There was an increase of 2.6% in crimes in 2016 compared to the previous year, according to the data released by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) on Thursday.
Uttar Pradesh recorded the highest number of heinous crimes such as murder and those against women in 2016. For the first time, the NCRB included data on the seizure of fake Indian currency notes in its report.
In 2016, a total of 2,81,839 fake notes with a face value of ₹15,92,50,181 were seized. Around 40% of these fake notes were seized from Delhi, followed by Gujarat (39,725 notes with a face value of ₹2,37,24,050) and West Bengal (32,869 notes having a face value of ₹2,32,95,800).
Rape cases recorded an increase of 12.4% from 34,651 cases in 2015 to 38,947 in 2016. Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh reported the maximum cases of rape at 4,882 (12.5%) and 4,816 (12.4%), followed by Maharashtra 4,189 cases (10.7%), the data, released by Home Minister Rajnath Singh, showed.
Uttar Pradesh registered 14.5% (49,262) of the total cases of crime against women, followed by West Bengal 9.6% (32,513 cases) in 2016.
Cases of crime against women have reported an increase of 2.9% in 2016 over 2015. Majority of these cases were reported under the heads of cruelty by husband or his relatives (32%), assault on women with intent to outrage her modesty (25%), kidnapping and abduction of women (19%), and rape (11.5%).
U.P. recorded 9.5 % of the total cases of crimes registered under the Indian Penal Code (IPC), followed by Madhya Pradesh (8.9 %), Maharashtra (8.8 %) and Kerala (8.7%).
Joint Director in the NCRB Surendra Panwar said a total of 48,31,515 cognisable crimes comprising 29,75,711 Indian Penal Code crimes and 18,55,804 special and local laws crimes were reported in 2016, showing an increase of 2.6% over 2015 (47,10,676 cases).
The total number of crimes against children in 2016 was 1,06,958, which is 13.6% more than 2015 (94,172 cases).
Juveniles
Cases reported under juveniles in conflict with the law have shown a mixed trend for the past three years with the decline of 13.1 % in 2015 (33,433 cases) over 2014 (38,455 cases), followed by an increase of 7.2 % in 2016 (35,849) over 2015.
A total of 7,369 cases (20.6 %) under juveniles in conflict with the law were reported in Madhya Pradesh, followed by 6,606 cases (18.4 %) in Maharashtra.
Atrocities against SCs, STs
Atrocities against Scheduled Castes have increased by 5.5 % (40,801 cases) in 2016 over 2015 (38,670 cases). Uttar Pradesh (10,426 cases) reported the highest number of cases of atrocities against Scheduled Castes, accounting for 25.6 % of total cases, followed by Bihar with 14 % (5,701 cases) and Rajasthan with 12.6 % (5,134 cases) in 2016.
Atrocities against Scheduled Tribes have increased by 4.7 % in 2016 (6,568 cases) over 2015 (6,276 cases). Madhya Pradesh (1,823 cases) reported the highest number of cases of atrocities against Scheduled Tribes accounting for 27.8 % of total such cases, followed by Rajasthan 18.2 % (1,195 cases) and Odisha 10.4 % (681 cases) in 2016, according to the NCRB data.
Riots
The cases of riots reported in 2016 were down by 5% compared to 2015. A total of 61,974 cases of riots and group clashes took place in the country in 2016 compared to 65,255 the previous year. The highest - 11,617 cases - were registered in Bihar, 8,018 in Uttar Pradesh and 7,898 in Maharashtra.
Custodial deaths
As many as 60 cases of custodial deaths or disappearance from lock-ups were reported in 2016 of which 12 were in Maharashtra, nine each in Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh, five in Madhya Pradesh, four in Punjab, three each in Tamil Nadu and Chhattisgarh and two in Rajasthan.
A total of 32 people also died or disappeared in the country last year while they were under the remand of the police. These included six each in Madhya Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh, four in Maharashtra and two each in Assam, Gujarat, Haryana and Tamil Nadu.
