Heinous crimes declined by nearly 12%: Police reports

New Delhi: In its annual press conference, Delhi police on Wednesday said that there has been 11.72% decline in heinous crime in the national Capital, according to the latest figures released.

In 2016, this number was 7,911 while in 2017, it came down to 6125 and in 2018, it was 5,407.

Dacoity, murder, attempt to murder, robbery, rioting, kidnapping for ransom are considered as a heinous crime.

Police said that due to their effective strategy of crime control like identification of hot spots, identification of active criminals and close surveillance of known criminals, the criminal activities have declined.

"Total heinous crime have declined by 11.72% while dacoity has declined by 36.11%. Attempt to murder by 16.26%, robbery by 20.15 %, rape has declined by 0.78% in comparison to last year," said Satish Golcha, Special CP Crime.

Murder cases, on the contrary, registered a small uptick as compared to 2017 which saw a 3.25% increase. During the year of 2018, 477 cases of murder were registered as compared to 462 cases in 2017. Police said that out of the registered cases 86.16 % were solved.

There has also been a decline in crimes against women as 5,787 cases were registered in 2018 compared to 5,955 in 2017, the Delhi Police said in its annual press conference.

The Delhi Police attributed the decline in crime against women to various safety measures such as Himmat App, Sashakti initiative and programmes for awareness and education, along with last mile connectivity, lighting the dark stretches as well as including self-defence in the school curriculum. It asserted that there has been a substantial increase in the arrests in cases.

Though, there has been 0.78% decline in rape cases. It has been found that friends of the woman or family's friends were the prime offenders which accounted for 43.47% (880 cases) of the cases registered against them.

The offenders also included live-in (650 cases) partners and those who refused to

marry.

Unknown and stranger accused in rape cases were only 2.50% of the total rape cases registered.

Delhi police also reported a 17.39% decline in heinous crimes against north east residents, down from 23 reported cases in 2017 to 19 in 2018.