Mr Nadda, you are wrong: Rajasthan, UP report more rapes

Union minister and officiating BJP president J.P. Nadda was parroting the usual party when he said West Bengal was reporting the highest number of rapes in the country. He also confidently claimed that he was merely quoting the NCRB (National Crimes Record Bureau) data. On both counts, he was guilty of spreading false information.

Between 2015 and 2022, the top 100 among 700 police districts in the country accounted for 45 per cent of the total reported rapes. Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan reported the highest number of cases during this period and dominated the top 100 districts.

In 2022, 22 districts in Rajasthan accounted for 15.2 per cent of the total rapes in India, followed by Uttar Pradesh with 5.1 per cent and Maharashtra with 4.9 per cent. West Bengal, for Mr Nadda’s information, accounted for just 0.9 per cent of the total. A fuller picture is provided by Rajasthan reporting 4,807 rapes in 2022 compared to 1,629 by Uttar Pradesh. 

An analysis of the NCRB data made by the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative has revealed that year after year, the same towns and districts in the same states have been reporting a high number of rapes. This calls for a sociological investigation to find out why rapes appear to be concentrated in the clusters or geography, says the analysis.

They, however, have failed to receive the kind of attention that the rape and murder of the junior doctor in R.G. Kar medical college and hospital in Kolkata has received.

Over 350 rape-and-murder cases registered by the police in the last five years in Kamrup (Assam), Latur (Maharashtra) and Meerut (Uttar Pradesh) have similarly failed to attract similar public or media attention, points out the CHRI analysis.

In 2021, Kamrup reported 24 rape-and-murder cases. In 2022, Meerut reported 18 rape-and-murder cases followed by 17 in Mathura (also in UP), and Chhindwara in Madhya Pradesh. Even Bongaigaon, again in Assam, reported 12 rape-and-murder cases and Morbi in Gujarat reported five.

Why are rape-and-murder cases so rampant in Kamrup or in Alwar (Rajasthan), asks CHRI, calling for more extensive research to look at the failure of preventive and punitive measures in these places.

The analysis also points out that women currently are made to shoulder the burden of preventing such crimes through self-defence training and raising IT-enabled alarms. There is little attempt to address the predatory instincts of men, those who commit such crimes.

With 14,247 cases in 2022, Delhi registered the highest rate of crimes against women in the country at 144.4 — way above the country’s average rate of 66.4. Such cases in the national capital stood at 14,277 in 2021 and 10,093 in 2020, the official data showed.

In absolute numbers, Uttar Pradesh (65,743) registered the maximum FIRs in cases of crimes against women in 2022, followed by Maharashtra (45,331), Rajasthan (45,058), West Bengal (34,738), and Madhya Pradesh (32,765). These five states together contributed to 2,23,635 (or 50.2 per cent) of the total cases lodged in India in 2022.

If Mr Nadda had cared to consult the NCRB data, he would have found that Delhi was the most unsafe city in the country and Kolkata the safest according to the NCRB annual report for 2022.