'Right to Education': Opportunities and Challenges1

Abstract The paper critically reviews the rise and use of the 'rights-based approach ' in ensuring entitlements of citizens visa-vis education, both internationally and in the context of the recently passed 93rd ammendment to the Indian Constitution which has given citizens the fundamental right to education. Reflecting on, policy shifts in Indian education such as decentralisation, and the characteristic of education itself as a 'social ' and 'political ' good, questions are raised about the prospects of a 'rights-based approach ' in education. The recent passing of the 93rd Constitutional Amendment recognising the fundamental right to education of Indian citizens is a landmark development in the context both nationally of tackling educational inequality and exclusion, as well as internationally of the articulation of the rights-based approach (RBA) to development. The right to education in India thus provides a useful entry-point through which to explore wider issues relating to citizenship and rights, particularly as the 'right ' has been centrally embedded within the national Constitution, thus providing a formal and symbolic frame for articulating the entitlements of citizenship in relation to education in India. In this paper I review the Indian case in the context of the rise of RBA in international development discourse on the one hand, and on the other, in relation to the particular characteristics of education as a social and political 'good ' and the particular challenges of educational equality in India. As this is a relatively recent development, no assessmen