NEW DELHI – Delhi retained its tag of the country’s rape capital, topping the list of 35 major cities in the country reporting the highest number of rape cases (414) in 2010. Mumbai was next with 194 cases, followed by Pune (91), Jabalpur, Bhopal and Jaipur.
Incidents of crime have increased by 4.9% in 2010 over the previous year to 22.24 lakh but the three gory crimes — murder, attempt to murder and rape — account for just 4% of all registered offences.
According to National Crime Records Bureau’s (NCRB) report presented to Union Home Minister P Chidambaram on Thursday, crimes had grown at 25.6% over the last decade while the population only grew by 18.3% in the same period.
A total of 33,335 people were murdered in 2010, 3% more as compared to 2009. The report says attempt to commit murder increased by 1.3%, rape cases increased by 3.6% and robbery cases increased by 4.4%.
The report also pointed out that incidence of kidnapping and crimes against children were increasing much faster than other serious crimes such as murder. Kidnapping and abduction cases increased by 13.5% while cases of crimes against children has also gone up by 10.3%.
An official later said the higher rate of increase could also reflect inadequate reporting rather than increase in incidence. Nationwide, the police only logged in 26,694 cases of crimes against children in 2010.
Another report said 15 suicides occur every hour in India. A majority (69.2%) of the suicide victims are married while 30.8% unmarried. One suicide out of every 5 is committed by a housewife.
“Social and economic causes have led most of the males to commit suicide whereas emotional and personal causes have driven females to end their lives,” the report said.
