EDUCATION

April 5, 1986 The other issues on which educational policy is going to stay silent are those of child labour and infant mortality. Both these issues are directly relevant to education; indeed, no headway is possible in the accepted aim of universalising primary education if child labour and high infant mortality persist. Both affect not only the material conditions of childhood, but also the adult society's attitude towards children. Indications are that the government does not plan to abolish child labour or to commit itself to an immediate programme of child survival. On child labour, Indian liberal view is quite different from the view that English liberals took in the early decades of this century Instead of pleading for the child's right to play and education, many Indian liberal critics are asking the government to recognise and regularise the child's right to work. This idcological posture makes it convenient for the government to present non- formal education as the magic that will fulfil the Constitution's promise of universal elementary education.