Crimes against Women: Delhi continues to report the most Crimes for every lakh Women
Sai Krishna Muthyanolla
September 29, 2017
While Uttar Pradesh reported the most number of crimes against women, Delhi with thrice the national average continues to report the most crimes against women for every lakh women.
The Nirbhaya incident in 2012 brought infamy to Delhi as an unsafe place for women. Even after 5 years, data indicates that Delhi continues to report the most number of cases of crime against women for every lakh women. It is the only state along with Assam that has reported more than 100 crimes against women for every lakh women, in each of the years from 2014 to 2016.
Only 3 states report more than 30000 crimes against women
In 2016, a total of 3.52 lakh crimes were reported against women. This is about 20000 more than the number of crimes reported in 2015. Uttar Pradesh reported the most number of crimes (48757) followed by West Bengal & Maharashtra respectively. Uttar Pradesh & West Bengal are the only two states that have reported more than 30000 crimes against women in each of the years from 2014 to 2016. A total of six (6) states reported more than 20000 crimes each in 2016 while 14 states reported more than 10000 crimes each.
The six states of Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh & Assam accounted for 55% of all the crimes reported against women while they together account for 47% of the total female population in the country. Of all the states with more than a crore female population, Punjab reported the least number of crimes against women.
Uttar Pradesh has the best Conviction Rate of the bigger States
Conviction rate is defined as the percentage of cases that resulted in conviction out of the cases whose trial was complete in a particular year. In terms of conviction rate in cases of crime against women, some of the North-Eastern states are way ahead of the rest of the states. Mizoram has reported a conviction rate of more than 75% in each of 2014, 2015 and 2016, the best for any state.
Of the bigger states with more than 50 lakh female population, Uttar Pradesh reported a conviction rate of more than 50% consistently. Uttarakhand, which was previously part of Uttar Pradesh also reported more than 40% conviction rate on a consistent basis. The conviction rate in both these states is more than twice the national average conviction rate. Of the states that reported more than 10000 cases of crime against women, both Karnataka & West Bengal reported a conviction rate of less than 5% in 2016, the lowest for such states.
Delhi continues to report the most Crimes against Women for every lakh Women
If the number of cases of crime against women is normalized with the female population, Delhi continues to report the most number of crime against women for every one lakh women. While the national average stands at 60 crimes per lakh women in 2016, Delhi reported more than thrice this number at 197 crimes per lakh women. In 2015, Delhi reported more than 200 crimes per lakh women, the only such instance till date. Only Delhi & Assam have consistently reported more than 100 crimes against women per lakh women in each of the last 3 years.