(12 September 2022) Government Data Roundup: Crime in India, Accidental Deaths & Suicides, Prison Statistics, India’s External Debt among the data & reports released recently

In the eleventh edition of the ‘Government Data Roundup’, we cover Crimes in India (CII), Accidental Deaths and Suicides in India (ADSI), and the Prison Statistics India (PSI) released by NCRB, India’s External Debt (2021-22) among others.

The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), under the aegis of the Ministry of Home Affairs, released three important annual reports for 2021 that provide statistics pertaining to the law-and-order situation in the country. These are the Crimes in India (CII), Accidental Deaths and Suicides in India (ADSI), and the Prison Statistics India (PSI) report. Apart from these three reports, this eleventh edition of Factly’s fortnightly government data roundup also covers the NITI Aayog’s progress report on the Poshan Abhiyan scheme, the Status Report on India’s External Debt 2021-22 released by the Ministry of Finance, and the Education Ministry’s survey on Mental Health and Well-being of School Students. 

The Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister (EAC-PM) and The Institute for Competitiveness released the Competitiveness Roadmap for India@100. The roadmap sets the premise for a transformed approach to augment India’s growth and enables India to become a high-income country by 2047 when India would celebrate 100 years of Independence. It envisions setting new guiding principles for the country’s growth journey over the following years and guiding different states, ministries, and partners in India’s growth to develop sector-specific roadmaps for achieving targeted goals. A 4-S principle has been suggested for the same. 

• Prosperity growth needs to be matched by social progress

• Prosperity needs to be shared across all parts and regions of India

• Prosperity growth needs to be environmentally sustainable

• Prosperity needs to be solid and resilient in the face of external shocks

It noted that weak social progress, rising inequality, few job opportunities, rising geopolitical tension, and climate change were among the challenges India would have to deal with. 

In addition to these, the quarterly reports like the – Estimates of Gross Domestic Product for the First Quarter (April-June) of 2022-23 and Periodic Labour Force Survey that were covered in our earlier stories, were also released in the last fortnight. 

Crime in India 2021

About the report/data:

The Crime in India (CII) report has been published since 1954 and provides data & insights into various aspects of crimes, reflecting the overall state of law & order in the country. Data on various IPC Crimes, SLL Crimes, Crimes against women, children, SCs/STs, senior citizens, environmental offences, cyber-crimes, juveniles in conflict with the law, crimes in railways, terrorism, etc. is provided in the report, along with data on the disposal of these crimes by police and courts. Data is available at the national level, state level, and for metropolitan cities with more than 2 million population.

Methodology:

The data has been compiled by NCRB from States/UTs Police and CAPFs/CPOs for the calendar year 2021. It should be noted that data in the NCRB report is based on the ‘Principal Offence Rule’, which means among many offences registered in a single FIR case, only the most heinous crime (maximum punishment) will be considered as counting unit for the purpose of data collection. However, for crimes against children, women, SC/ST and a few other similar cases, the rule is not followed.

Key Highlights: 

• A total of 60.96 lakh cognizable crimes including over 36.63 lakh Indian Penal Code (IPC) crimes and 24.32 lakh Special & Local Laws (SLL) crimes were registered in 2021. Compared to 2020, the cases registered dropped by more than 5 lakhs registering a decline of 7.6%. The crime rate registered per lakh population has decreased from 487.8 in 2020 to 445.9 in 2021.
• Most cases were registered in Tamil Nadu (7.56 lakh cases), followed by Gujarat (7.31 lakh cases) and Uttar Pradesh (6.08 Lakh cases).
• A total of 4.28 lakh cases of crime against women were registered in 2021, showing an increase of 15.3% over 2020. The rate of crimes against women has increased from 56.5 per lakh in 2020 to 64.5 per lakh in 2021. 
• The State/UT reporting the highest Charge-sheeting rates under IPC Crimes are Gujarat (95.9%), Puducherry (93.0%) and Andhra Pradesh (92.9%).

Significance:

Detailed recording of data pertaining to crimes makes it more comprehensive for parliamentarians, policymakers, researchers and others who use the data for policymaking, crime analysis, and designing mitigation strategies. 

Accidental Deaths and Suicides in India 2021

About the report:

The report contains information on deaths due to accidents and suicides that took place in the country during the calendar year 2021. The deaths due to accidents have been classified into two broad groups – accidental deaths due to causes attributable to nature such as natural disasters, epidemics, etc. and accidental deaths due to causes not attributable to nature such as road accidents, building collapse, electrocution, etc. Age-group-wise and sex-wise details of victims are available in the report. 

Methodology:

The information published in ADSI-2021 is a compilation of the information received from the States/UT Police. Hence the information is based only on the cases that are recorded by the police. 

Key Highlights:

• As per the 2021 report, there were 3.97 lakh accidental deaths in 2021, which is 6% higher than that in 2020 when 3.74 lakh deaths were recorded.  
• In 2021, maximum casualties, 30.9%, were reported in the age group of 30-45 years (1.23 lakhs deaths) followed by the age group from 18-30 years (1.01 lakh deaths).
• A total of 7,126 deaths in the country were reported due to causes attributable to forces of nature of which 40.4% deaths due to ‘Lightning’, 9.2% deaths due to ‘Flood’ and 8.7% deaths due to ‘Exposure to Cold’.
• In 2021, there were 1.73 lakh deaths that were caused due to Traffic Accidents, accounting for around 44% of the total accidental deaths for the year. 
• The rate of suicides increased from 10.4 in 2019 to 11.3 in 2020, which further increased to 12 in 2021. Suicides in males increased by nearly 33% between 2016 and 2021, while that among females registered an increase of about 7% during the same period. 

Prison Statistics India 2021

Brief about the report:

The annual Prison Statistics India (PSI) provides comprehensive statistical information on various aspects of prison administration in India such as type of jails & occupancy, types of prisoners & demography, Indian & foreign prisoners, releases, transfers, movements, rehabilitation, and welfare of prisoners, etc. The report contains information on prisons, prisoners, and prison infrastructure in India. Age-group-wise and sex-wise details of prison inmates are available in the report. The report was first published in 1995. It is based on the information produced by state prison departments. 

Key Highlights:

• The occupancy rate of prisons has increased from 118% in 2020 to 130.2% in 2021 indicating that overcrowding in prisons continues.
• During the year 2021, a total of 18.06 lakh inmates were admitted to various jails of the country and the admission of inmates increased by 10.8% over 2020.
• Convicts, Undertrial inmates and Detenues accounted for 22.2%, 77.1% and 0.6% of the prison inmates respectively.
• The number of convicts in prisons has gone up by 9.1% in 2021 as compared to 2020, while that of undertrials has gone up by 14.9% during the same period. 
• The percentage share of foreign prisoners out of total prisoners has remained at 1% in 2020 as well as in 2021.

India’s External Debt – A Status Report 2021-22

About the report:

The External Debt Management Unit (EDMU) in the Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance, has released the 28th edition of the Status Report on India’s External Debt 2021-22. This Status Paper documents the position of India’s external debt as of end-March 2022. It presents an overview of India’s external debt focusing on the stock of debt, debt and valuation effects, debt in relation to GDP and foreign exchange reserves. It also gives information on the classification of India’s external debt and enumerates sovereign external debt in detail. The issues relating to debt service payments are also addressed in the report which also presents India’s external debt position from a cross-country perspective.

Key Highlights:

• From the end of March 2021 to the end of March 2022, India’s external debt increased by 8.2% to USD 620.7 billion. 53.2% of it was projected to be in US dollars, and 31.2% was anticipated to be in Indian rupees.
• External debt as a ratio to GDP fell marginally to 19.9% as of end-March 2022 from 21.2% a year ago. Foreign currency reserves as a ratio to external debt stood slightly lower at 97.8% as of end-March 2022 compared to 100.6% a year ago.
• Commercial borrowings, NRIs deposits, short-term trade credit and multilateral loans together accounted for 90% of the total external debt. While NRI deposits marginally contracted during end-March 2021 and end-March 2022, the remaining expanded during the same period. The rise in Commercial borrowings, short-term trade credit and multilateral loans was significantly larger than the contraction in NRI deposits.
• From a cross-country perspective, India’s external debt is modest, occupying the 23^rd position globally. In terms of various debt vulnerability indicators, India’s sustainability was better than the Low-and-Middle Income Countries (LMICs) as a group and vis-à-vis many of them individually.

Preserving Progress on Nutrition in India: Poshan Abhiyaan in Pandemic Times

Brief about the report:

NITI Aayog’s “Preserving Progress on Nutrition in India: Poshan Abhiyaan in Pandemic Times” is the fourth progress report on the government’s flagship programme, the POSHAN (Prime Minister’s Overarching Scheme for Holistic Nourishment) Abhiyaan, to draw national attention to and act against malnutrition, in a mission-mode, launched in 2018. The report assesses the implementation of the scheme and presents key recommendations to deepen India’s efforts to tackle malnutrition, focusing on the context of COVID-19. It also highlights key lessons learned by the implementation of POSHAN Abhiyaan.

Methodology:

NITI Aayog collected information from State and Union Territories using two questionnaires to assess progress and implementation capabilities on infrastructure, human resources, training and capacity building, convergence, programme and output activities, service delivery by frontline workers (FLWs) during COVID-19 and the status of innovation and the flexi-plan for March and July 2020. A progress and implementation score framework was developed to assess the progress and capabilities of States and UTs using the data collected.

Key Highlights:

• Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, and Gujarat have been ranked as the top three states among large states in terms of the overall implementation of the scheme.
• Only Punjab scored less than 50 among the large states on a scale of 100. Arunachal Pradesh (36.25), Manipur (27.25) and Mizoram (37.00) were the poor performers among the small states while no UT scored less than 50.
• Overall, fund utilization under the scheme is low, with less than half of funds utilized in 23 States and UTs.
• Some of the key recommendations include expansion of coverage and improvement of quality of essential health and nutrition interventions by continuing to strengthen the ICDS and health platforms, demand creation to access and use of health and ICDS services through social and behavioural change components, convergence with key sectors, especially food and civil supplies via the public distribution system (PDS) and rural development via the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA), and community engagement. 

Featured Image: Government Data Roundup