India-Indonesia Bilateral Ties: An Introspection
Contents: Preface. 1. India-Indonesia: Natural Partners?/Navrekha Sharma. 2. India-Indonesia: economic and foreign policy/Baladas Ghoshal. 3. India-Indonesia bilateral ties: prospects ahead/Rizali W. Indrakesuma. 4. India–Indonesia relations: need for new areas of co-operation/Ganganath Jha. 5. India-Indonesia: bilateral trade and investment relations/T.S. Vishwanath. 6. Indonesian democracy and Islam: challenges ahead/Gautam Kumar Jha and Son Kuswadi. 7. India and Indonesia: co-operation challenges and way ahead/Vikash Saharan. 8. India-Indonesia relations in a changing world/Yuvaraj Gogoi and Junuguru Srinivas. 9. India-Indonesia strategic partnership: defining contours of engagement/Pankaj K. Jha. 10. Being the first among equals: Indonesia’s emerging leadership role in ASEAN/Anushree Chakraborty. 11. India-Indonesia trade relations/Afreen Bano. 12. India and Indonesia in the indo-pacific imagination/Krishnendra Meena. 13. The evolution of India–Indonesia relations from Ramayana to China/Nishit Kumar. 14. India and Indonesia as natural partners in the Asia-Pacific security architecture/Asif Shuja. 15. Determinants of outward foreign direct investment: a study of Indian manufacturing firms/Priya Arora. 16. India and Indonesia in the emerging Indo-Pacific security dynamics/Rahul Mishra. 17. Leadership from below: Indonesia in a twenty-first century South-East Asia/Ruth Rhea Khan. 18. India-Indonesia relationship: maritime security/Sudhir Singh. 19. India-Indonesia: science and technological collaboration prospects/Son Kuswadi and Gautam Kumar Jha.
India and Indonesia experienced close historical and civilizational relations from the ancient times to sixteenth century ce. During the Indonesian freedom struggle, its leaders were inspired by the anti-colonial views of Indian leaders. India firmly stood for the freedom of Indonesia from the Dutch.
During the post-colonial period, the bilateral relations underwent ups and downs. India’s Look East Policy of the 1990s made a phenomenal leap in both the countries’ relationship. India by leveraging its soft power, stable foreign policy, non-interference policy established trust among many South-East Asian countries and in particular Indonesia. Indonesia, being the largest country in the region, has been proved as one of the greatest allies of India.
After a decade of stable governance under President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, Indonesia now has a fairly strong democratic set-up. The country made the transition after thirty-one years of dictatorship of Soeharto, under the leadership of B.J. Habibie, Abdurrhaman Wahid and Megawati Soekarnoputri.
Now, when both the countries are poised to fly high after having witnessed considerable economic reforms, they need to forge stronger ties in order to further expand bilateral trade and strategic relations, being the main focus of this volume.
