As in the past six years, the dropout rate in secondary level education fell in 2011, this time by 1.98 percentage points to 53.28 percent, a latest government report revealed yesterday.

The "Bangladesh Education Statistics 2011" rep ort said although the dropout rate among girls was higher than boys, its decline rate among girls was higher than their male counterparts.

About 46.73 percent of boys dropped out in 2011, while it was 56.43 percent among girls, it said.

The report was launched by Bangladesh Bureau of Educational Information and Statistics (Banbeis) at its office in the capitalyesterday.

"The dropout rate has declined significantly but it happened slowly," Banbeis

Director Ahsan Abdullah told the launchingprogramme.

The director said qwami madrasas were not included in the survey.

Back in 2005, dropout rate was as high as 80.02 percent. For a stable decline over following the years, it fell to 55.26in 2010.

The net enrolment rate in secondary level is56.50percent.

The Banbeis director said the net enrolment rate in primary level had increased tremendously to 94.83 percent though the dropout rate was still high, 39.80 percent, in 2011, he said.

The total number of students, from primary schools to universities, in Bangladesh is 3.06 crore and total number of institutions stands at 1,14,114 as of2011. Over 50 percent of the students are women, while over 33 percent of the 8,67,764 teachers are female.