The National Crime Records Bureau has released its latest report on the data for the year 2016.
What are the highlights?
Children - There is an overall increase in crimes against children.
The all-India rate for crimes against children stood at 24.
The rate of crimes against children was the highest in Delhi, followed by Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh.
Among cities, Delhi and Mumbai accounted for a major chunk of the offences against children.
Particularly, the year 2016 has registered a sharp spike (of nearly 80% compared to 2015) in cases of rape against children.
The highest rise in numbers has been registered in Uttar Pradesh where the figures have tripled.
Notably, this is for the first time that such a sharp increase in sexual assaults on children has been registered.
The most numbers of rape cases under IPC and POCSO were reported in Maharashtra, Odisha, MP, UP, and Tamil Nadu; the latter three have registered very high increases compared to last year.
Women - The year 2016 has registered an overall rise of about 3% in crimes against women.
Strikingly, incidents of rape against women have risen far more sharply than other crimes against women, recording a rise of about 12%.
The highest number of rapes has been reported from MP, UP and Maharashtra.
The majority of cases categorised as crimes against women were reported under ‘Cruelty by husband or his relatives’.
West Bengal, Rajasthan and UP have reported the highest number of incidents of ‘cruelty by husband’.
Other crimes include Assault on woman with intent to outrage her modesty, Kidnapping and abduction, Rape, Voyeurism, Stalking, etc.
In terms of rate of crime against women Delhi reported the highest compared to the national average rate.
It is followed by Assam, Odisha, Telangana and Rajasthan.
Among cities, Delhi topped the charts again, followed by Lucknow, Jaipur, Patna and newly, Nagpur.
Dalits - Data on crimes against Dalits draws a distinct pattern of similarity between rural and urban spaces.
This breaks the prevalent notion of blurring caste lines in urban spaces.
City-wise data on atrocities against Dalits shows that a major chunk of crimes against Dalits involves the violation of women.
Uttar Pradesh has recorded the highest number of crimes against women among dalits.
It was highlighted that crimes against Dalits were not solely registered under sections of the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
Cases are categorised and registered under the usual Indian Penal Code, denying the rights offered under exclusive legal mechanisms.
Coimbatore (TN), Kolkata and Chennai have witnessed the least number of cases of caste atrocities in 2016.
Kanpur, Ahmedabad, Ghaziabad were, however, in the top ten cities where the maximum number of caste atrocities were registered.
Lucknow has witnessed a fourfold increase in instances of crimes against Dalits since 2014.
Quick Facts
NCRB
National Crime Records Bureau is an attached office of the Ministry of Home Affairs.
It was established in 1986 with a mandate to empower Indian Police with information technology solutions and criminal intelligence.
It must be noted that the NCRB figures merely reflect the number of crimes registered by the police.
These may or may not reflect the actual situation on the ground as generally well-policed states have a high crime rate as the police ensures the registry of all cases.
Rate of crime
It calculates incidents per one lakh people of the population.
Thus it is a better determinant for the prevalence of a crime in a particular region.
