NCRB’s report on crime against women
- Hueiyen Lanpao Editorial :: July 07, 2014 -

From daily report of crime and violence against women and young girls coming in from different parts of the State, to say that Manipur has registered a downward trend in cases of crime against women among the North-eastern States sounds anachronistic.

Of course, this claim of National Crimes Records Bureau (NCRB) was based on the data collected from the police during the year 2013.

According to the Crime in India 2013 Report of National Crimes Records Bureau (NCRB), while six of the eight North-eastern states have seen significant increased in crimes against women last year as compared to previous years with Assam on top of the list, the remaining two States, namely Manipur and Mizoram have recorded a slide in crimes against women with the incident rate in the former falling to 285 from 304 while the latter saw it dropped from 199 to 177.

The report further said while all other North-eastern States including Manipur saw increased in the incidents of rape, Mizoram was the only State in the region which witnessed a drop in rape case from 103 to 89.

This is, perhaps, why one can’t do away with the anachronistic feeling on the report of National Crimes Records Bureau when it comes to the part of Manipur where almost every single day brings in some news reports on either killing or raping of some women or girls somewhere in the State without even sparing innocent minor girls.

As we have stated, this annual report of the National Crimes Records Bureau (NCRB) is based on the data collected from the respective State Police Department.

So, at the most, one can only look upon this as official figure. But the ground reality is quite a different thing with many of the cases not reported to the police or brought to the notice of media or settled mutually among the parties concerned quietly.

For the current year itself, Women Action for Development (WAD), an NGO working in the field women and child issues in Manipur, has recorded as many as 147 cases of crime against women including rape, murder, physical assault, molestation, etc from January to June.

While various factors like misuse of technology, delayed in delivery of justice, poor economic condition and imposition of the controversial Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, etc that are fuelling crime against women in Manipur, lack of human rights and gender equality education in police training and non-implementation of gender issues in education are also adding to the problem.

All these called for a specific policy that aims at bringing about a structural change in the system to ensure people are well aware of gender equality issues.

Ensuring speedy trial of cases of crime against women so that the perpetrators are given their due punishment is another measure that the Government should think of for putting a brake on the galloping rate of crime against women, regardless of whether the data on the crime incidents is provided by the police or an NGO.