By Mehru Jaffer

I am in Bali, cruising up to the crater of the still active Mount Batur, throne of Vishnu, the mountain god of property here, and patron of peasants. The utterly mesmerizing surroundings of Mount Batur with its
languorous lap peppered in black volcanic ash and patches of emerald green foliage are mercifully miles away from the beach bums in the southern part of the island. The bare-bodied Balinese boys who insist on trailing behind, and serenading, probably all Indians with the theme song from Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, a film that plays to packed audiences here as well, do not belong to this area either.

My escort on the island is 26 year old Wiwin whose mother is a peddler of the famed Bali T-shirts. She is from the Shudra community while his father is an East Javanese Muslim, he says. Listening to Wiwin talk
about his family, I am reminded of Indonesian President Megawati's trip to India. She brings with her the proud legacy of Bali, a minority Hindu corner of a large Islamic sea, considered the mother culture here along with Java, the father culture of multi-ethnic Indonesia.

The eldest child of Sukarno, founding father and first president, Megawati's paternal grandmother was a Hindu Balinese. And Sukarno, the poet president had allowed himself to bask in the composite culture of both his parents, passing the same attitude to his children. Even the politics of the visionary Sukarno had circled around the enticing idea of creating unity out of the cultural diversity of people living on thousands of different islands that make up Indonesia.

He invented the slogan unity in diversity and imagined the country's culture as a synthesis of all regional cultures including that of the majority ethnic Javanese, ethnic Chinese, all urban life, rural
traditions and elements of modern western life style. He repeatedly pointed out to his people aspects of their common pre- Islamic past. Along with economic development he was obsessed with the idea of cultural enrichment and social harmony. 

According to Adrian Vickers, author of Bali, A Paradise Created, Sukarno looked to Bali to provide another dimension to the culture repertoire of
Javanese symbolism. While talking to his people about the future Sukarno did not shy away from drawing multiple examples from well-known stories used to this day in the ancient art of shadow puppet theatre. He referred to characters and incidents from the Ramayana and the Mahabharata epics that are also popular, especially in the rural areas to talk of his dream for modern Indonesia and
built upon the idea of Ratu Adil or the just king. In his most romantic moments he looked upon himself as god-king and reincarnation of Vishnu.

Sukarno was taught theosophy from his Muslim Javanese school-teacher father and by the time independence was wrested from the colonial Dutch he had a fairly good feel of the great mystical spirit of Asia and he saw Indonesian culture as a shinning component of this
whole.

Bali delighted him as a museum of the Hindu arts of ancient Java that had existed before the coming of Islam. As head of the largest Muslim country in the world Sukarno was forever delighted to play host to
many other great leaders in Bali including India's Nehru, Robert Kennedy and Ho Chi Minh. He encouraged Affandi, one of the modern Indonesian painters he admired most to visit Bengal's Shantiniketan University. 

A favourite retreat of Sukarno was in the mountains of Bali. He built a home in the midst of lush terraced rice fields around a renovated Dutch rest house that overlooked a temple with the holy spring waters.
Looking back it seems that Sukarno had made earnest attempts to pick out the essence of the minority religion and culture and to elevated it to the national level. His dream remained to weave and integrate the prayers and practices of all the people of this island country into a modern anthem. 

Hopefully India and Indonesia will use this occasion to talk of ways to continue the strengthening and the sharing of ideas and customs that make spirits soar and not concentrate just on signing the very essential
economic deals alone.

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