We have seen several drafts of the right to education Bill, none of them entirely satisfactory. One of the sticking points was allocating the costs between the Centre and the State governments. It seems that there is some movement on the issue, with the centre apparently agreeing to share the most of the financial burden. This article points out to the new interesting aspects of the Bill currently under consideration:
1. An obligation on all schools, public or private, to admit it least 25% of the students from the neighbourhood.2. To gradually do away with the informal school system established under the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan and evolve quality indicators for recognizing a school.

A detailed analysis of the Bill is available on the PRS website. After all the attention to tertiary education in the reservations controversy recently, this glimmer of hope for primary education has not come too soon.