India imports 7.59 million tons of CPO in 2014 and most of which were supplied from Indonesia."
Jakarta (ANTARA News) - India was one of the initiators of the historical Asian African Conference (AAC) together with Indonesia, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and Pakistan on 18 April-24 April 1955.

India regained its independence from British colonial administration on 15 August 1947 led by its first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, who was also a founder of the Non-Aligned Movement.

The Asia Africa conference was held amid raging war for independence in Asia and Africa.

Nehru was a distinguished leader in the conference for his great contribution to the Bandung Ten Principles that inspired anti colonialism war in the two continents.

Many countries in Africa gained independence after the conference.

India has often been seen as an indicator of progress in developing Asia.

Indian economic development was first driven Swadishi, the teaching of that countrys spiritual leader Mahatma Gandhi.

Swadeshi inspired Indian nationalism, and called for the use of domestic products toward self sufficiency in economy.

Indians love for own products resulted in the expansion of its industry, promotion of its culture, traditional dresses and foods not only in that country but also abroad.

India has also made great progress in education and technology.

Mention of India often conjured up vision of poverty and beggars but at the same time it has ranked among the advanced countries in technology.

A report in a major newspaper in Asia predicted that slowdown would continue to hit Asian developing economies until 2016 but not India.

India, which has succeeded in removing bottlenecks that dragged its economic development would lead Asia in economic growth with China still beset by slowdown, the report said.

Indian economy is predicted to grow 7.8 to 8.2 percent in 2015 on successful monetary policy and capital spending in infrastructure project. In 2014, India recorded an economic growth of 7.4 percent.

India represents an important position in the Asian African Conference that Indonesian Deputy Foreign Minister Indonesia A.M. Fachir has been sent as a special envoy of President Joko Widodo to convey an invitation to the Indian government to take part in the 60th anniversary commemoration of the conference in Bandung, and the 10th commemoration of "New Asian-African Strategic Partnership".

A.M. Fachir conveyed the invitation to Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj stressing the importance of the presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the two events.

Sushma Swaraj said the government of India welcomes the invitation as India considers Indonesia as a strategic partner and Indias friend, adding Indonesia and India have similar historical backgrounds and common goals in fighting for the interest of Asian and African countries.

Various facets of Cooperation

Deputy Foreign Minister A.M. Fachir has said ASEAN-India need to strengthen maritime cooperation.

A.M. Fachir said the cooperation covers aspects of maritime culture,infrastructure, tourism, diplomacy and security.

He said maritime cooperation is no new issue in ASEAN, pointing out it was a mandate agreed upon by ASEAN and Indian leaders in December, 2012.

As a step toward implementation of the mandate, Indonesia expects India to support promotion of maritime cooperation to strengthen relations between ASEAN and India in various sectors, he said.

New Delhi host a meeting on Indian-ASEAN political and security cooperation including in Cyber Security.

ASEAN-Indian cooperation is expected to produce a concrete result in taking care of Cyber Security in ASEAN and India , which is quite advanced in technology.

The Indonesian embassy in New Delhi, represented by Indonesian Trade Attache and Indonesian Trade Promotion Centre (ITPC) Chennai took part in the "Aahar International Food and Hospitality Fair" in the Indian capital city in March 2015.

A number of Indonesia food companies took the opportunity to promote Indonesian foods in that country and established marketing cooperation with Indian counterparts.

The Indonesian companies were optimistic they could boost exports to India.

On the other hand, India is known to have exported textile products to Indonesia.

India is major market for Indonesian palm oil. Its imports of crude palm oil (CPO) from Indonesia is expected to continue to increase in the coming years.

"India imports 7.59 million tons of CPO in 2014 and most of which were supplied from Indonesia," President of the Solvent Extractors Association of India (SEA), Pravin S Lunkad, told Antara news agency last month.

Pravin said India is growing more dependent on Indonesia for palm oil supply with the growing demand for that commodity.

He said Indonesian CPO is high in demand in India as the quality is guaranteed.

He said India with a population of 1.2 billion, the worlds second largest, needs 18 million tons of vegetable oils and 11 million tons of which have to be imported.

He said Indias import of palm oil are expected to increase in 2015 as Indias production of edible oil is declining.

Indonesia and India also have established cooperation in automotive industry covering exchange of concession in import duties on automotive products, technology, promotion and investment.

Indias largest automotive company Tata Motors has established its foothold in Indonesia since 2013.

President Director of Tata Motor Distribusi Indonesia (TMDI) Biswadev Sengupta said Tata wants to make Indonesia its largest market outside India.

In addition to economic cooperation, Indonesia and India have cooperated in the tourism, educational, arts and cultural sectors.

Cultural Similarity

Over the past 300 years, on every 1 Jumadilakhir (the 6th month of Arabic calendar), Muslims in Padang held the traditional Serak Gulo cultural show to commemorate the birthday of Indian Islamic scholar (ulema) Souhul Hamid.

Chairman of the Association of Muhammdaan Families in Padang Ali Khan Abu Bakar Alhaj said the tradition is maintained to preserve the Indian culture, which has become a tourism asset in the West Sumatra city.

Serak Gulo is a forum gathering ethnic Indians in Indonesia.

Similarity in culture between the countries has also been promoted with a number of festivals with Indian theme in Indonesia such as Festival Sahabat India (Indian friend festival) in Makassar, held last month.

Indian Consul General for Indonesia Amarjeet Singh Takhi when opening a photography exhibition displaying photos of Islamic monuments in India and Indonesia in Makassar recently said India has rich and varied Islamic inheritance.

The monuments are priceless cultural wealth reflecting the values of Indian culture and arts , culturally binding India and a number of other countries including Indonesia, he said.

The Indian embassy in Indonesia also once staged Ramayana dances in celebrating a century of Indian cinema.

"Ramayana dance has great humanitarian values and moral messages as also shown in most Indian films today," Indian Ambassador to Indonesia Gurjit Singh told ANTARA News.

The ambassador said Indian folk stories like Ramayana still inspires many Indian films which are dominated by love and affection stories.

He said the Ramayana dancers are not only Indians, but also Indians of British origin, Tamil even Indonesians.

Indian dancers have also made appearances in a number of shows in Indonesian, such as in the cultural show of "Phoolon Ki Holi" in Prambanan, Yogyakarta,in March 2015.

"The presentation was to introduce Indian culture to Indonesian people and to give educational values based on culture, and tourism, particularly art," said Retno Hardiasiwi, the Operation Director of PT Taman Wisata Candi Borobudur, Prambanan and Ratu Boko.

In January, 2015, a group of Indian tourists visited Bali, which has emotional relations with India in Hindu religion.

"It is natural many Indian tourists like to visit Bali not only because of the natural beauty of the island but on the similarity of the Hindu based culture," a Bali tourism observer Made Sudana said.

The cultural similarity between Bali and India are expected to encourage more Indians to visit Bali in the future.

Ambassador Gurjit Singh described relations between Indonesia and India saying once that Indonesia is Indias best friend because they have similarly long history and identical cultures.

"We deliberately come directly to Indonesia to strengthen harmonious relations which have been established for centuries between India and Indonesia, which we call Indian friend," Gurjit Singh said.

The statement of friendship is expected to help cement bilateral cooperation in various sectors , economy and culture inspired by the Bandung Ten Principles of Asian African Conference.
(Uu.H-ASG/A014)

Reporter: Alviansyah Pasaribu & A. Sarag
Editor: Priyambodo RH
Copyright © ANTARA 2015