Once again united Andhra Pradesh is in news. This time also for the wrong reasons as the state recorded the maximum number of crimes committed against women in the previous year 2013.
The latest data released by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) on Tuesday shows, the undivided state was second in position next to Maharashtra in cyber crimes where once again most of the victims were women.
However successive governments had asserted that safety of women was their top priority, when it comes to crimes against the fairer sex the undivided AP is in the same confederacy as notorious states like West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh.
The state in 2013 recorded 32,809 incidents of crime against women, the highest in the country as against 28,171 instances the previous year (2012). Uttar Pradesh had recorded 32,546 incidents, whereas West Bengal was third with 29,826 cases.
As per NCRB data, the state recorded 1,635 rapes (five per day), 15,084 domestic violence incidents, 1,595 kidnappings. Regarding rape, in 800 cases the wrongdoer were known to the victims.
In kidnapping incidents in the age group of 10 and 50, were female victims are 10 to 20 times more than male. However, once the age group crosses 50, the number of female victims drops way below the number of male victims, clearly indicating the exposure of women to human trafficking in the state.
“Marriage and illicit intercourse” were cited as the prime factors for kidnapping as per NCRB statistics regarding kidnapping of woman.
In case of women trafficking, the state holds the second position after Tamil Nadu with 489 cases.
Andhra Pradesh also occupied second stand in cyber crime (651) and Visakhapatnam (175) and Hyderabad (160) hold second and third positions in the number of cyber offence cases recorded in major cities across the country.
Sexual harassment and Eve teasing were the main motives behind cyber crime with 225 cases registered under this category.
RP Thakur, Additional Director-General (Law and Order) of Residuary Andhra Pradesh admitted that a lot needs to be done to control the crime against women.
“Since registration of FIR has been made hassle-free, the numbers might be high. In AP, a new system will come up to address grievances of women and the modalities are being worked out,” Thakur said.