Lalit (political party)

Lalit is a left political party in Mauritius. It is opposed to private or any other undemocratic control of the means of human survival on the planet. Lalit traces its origin to workers' and students' protests in the country in 1975.

The party opposes the Anglo-American occupation and military base on Diego Garcia, outlying Mauritian island.

Lalit is working for an alternative political economy, towards care for ecology, against repression and torture, towards women's liberation and the emancipation of the Kreol language. Lalit strongly opposes communalism and the use of ethno-religious labels for official purposes. Its candidates in the 2005 National Assembly elections each drew the legally compulsory classification he or she would use from a hat, regardless of candidate's actual supposed "ethnicity" or religion. The party failed to win seats in the Assembly.

Lalit has loose links with other left parties all over the world, with anti-war movements, women's associations, ecology groups, and with organizations against military bases world-wide. It draws its inspiration from the broadest philosophical and political traditions that aim for individual human fulfillment for everyone in the context of a caring, peaceful society where avarice and war-mongering no longer have their place. Lalit builds on the collective experience of generations of disinherited people, including on their oral traditions. Lalit is also indebted to the dialectical way of thinking of the Orient, and to political thinkers from Europe like Karl Marx, Rosa Luxembourg, Antonio Gramsci, Leon Trotsky, Raymond Williams. African thinkers that influenced Lalit include Frantz Fanon.

(Lalit's name means "struggle" in Mauritian Creole and, as a happy coincidence, "beautiful" in Hindi.)

External links

*Official|http://www.lalitmauritius.org