Last week on two consecutive days, robbers entered the house inhabited by two elderly women and committed robbery.
In one case two robbers entered a house in Sector-11 of MVP Colony decamped with about 350 gms of gold jewellery and ₹ 1 lakh in cash and a few others articles after holding hostage the 74-year-old woman, who was alone in the house.
In another incident, two persons came on a bike and entered a house inhabited by a 61-year-old woman and made good with 30 gms of gold jewellery.
Crime against elderly women is on the rise in the city, as well as in the state.
Andhra Pradesh stands in the fourth place when it comes to crime against senior citizens (above 60 years), after Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Tamil Nadu.
As per the latest statistics of National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), AP has recorded 1852, 2495 and 2243 crimes against the senior citizens in 2014, 2015 and 2016 respectively. And according to a senior police officer, Visakhapatnam heads the list in the State.
In this year, the city has recorded around six cases where senior citizens were robbed at their homes in places such as MVP Colony, Seethammadhara, JR Nagar, Lawson's Bay Colony and East Point Colony.
According to Three Town Police Station Inspector B. Venkat Rao, in many cases it has been seen that aged parents stay alone, as their children are settled abroad. In three cases, children of the aged parents were staying in some foreign country and the robbers conduct a recce before committing a crime.
ACP (East) Narasimha Murthy suggested that to keep robbers at bay such elderly couple should install CC TV cameras or some security system at home or at least keep a dog as pet. Moreover, they should not open the doors to unknown persons and always keep at hand the number of the closest police station.
Sumit Bhattacharjee
