Shillong, May 30 -- The Meghalaya government on Tuesday signed a pact with the National Institute of Open Schooling (NIOS) to facilitate the return of dropouts to educational institutions.

While Assam recorded the highest dropout rate in the country with 31 per cent of out-of-school students at the secondary level, Tripura with 29.8 per cent is ranked number 2, an official of the education department said.

Meghalaya with 27.9 percent dropout rate in the secondary level is ranked third followed closely by Madhya Pradesh (26.1 per cent) and Nagaland (24.4 per cent), he said.

"An MoU for identification of Out of School Children (OoSC) and enrolling them into the NIOS Study Centres was signed between the Samagra Shiksha authorities and the...