An umpteen number of promises were made by the ruling party of the State to ensure protection for women and girl child of the state but all those announcements are just to say once and then forget forever. The recent report released by The National Crime Records Bureau, Ministry of Home Affairs for 2007 revealed that Madhya Pradesh bags the 4th position in terms of total incidences of crimes against women and girls. A comparative analysis of crime has been done including 35 States and Union Territories in India. Also, the analysis of crimes in 35 mega cities has been included in the report.

During 2007, total 185312 incidents of crime against women (both under IPC and SLL) were reported in the country while the cases of crimes reported against women and were 164765 during the year 2006. It means that this year the rate of crime has increased to 16.3 from 14.7 during 2006. There has been a continuous increasing trend in the number of crimes against women from 2003 to 2007 with 140601 cases in 2003 and reaching 185312 in 2007. In Madhya Pradesh the total 15370 numbers of crime incidences have been recorded against women while Andhra Pradesh tops the list with 24738 number of crime cases against women followed by Uttar Pradesh (20993) and West Bengal (16544) respectively being at second and third positions.

During the year, 3010 incidences of rape and 6772 of molestations against women accounting the highest numbers in nation were registered in Madhya Pradesh. Also, the state is at third slot in the cases of dowry deaths with 742 incidences of deaths due to dowry following after Uttar Pradesh (2076) and Bihar (1172). Moreover, the state accounts for 5.2 % of the total incidences under Child Marriage Restraint Act (1978). Other than these, procuration of minor girls in the State accounts for 6.32% and selling of girls for prostitution accounts for 2.9% out of the total nation’s data.

Among the cities of Madhya Pradesh, the commercial city Indore, the State capital Bhopal and Jabalpur were included in the list of 35 mega cities selected for crime analysis and it has been reported that Indore is at 15th rank with 597 total incidences of crimes against women. Also, Indore is at third place accounting for 74 numbers of rape cases. Bhopal and Jabalpur are at 19th and 20th positions with 436 and 374 number of total incidences of crime against women, respectively.

All these show the grim reality of the status of protection of women and girls in the State. Still, it is a distant dream for the women and girls of the state to live in a protective environment and life with dignity!

12 children of the state are victims to some kind of crimes daily!

Crime against Children in Madhya Pradesh

It’s an alarming fact that in Madhya Pradesh 12 cases of crimes against children are recorded daily. It means 330 children in a month and 4290 children in a year are victims of crime in the State. And with these data, the National Crime Records Bureau report released in 2007 says that the State obtained the top position in the country in terms of crime against children.

Though the government of Madhya Pradesh under the lead of Shivraj Singh Chouhan (Chief Minister) claims a lot for the sure protection of children and women but the still the State is at top in terms of crime against children. The cases of crime reported in State are 4290 which accounts for 21.3% of total cases of crime against children followed by Maharashtra with 2707 (13.3%) number of crime cases and Uttar Pradesh with 2248 (11%) number of crime cases being at second and third positions respectively.

Indore, the commercial city of Madhya Pradesh, is at 2nd position in the city-wise data following the nation’s capital Delhi which ranks at top in crime cases against children. Total 440 (9.4%) incidences of crime committed against children were reported in Indore while these incidences for Delhi are 1742 (37.4%) during the year.

The incidences of sexual abuse with children accounts for the maximum cases of crime, the number being 1043. It means that every day three children of the State are exposed to the sexual abuse. Also, 283 cases of children kidnapping have been reported during the year. Moreover, 21% cases of infanticide and 6.3 % cases of girl-child prostitution were registered in the State. The State also accounts for 2.9% of outrageous cases of selling girl child for prostitution. Other than this, there are an umpteen number of cases regarding foeticide, child marriage and crime against street children have been reported in the State.

Rajiv Bhargava of Bachpan-an organization working for child right’s protection says that India has signed and ratified the United Nation Child Rights Treaty in 1992 which declare for a better and protective milieu for all the children. And being a nation all the States of the country ultimately are also responsible for this treaty. But unfortunately no concrete steps have ever been taken in Madhya Pradesh to counter the crimes against children. Even the State’s step regarding the Juvenile Justice Act which provides protection to child’s right is very sluggish. Rajiv further added that children are never in the priority of the policies of government because they don’t form the vote banks.

According to a recent survey done by Bachpan organization, in Madhya Pradesh daily 3 new children at an average join the platform children’s population and this number grows to 1000 in the end of the year. And most of the crime cases are reported against these children. The government should take decisive steps to protect these children and priority should be given to identify and overcome the very reasons which promote these children to fly off from there homes.

All these concurrent situations of crime against children in the State are a tough challenge for the elected government and some substantial steps must be taken to counter the problem of crime against children.

[This infopack is based on the National Crime Record Bureau Report – 2007]

Prashant Dubey and Smriti