“Both our countries have made diversity the very foundation of our unity within our democracies,” Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in the Indonesian parliament
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in his address to the Indonesian parliament on Tuesday, highlighted how India and Indonesia have made diversity the very foundation of unity in their own countries.
PM Modi, who became the first Indian prime minister to address the Indonesian parliament, recalled how New Delhi became a strong voice for Jakarta’s independence movement at the United Nations.
“Both our countries have made diversity the very foundation of our unity within our democracies. When India celebrated its first Republic Day in 1950, the chief guest at that historic ceremony was none other than President Sukarno, as the Honourable Speaker has just mentioned,” PM Modi said.
“During that era, at the Bandung Conference, President Sukarno and Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru sent a clear message to the world that independent nations have the sovereign right to make their own decisions,” he said.
The historic Bandung Conference was held in 1955 with 29 newly independent Asian and African countries as participants. The summit promoted cooperation, opposed colonialism and laid the groundwork for the Non-Aligned Movement.
“There is so much that our ancestors experienced together. Both our nations endured long periods of foreign rule. We gained our independence at almost the same time, Indonesia in 1945 and India in 1947,” the prime minister said in the Indonesian parliament.
Merupakan suatu kehormatan dapat berpidato di hadapan Parlemen Indonesia. India dan Indonesia terhubung oleh sejarah, budaya, dan hubungan antar-masyarakat yang telah terjalin selama berabad-abad. Bersama-sama, kita akan terus bekerja sama demi mewujudkan masa depan yang… pic.twitter.com/TVNWUIm1Ng
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) July 7, 2026
He also recalled how Biju Patnaik, a great pilot, and his co-pilot wife, Gyanwati Patnaik, flew a Dakota aircraft to Indonesia and safely extracted prime minister Sutan Sjahrir and vice president Mohammad Hatta just as Indonesia declared independence from Dutch rule on August 17, 1945. The flight landed in Delhi (via Singapore) despite Dutch threats to shoot down the aircraft.
During PM Modi’s visit to Indonesia and the bilateral with Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto, the two nations discussed cooperation on the BrahMos missile system as part of efforts to elevate bilateral defence ties, while also reviewing progress on integrating India’s UPI with Indonesia’s QRIS payment system and expanding collaboration in the mining and critical minerals sector.
