Estimates of human capital are mostly available at the national and/or provincial levels which restrict cognitive abilities of the policymakers to analyze determinants of its development and form policies at the local level, creating policy biases and loss of scarce resources. To overcome this bias, this paper calculates one dimension of human capital, the extent of gender disparities and the associated barriers to its attainment by districts and towns of Punjab. The dimension here is the education attainment. Estimates exposed harsh realities of education attainment with huge variations and gender disparities across towns, districts and regions. Further analyses revealed five barriers to education attainment and reasons of gender disparities. These are: personal, societal, economic, outcome and enabling environment. Policy prescriptions are given which can potentially eliminate these barriers.