Amit Roy says that, in India, there will be relief at the result from Scotland

In India, where the Scottish referendum has been followed closely, especially in the closing stages, there was real nervousness that a "yes" vote might encourage cross-border terrorism in Kashmir and secessionist movements in some of the north-eastern states.

"If Scotland can have independence, why can't we?" would have been a refrain governments all over the world would have found troubling to answer.

India's traditional policy has been one of respecting the "unity and territorial integrity" of sovereign states. This runs contrary to the broad philosophy of "self determination" but India does not like bits of a country going off to do their own thing.

A few days ago India's new foreign minister in Narendra Modi's government, Sushma Swaraj, was asked what she thought about Scotland's referendum.

Without thinking, she blurted out her response, with her voice betraying almost a sense of horror: "A break-up of the UK? God forbid!"

The top civil servant in India's external affairs ministry, Sujatha Singh - lots of top jobs in India are held by women these days - leaned across and whispered something to her political boss.

Sushma immediately reversed her earlier remark: "The people of Scotland have to decide for themselves."

In writing about Scotland, I ought to "declare an interest", as they say. If this is not a silly remark for an Indian to make, I consider myself to be "an honorary Scot".

This dates back to my days as a reporter on the then Glasgow Herald, based at 56 Fleet Street in London, where I was so thoroughly spoiled that when I did leave (for the Daily Telegraph across the road) I determined I would stick up for Scotland whenever I got the chance. I have on the whole kept my word.

There is another reason - both my father and mother read English at Scottish Church College in Calcutta which is where they met.

The college, still one of the finest in India, was founded by a Scottish missionary, the Rev Alexander Duff (1806-1878). In 1830, with the support of Raja Rammohan Roy, a great Indian social reformer, he founded an educational institution that evolved by 1929 into Scottish Church College.

Duff was frank about wanting to convert Indians to Christianity but his biography stresses that "he went further, seeing his ultimate goal to be that of advancing the peoples of India so that they could govern themselves and become a country that could take its place in a quickly developing world".

My readers at The Telegraph newspaper in India, which has its headquarters in Calcutta and for whom I am the London correspondent, are probably a bit fed up with me going on and on about how wonderful the Scots are - but which they are.

There are many connections between India and Scotland, not least that of the jute trade. The actor Brian Cox did a very fine documentary about his folk who worked in the jute mills in Hooghly just outside Calcutta.

The fact is Indians love Scotland. Tourists from India who come to the UK on holiday go crazy doing their shopping in Oxford Street in London before heading for Scotland to catch a glimpse of Edinburgh Castle or take pictures of Bollywood locations.

Ah, yes, Bollywood. I am not sure whether people in Scotland are aware of this but, in 2007, VisitBritain produced a map of the UK, with dots to show the locations where Bollywood films had been shot (for song and dance sequences and sometimes for stories about immigrants, too). You can't almost not see Scotland for dots. Perhaps I exaggerate but not much.

The opening number of Kuch Kuch Hota Hai (Things happen when least expected), made in 1998, used several beautiful Scottish locations including Eilean Donan Castle and Inchmahome Priory on an island in the Lake of Menteith.

Another movie, Pyaar Ishq aur Mohabbat (Love, love and love), from 2001, which tells the story of an Indian girl who comes to study in Scotland, was filmed in numerous locations including Stirling Castle, the University of Glasgow, Loch Lomond and Culzean Castle.

So what about the referendum result? In the last few days I have been writing about the "yes" and "no" campaigns, but reflected through Indians settled in Scotland.

At Edinburgh University's law school, Navraj-Singh Ghaleigh, 42, senior lecturer in climate law, predicted a 75% turnout three weeks ago, with 44-46% voting "yes" and 54-56% voting "no"

"I have softened my position," he admitted on the eve of the referendum, though he still thought that "no" would win by 53% to 47%.

Because of India's own colonial experience during the time of the Raj, the natural inclination for most Indians was to support the movement for an independent Scotland. But this was tempered by the legacy of partition.

When Pakistan was carved out of India to create a separate homeland for Muslims in 1947, a million people, caught on the wrong side of hastily drawn borders, were slaughtered.

Those I interviewed spoke about everything from currency to defence, but sometimes in the privacy of the polling both, the final, final, final, the lastminute.com decision was made on purely emotional grounds.

Bashabi Fraser, poet and writer, was in turmoil after voting "no". A Bengali originally from West Bengal, and married to a former Edinburgh University social policy lecturer, Neil Fraser, she has been settled in Edinburgh for over 20 years (some of the Indian doctors I interviewed have been here for over 50 years).

Now professor of literature and creative writing at Edinburgh Napier University and joint director of the Scottish Centre of Tagore Studies, Bashabi explained: "As a writer I feel people should be free if they want to be free. There must be a good reason why so many Scots don't feel free - they vote Labour but consistently get an English Tory government."

At the same time, however, as an Indian, she could not but be aware of the tragedy of partition in India. "I don't want any more borders."

As for her identity, "I am Bengali first, my main identity, but I can be both Bengali and Indian. And my loyalty is to Scotland."

She revealed: "My daughter is very angry with me." Rupsha, 30, a scientist, could not be in Scotland on Thursday but instructed her mother to cast a proxy no on her behalf. She had been worried her mother was leaning towards yes. "My daughter feels Scottish but also British and did not want to choose between the two."

Bashabi's father, Bimalendu Bhattacharya, 85, who divides his time between Calcutta and Edinburgh, is staying with his daughter and son-law at the moment.

He is a geographer who had taught at university level in India all his life. He was not for a separate Scotland.

A country needed space for development, he has always told his students. "More space means more room, more room means more development. Brazil has come up because it has so much space. Same with China. A small country like Scotland cannot have proper development if it cuts itself off from England."

That said, he could not speak more highly of the Scots, "polished, very kind, very courteous. I have been coming here for 20 years, and I have never been pushed here. I am treated better here than back in India."

Bashabi then brought out her poem, The Border, taken from a book she has edited, Bengal Partition Stories: An Undisclosed Chapter. She had read it as part of an artists' tour of Scotland.

It begins:

There was a time when you and I

Chased the same butterfly…

The poem is dedicated to a Pakistani friend from Peshawar, Syed Hussein Shaheed Soherwordy.

It ends by highlighting the pain of separation - and Bashabi felt it was relevant in Scotland though, admirably, there had been no violence during the referendum campaign:

The border that now decrees

Our shared past with two histories

This border that now decides

The sky between us as two skies

This border born of blood spilt free

Makes you my friend, my enemy.

Amit Roy is UK correspondent for Indian daily newspaper The Telegraph