This blog is part of a series on crimes against women, and current legal and administrative safeguards. The first blog can be found here.  

In my last blog I had highlighted the different kinds of crimes against women and the fact that these crimes are interrelated. The main question is whether the solutions to rape can be found in an isolated fashion, without considering the best way to tackle other interrelated crimes that were described in the previous blog. To address this question, one needs to look at the patterns in the numbers of crimes reported and the action taken on them.

Undertaking an analysis of the crime statistics is a tedious task. As related in last week’s blog, there are a bewildering array of crimes against women under several separate legislations. Though many of these are interrelated, the effort to bunch them together on the basis of their similarity is not undertaken in detail. Instead, in most cases, the data is presented for each piece of legislation, even though the crime concerned is similar to another, which is classified under a separate law. 

In order to overcome these impediments, I undertook a classification on the basis of the nature of the crimes reported and came up with seven categories of crimes against women, and related crimes against children. Each category in turn comprises several different crimes, which may or may not be treated under the same law. 

I formed seven categories of crimes against women as follows (Table 1):

Using this categorisation, a study of the patterns of crimes against women became readily apparent, as detailed in Table 2.

Table 2: (Please note: Table numbers refer to the tables contained in the crimes statistics)

When related crimes are put together, the real dimension of the problem of rape stands out. According to the NCRB report, rape crimes account for only 7 percent of all crimes against women However, the moment that rape related crimes are taken together, such as gang rapes, rapes of children, that are prosecuted under the POCSO act, and attempts to rape are added, 18 percent of all crimes against women fall into this category.

A further break up of all cases that fall within the ‘rape related’ category that I had put together, reveals the following pattern. (Table 3)

While rape of women above 18-years-old constitutes nearly 34 per cent of the cases reported, rapes of minors and children constitute 59.5 per cent of all cases. Clearly, children and minor girls are very vulnerable and are victimized. 

What emerges is the clear pattern of most crimes against women arising from the domination of men over women. Rape is the most heinous form of such domination, but the stage is set through cruelty, often at home, assaults, abduction and trafficking. Rape does not occur in isolation of these, and the numbers of rapes are significant, even though it is not readily apparent from the crime statistics.