Lalita Ramdas

Lalita Ramdas is the former president of the International Council for Adult Education [ICAE].

"She also carried on her work as a peace activist, visiting Pakistan as a member of the Pak India Forum, to take part in exchange workshops, home visits, and lectures to build people-to-people contact. She has helped to develop a peace education program for South Asian youth. For Lalita, the personal is the political–she and her husband demonstrated their commitment to secular values when they provided unstinted support to their eldest daughter’s decision to marry a Pakistani.

"Soon after India went nuclear, Lalita and her husband went public in their opposition to the government’s decision and participated at various points in the “Long March from Pokhran”, the blast site, to Varanasi, helping to raising awareness among people and communities on the perils of the nuclear arms race. They came under threat from Right-wing groups. The couple also spoke out fearlessly against the killings in Gujarat in 2002.

"For Lalita, peace is not just the absence of war but a comprehensive vision of a just and equitable society. She has pursued her commitment to this ideal through all manner of adverse circumstances–including family crises and serious illnesses like tuberculosis and cancer–and has made use of all available space to push for peace. (Read all on 1000peacewomen 2005).

"Since her husband’s retirement from active Naval Service in 1993, they have moved into a rural area in the coastal Konkan region of the state of Maharashtra. Lalita continues to be active in work for women, development, and education at the local, the national and the regional and global level. Almost all of her time is provided free of cost and in a voluntary capacity. She actively co-ordinates a group called Pratham – Raigad Education Initiative – which works to improve the quality and address access and equity issues in rural primary education with a special focus on indigenous and other minority groups and on building a network of pre-school institutions. The programme also enables and empowers rural youth – girls in particular to develop leadership and other initiatives within their communities'."

• Chair, Greenpeace International
• Governing Board, Society for Participatory Research in Asia