I won’t bore you all with why the departure of Britain from the EU will be a disaster for that country. There is enough in the media about that. Britain will continue to lose its relevance on the global stage, the last remnant of that being their seat on the UN Security Council.

Now there is talk of further breakups, perhaps first of Scotland and then Northern Ireland, that would make the UK a shadow of its former self. The EU itself will possibly undergo further breakups as resentment builds against poorer countries not bearing their fair share of costs.

What Brexit made me realize is that there is something unique about India. Something that Indians the world over should pause to celebrate. India has over twice the population of the EU, has many more languages, much higher religious diversity, and far greater variation in culture and tradition. And it is dirt poor with enormous income inequality. India should have been a prime candidate for various bits of the country wanting to carve themselves out. Or least engage in serious inter-state or inter-language or inter-religious conflict.

Barring occasional bloodletting that happens every 20 years, such as the 1984 anti-Sikh riots after the assassination of Indira Gandhi and the 2002 anti-Muslim riots in Gujarat, the population of over 1.2 Billion people have lived relatively peacefully in its history. One could argue that this is made easier by India being a single country but then again it has been one nation relatively recently in its history. Various kingdoms had to be sown together to form modern India.

A large homogenous China clearly will continue to grow in importance both economically and militarily. The U.S. will continue to be the most important global power, at least for the next 20 years. If the EU were to go down this path of losing its cohesion, we could yet witness the reemergence of a more aggressive Russia. Without a coordinated EU response to Russia, the U.S. may well find itself on its own tackling global tensions.

A weakened EU also opens up a window for India to play a bigger role on the global stage. There is no hope for India to come close to Chinese living standards (whatever Indian politicians may claim) but its sheer size will give it increased heft in global politics. In that world of a weakened EU, the partnership between the U.S. and India will become increasingly important. Hopefully, the next American president is wise enough to realize that.