineteen and lived there for twelve years, first at Cambridge and then in London, learning to tackle the dimly lit alleyways of science, physics in particular. It was a glorious and fantastic time without any worry or anxiety except that we were permanently in debt. Beatles mania had just gripped the world; blue jeans, long hair and a pipe dangling from one’s mouth were the fashion of the day. Politically we were left of centre, and every day felt like a carnival, a celebration of joy and hope for tomorrow. We were all convinced that tomorrow something incredible, something frightfully original was going to happen.
Cambridge was more than a dream, and King’s, London, was a fascinating fusion of DNA spirit of discovery in the basement with Maurice Wilkin presiding, with Appleton’s ionosphere reflecting radio waves, John Taylor’s craziest idea of bent spoon and occasional entry of Hermann Bondi even the great Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar. Parliament was not very far from the Strand where King’s was located; the Indian High Commission was just opposite. Time to time we used to go to Parliament as members of the India League. V. K. Krishna Menon, the father of the League in the early days, always attired elegantly, used to drop in. India League used to organize debates on issues related to India, not a very heated discourse but a very gentle exercise of the brain.
The decibel level was smooth and certainly not at a very high pitch. Occasional excitement used to grip the early evening hours, when the evening tabloids used to come out. One evening it was really juicy with Lord Lambton found in a St. John’s Wood flat in a compromising embrace. He was the defense secretary. The same evening a well-known Earl, member of the cabinet, was discovered in a red-light district obviously not in a touring mood. Both resigned the same evening. Most of the excitement, typical of the British style of society those days, was to do with lightweight scandals. But no financial scandal came up, no diamonds, no gold bars, no big accounts in tax-free havens. Europe remained, at least the in mind’s eye, a faraway land beyond the English Channel. Paris was considered chic and naughty! The British used to go there for fun and frolic, escaping from the oppression of the lingering Victorian era.
The European Union remained still a dream. Schengenstaten visa was not born. We Indians had to obtain a visa for each country if one wanted to travel through Europe. Eventually when the Schengenstaten visa arrived and the European Union was formed, Britain steadfastly maintained its sovereignty with its visa system and its sterling pound, no euro please! Most upper middle-class British suffer from a colonial hang up, the Conservatives in particular, believing the sun refuses to set in the British empire. The jewel in that crown was of course India. Britain always had a love-hate relationship with India – the attitude towards India oscillated between a Maharaja to a fakir.
Gandhiji, though, a fakir was way above a Maharaja as a human being. So, Britain joined the European Union somewhat reluctantly. They had been fighting the French for centuries and most Britons haven’t forgotten or forgiven the sheer calamity due to Hitler’s adventure. All said and done Second World War was essentially a war between Britain and Germany, the other players entered the theatre by and by. The foundation of the British relationship with the European Union, to start with, was rather shaky. Then came the idea of a referendum – the truth came out, a substantial part of the British people wanted to get out. The ghost of centuries of history now rotten to the core, started devouring the British psyche, especially of people who are sixty plus.
The younger lot knows India as an exotic if not incredible place, great to visit. They don’t suffer from any colonial heat! And there lies the seed of conflict, still nagging right across the British society. The younger lot got educated in a multiracial, multilingual “world” society where P. G. Wodehouse is a mere shadow. The saddest scenario that can happen is that the once formidable House of Commons has turned into a place that sees high-decibel wrangling matches between “to be in” and “to be out” with no sign of the end of the agony on the horizon.
The land of Shakespeare, Newton, Darwin, Byron, Shelley and Tennyson, Winston Churchill, Gladstone, and so many, is now slowly but surely turning into a land of a shouting, incompetent bunch of non-performers. Nobody really listens to anybody; the entropy of chaos cannot hold back the ghost of history. From a mighty empire Britain may well be reduced to an isolated island floating in the Atlantic.
(The writer is INSA Honorary Scientist and former Homi Bhabha Professor, DAE)