IN advancing excuses for not providing all its children at least eight years of basic education – despite political independence in 1947 or passing the 86th amendment of the Constitution in 2002, making education of 6-14 year olds a fundamental right – nothing of essence seems to have changed. Seventy years earlier, Gandhiji’s plea for universal education was countered with a response that the only possible way to meet this objective was by relying on revenues generated from liquor sales.