away from the united kingdom are doing, and what's ahead, i spoke with npr london correspondent frank langfittay. so, frank, why are people paying so much more attention to this round of elections? >> the scottish national party was saying if they could get a majority or a pro-independence majority in the parliament this year, they would push for an inpendence referendum to, basically to break away from the united kingdom. so, people are watching this naturally very closely. >> sreenivasan: since the last time scotland wanted to break off, we've had a brexit and a pandemic. how does that change things? >> brexit was fundamental, hari. i think that this-- the independence referendum failed. it was only 45% voted back in 2014. and a lot of those people, quite a few of them,oted to stay in the united kingdom because they were told it was the only way they could stay inside the european union. two years later, they felt betrayed when brexit happened. and that really angered a lot of scots that i've talked to. and so, they've been very determined not only to leave the united kingdom, but hopefully