Devbrat Patnaik

Bhubaneswar: Despite several measures by the Commissionerate Police to minimise crimes in the twin cities of Bhubaneswar and Cuttack, it was shocking to see that the crime rate in 2018 has increased by almost 5 per cent as compared to the triennial average (TA) of crimes reported in 2015, 2016 and 2017.

The annual crime rate statistics was released by Twin City Police Commissioner Satyajit Mohanty today.

While crimes like murder, robbery, rape, accidents have increased, police have managed to reduce the instances of burglary, theft, swindling and riots, Mohanty said, adding that rising population, urbanisation, employment crisis have been the major factors which have altered the crime rate.

"In Bhubaneswar, 7219 cases have been registered in 2018 against the TA of 7151, so there's an incease in crime rate by 0.9%. But if we consider the cases under Commissionerate Police which includes Cuttack, the crime rate goes up by 5% as 11,530 cases were registered in toto against the TA of 10,972."

However, Mohanty stated that the reason behind this is the increase in non-preventable crimes, rape being the major of them with a steep rise of 26%. Most of the rapes have happened in cases of elopement and love or either by someone close to the victim's family.

The Commissioner also compared Odisha's average with the national average and said we live in a safer city and in a safer State. "All India statistics reveal that 340 crimes occur per one lac population, which is around 250-260 here in Odisha. While the average in urban areas outside is somewhere around 720 per one lac people, the average in urban areas in Odisha stands around 500," he mentioned.

Mohanty further said that prophylactic measures would be taken to handle the situation during the upcoming polls. "We have set a target which will be reviewed in every 15 days. All the anti-social elements against whom cases were registered ahead of previous elections or those having the potential of creating trouble, will be under the scanner. All their anti-social history sheet will be checked," he stated.

Crime Rate Statistics:

Murder rate has increased by 7.5% as 43 murder cases were reported in 2018 against the TA of 40.

Dacoity rate has increased by 25% as 27 dacoity cases were reported against TA of 21.6

Similarly, robbery rate has also increased by 5.8%. Total 194 robbery have been reported in 2018 against the TA of 183.

However, there has been a slight decrease in burglary(by 6.9%), theft (by 2.9%) and swindling cases (by 3.8%). Total 229 burglary cases were reported in 2018 against the TA of 246, 1555 theft cases against TA of 1594, and 584 swindling cases against TA of 607.

This apart, the Commissionerate Police has registered numerous suo motu cases along with arresting notorious criminals in the investigation process. In excise cases, 1067 persons were arrested, 50 cases were registered under Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act (NDPS) and 83 arrested, 105 cases were registered under illegal arms act and 138 persons arrested.

Another interesting report Mohanty presented was that the Commissionerate Police has received as many as 15,64,125 phone calls last year from PCR (dial 100). "Of those, dead bodies have been recovered on 66 occassions, 2147 persons have been rescued in critical condition. So in a way one can say that we are also working as an alternative of 108 ambulance services," he said.

Going by the statistics, Mohanty also highlighted, "We have rescued 270 distressed people from shelter homes, 412 drunken persons were shifted to hospitals, rescued senior citizens and women on 255 occassions and there were 530 such instances where criminals were caught red handed after receiving a tip-off."

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