Anushka Kogta, TwoCircles.net
New Delhi: A 16-month-old infant was found injured by her family, 800 meters away from their home near Delhi’s Tughlaq Lane, in February this year. She was declared dead upon arrival at the hospital. While the police attributed the incident to a stray dog attack, city activists have raised serious questions about the circumstances.
Ambika Shukla, an animal welfare advocate with the People for Animals India, alleged that the victim’s family owned a Pit Bull breed dog for aggressive purposes, which had a history of biting.
According to Jayant Anand, a former advocate at the High Court, a case should have been registered as a cognisable offense under Section 93 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).
Despite these claims, the police did not verify the allegations until two weeks later, when an officer was presented as an eyewitness to the incident. Shukla questioned, “How could a little girl get so far from her home in a gated community? There were no dog bite marks on the toddler’s body. The police did not produce any CCTV footage or eyewitness accounts at the time of the incident.”
The inspector in charge at Tughlaq Road Police Station declined to comment, citing the absence of the investigating officer who had been at the crime scene.
According to the National Crime Records Bureau’s (NCRB) 2022 report, cognisable crimes — allowing the police to make arrests without a warrant — rose by 16.33% from 2017 to 2022, increasing from 5 million to 5.8 million. Yet, half of all crimes in India go unreported, creating a distorted picture of crime rates due to systemic practices and limitations in police investigations. Factors such as “burking”, where the police intentionally avoid registering First Information Reports (FIRs), significantly contribute to this underreporting.
Despite India’s large population, it maintains a relatively low crime rate globally, ranking 61 among 193 countries according to the 2023 Organised Crime Index. Experts point to a pressing need for improvements in policing, the national criminal justice system and methodologies for collecting and analysing crime data.
Data on Crimes
| Year | Total Cognizable Crimes | Population (Million) | Crime Rate |
|——|————————-|———————-|————|
| 2017 | 5,007,044 | 1,354 | 388.6 |
| 2018 | 5,074,634 | 1,369 | 383.5 |
| 2019 | 5,156,172 | 1,383 | 385.5 |
| 2020 | 6,601,285 | 1,396 | 487.8 |
| 2021 | 6,096,310 | 1,408 | 445.9 |
| 2022 | 5,824,946 | 1,429 | 422.2 |
Crime Rate is calculated as crimes per one lakh of population (Source: NCRB)
The NCRB data encompasses crimes reported in states and union territories, as well as in 19 metropolitan cities with populations over two million. It focuses on cognizable crimes while excluding non-cognisable offenses, which are deemed less serious and require an arrest warrant for registration and investigation by the police. Serious crimes are classified into nine categories, including murder, kidnapping, crimes against women and children, property offenses, economic offenses and cybercrime.
Even cognisable crimes often go unrecorded, noted Colin Gonsalves, a senior advocate at the Supreme Court and founder of the Human Rights Law Network (HRLN). He highlighted the difficulty in comparing data across the selected 19 cities, given their vastly different population sizes. For instance, Kozhikode, Kochi and Coimbatore have populations around 2 million, while Kolkata, Delhi and Mumbai exceed 14 million each.
Burking of Crimes
A significant contributor to crime underreporting is the practice of “burking”, where the police deliberately avoid registering FIRs to portray a lower crime rate. This practice not only skews crime statistics but also denies justice to numerous victims.
The Supreme Court in Lalita Kumari v. Govt. of Uttar Pradesh (2013) estimated that the numbers for burking closely matched the number of registered FIRs.
Gonsalves emphasised the issue in rural and slum areas. “A significant number of crimes go unregistered, either due to intentional suppression by authorities or the reluctance of victims to approach the police.”
He added, “Only 10% of crimes are actually documented, with incidents involving women and children being particularly underreported.”
Anushaman Rai, a criminal lawyer practicing in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi, underscored the severity of certain offenses under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act. “Cases under sections such as 300 (offense of murder) and 302 (punishment for murder) are cognisable and non-bailable offenses,” he explained. “Police prioritise these sections because they are serious, ensuring justice for the public and protecting them from risks.”
Rai further clarified the distinction between state and complaint cases. “If the offense is serious and non-bailable, and the police, due to bias, do not register the complaint, it can be filed with the chief metropolitan magistrate (CMM) in Delhi or the chief judicial magistrate (CJM) in Bihar or UP. From there, a copy is sent to the superintendent of police, the district magistrate and the station house officer, leading to the eventual registration of an FIR.”
Delayed FIR Registration
Data from the 2015 Crime Victimisation and Safety Perception Survey by the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI) indicates that only two out of five victims report crimes to the police. Of those, only one FIR is officially registered.
Previously, Section 154 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) mandated police officers to register every report of a cognisable offense, whether oral or written. With the introduction of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), FIRs are now registered under Section 173 of the new code. It requires immediate action once an informant contacts the police.
According to a study by the South Asia Terrorism Portal, the police reports in India do not accurately reflect the total number of crimes, as many incidents go unreported by victims, and some police departments do not prioritise these reports.
Challenges in Justice Access
In his 2023 paper on the fallacy of crime data in India, K. Jaishankar, founding director and professor of the Criminology and Justice Sciences, noted that district superintendents of police and deputy commissioners often pressure lower-ranking officers weekly to show crime reduction. Inspectors may face transfers if crime rates increase, reflecting a failure to control crime.
Rai pointed out, “In many instances, people do not approach the police to register FIRs due to a lack of trust in the system. That is when they turn to lawyers for help.”
The 2015 CHRI report revealed that approximately 53.2% of crime cases in Delhi and 58.2% in Mumbai went unreported. Reasons include a desire to avoid involvement in legal processes, a belief that the police would not take their cases seriously due to insufficient evidence and fears of retaliation.
To address these issues, the CHRI and the Association for Advocacy and Legal Initiatives (AALI) recommended in their September 2020 report that the NCRB should include data on the types of crimes committed and the number of oral and written complaints received by the police.
(Anushka Kogta is a freelance journalist and a master’s student, pursuing convergent journalism at AJK Mass Communication Research Centre, Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi)