More than 370,000 cases of crimes against women reported in 2020, says govt

A total of 371,503 cases of crimes against women were registered across the country last year, the government told the Parliament on Wednesday, citing data from the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB).

The ministry of women and child development shared the data in response to a question from CPI(M) lawmaker Jharna Das Baidya in the Rajya Sabha. Baidya sought to know about data on crimes against women from last year.

The data shows that in 2020, 398,620 persons were arrested in connection with crimes against women, 488,143 were charge-sheeted, and 31,402 were convicted.

Also, instances of crimes against women in the cities went down by 8.3% in 2020 over the previous year.

Crimes against women include cases of rape, outraging modesty, dowry deaths, harassment, acid attacks, and kidnappings.

Among states and Union territories, Uttar Pradesh saw the highest number of such cases, with 49,385, followed by West Bengal (36,439), Rajasthan (34,535), Maharashtra (31,954) and Madhya Pradesh (25,640).

According to the NCRB report released in September and cited by the government on Wednesday, “Majority of cases under crimes against women were registered under [the category of] cruelty by husband or his relatives (30.2%), followed by assault on women with intent to outrage modesty (19.7%), kidnapping and abduction of women (19.0%), and rape (7.2%).”

Asked about steps taken by the government to swiftly ensure justice to victims of such crimes, the ministry said, “The Central government gives highest priority to ensuring safety and security of women and has undertaken various legislative and schematic interventions in this regard.” It also pointed out that police and public order are state subjects.

The ministry said the government has put in place what is called “Investigation Tracking System for Sexual Offences”, an online analytic tool for monitoring probes. Separately, a national database of sexual offenders has been created.