Education has continued to evolve, diversify and extend its reach and coverage since the dawn of human history. Every country develops its system of education to express and promote its unique socio-cultural identity and also to meet the challenges of the times. There are moments in history when a new direction has to be given to an age-old process. That moment is today. The country has reached a stage in its economic and technical development when a major effort must be made to derive the maximum benefit from the assets already created and to ensure that the fruits of change reach all sections. Education is the highway to that goal. Prevelance of Child labour: All non-school going children are child workers in one form or the other. Agricultural child labour constitutes the core of the problem. Child labour policies and education policies have to be formulated and operated in tandem. Parents do want to send their children to be educated and poverty as a limiting factor is highly over-rated. Motivation and availability of infrastructure rather than poverty are the key factors. The paper underlines the strengths of formal education in eradicating child labour and forcefully argues for a legislation to provide for compulsory education. The main argument against child labour and compulsory education is that it is necessary for the wellbeing of the poor as the state is unable to provide relief. The second argument, is that education would make the poor unsuited for the kind of manual work that is required to be done. The third argument is that certain industries would be forced to close down if they did not have the facility of the low wage child labour. The last argument against banning child labour and enforcing compulsory education is that the State should not be allowed to interfere in the parents' rights who know what is best for their children and families. Lack of Coverage: Despite the regular expansion of the ICDS, the coverage of children for ECCE is still as low as 20 percent. This is an issue of both inadequate access and inadequate quality of service delivery. With ICDS continuing to be the main vehicle for ECCE, the GOI is proposing to expand the service further and universalize it within the next few years. While this is a welcome proposal, the risk is of expanding too fast and compromising on quality. Girl Child Education: The Indian government has expressed a strong commitment towards education for all; however, India still has one of the lowest female literacy rates in Asia. In 1991, less than 40 percent of the 330 million women aged 7 and over were literate, which means today there are over 200 million illiterate women in India. Education has continued to evolve, diversify and extend its reach and coverage since the dawn of human history. Every country develops its system of education to express and promote its unique socio-cultural identity and also to meet the challenges of the times. There are moments in history when a new direction has to be given to an age-old process. That moment is today. The country has reached a stage in its economic and technical development when a major effort must be made to derive the maximum benefit from the assets already created and to ensure that the fruits of change reach all sections. Education is the highway to that goal. Prevelance of Child labour: All non-school going children are child workers in one form or the other. Agricultural child labour constitutes the core of the problem. Child labour policies and education policies have to be formulated and operated in tandem. Parents do want to send their children to be educated and poverty as a limiting factor is highly over-rated. Motivation and availability of infrastructure rather than poverty are the key factors. The paper underlines the strengths of formal education in eradicating child labour and forcefully argues for a legislation to provide for compulsory education. The main argument against child labour and compulsory e