Education is, since long, hailed as a lever of social change. More than the children in towns and cities, those counterparts who live in rural and tribal pockets of the country suffer most from the handicap of being unable to get enrolled to the school and even after that to remain there till the completion of schooling. Decentralization of planning and governance was expected to herald a new wave of change in the general administrative and political systems that work for bringing about rural (and tribal and urban development). The last few years have seen the intervention by a multitude of agencies and schemes to give a face lift to rural education. This paper highlights some of the critical factors operative in rendering education inaccessible to rural children, in particular from the SC, ST and Minority communities.