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JAKARTA, INDONESIA, May 12, 2004: When Indian traders travelled to Indonesia as early as the beginning of the first millenium ce, they took with them the story of the Ramayana as recorded by the Indian poet Valmiki around the seventh century bce. Indonesians loved the epic that expounded human values as well as philosophical concepts. Thus the story of the Ramayana took on an uniquely Indonesian flavor as it was reconstructed by ancient Indonesian poets and scholars. Vinod C. Khanna and Malini Saran have written a book called “The Ramayana in Indonesia.” In this book, the two authors, who now live in New Delhi, explain the way Rama is depicted in Indonesian literature and in temple sculptures in both Java and Bali. Saran lived for five years in Indonesia while Khanna was India’s ambassador in Indonesia from 1985 to 1988. Khanna says, “I am deeply impressed by the creative manner in which Indonesians had adopted many elements of Indian culture.” The article says, “According to Khanna and Saran, the ancient Indonesian scholars were much influenced by Bhatti’s version of the Ramayana, the Ravanavadha (The Slaying of Ravana) or Bhattikavya, as the poem was known. The Javanese poem Ramayana Kakawin, written in the ancient Javanese language of kawi by an author only known as Yogiswara, is one such example.” The story of Rama has become so immersed in Indonesian culture that some Indonesians do not recognize it has Indian origins. The article explains, “Through the transformations, Rama has become a fully Indonesian hero. This is so evident that Khanna and Saran, in their closing words in the book, recall an old Javanese Muslim woman in Jakarta who asked them in all innocence: ‘Do you also have a Ramayana in India?’ “

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