2023 NCRB data: Murder, rape fall, cybercrimes rise

Of the 6.24 million criminal cases that the 2023 report recorded, 3.76 million were those under the Indian Penal Code (IPC), up 5.7% after falling in the 2021 and 2022

A crime in India was committed every five seconds in 2023 and the total number of crimes swelled 7.2% from the previous year to 6.24 million, government data said on Monday, underlining that dangerous crimes such as murder or rape declined even as forgery, cheating, fraud, rash driving and cyber crimes ballooned.

Crimes against women remained largely flat, rising a modest 0.7%. The case was similar for crimes against scheduled castes, which rose by 0.4%. (Representational Image)

The National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) released Crime in India 2023 on Monday evening after a gap of two years.

Of the 6.24 million criminal cases that the 2023 report recorded, 3.76 million were those under the Indian Penal Code (IPC), up 5.7% after falling in the 2021 and 2022. Another 2.48 million cases were registered under Special and Local Laws (SLL), which increased 9.5% from 2022.

“Major increase is seen in the cases registered under Obstruction on Public way (Sec.283 IPC) from 93,548 cases in 2022 to 151,469 cases in 2023 and under ‘thefts’ from 652,731 cases in 2022 to 689,580 cases in 2023. Similarly under SLL category, major increase is in cases registered under Motor Vehicle Act from 94,450 cases in 2022 to 191,828 cases in 2023,” the report said.

Murder declined 2.8%, abductions rose 5.6% and crimes against children spiked by 9.2%.

Crimes against women remained largely flat, rising a modest 0.7%. The case was similar for crimes against scheduled castes, which rose by 0.4%. But crimes against scheduled tribes saw a spurt of 28.8%. Cyber crimes soared by 31.2% and offences against the State dropped by 13.2%.

This is the last full year when the CII report will capture IPC crimes. The new Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita was passed by Parliament in 2023 and came into effect in July 2024.

To be sure, the year-on-year changes in the headline number of crimes in the years starting 2020 can be somewhat misleading. This is because 2020 saw an unusual 28% growth in crime due to a spike in cases lodged against people who violated Covid-19 norms during the pandemic, a caveat highlighted in the 2020 report.

If the sections related to such violations were left out, 2020 showed a 9.5% decline in criminal cases. However, crimes jumped every year thereafter: 9.5% in 2021, 7.2% in 2022, and 8% in 2023.

Which offences led to the growth in crimes in 2023?

IPC crimes are bunched in seven major groups. Among groups with around 5% share in total IPC crimes, Offences against the human body registered the slowest growth rate, increasing only 2.3% to 1.19 million.

The group with the fastest rise was that of miscellaneous IPC crimes, which includes offences ranging from rash driving to cruelty by husband or his relatives. This category registered a 9.6% increase to 1.14 million cases. Other IPC crimes registered the second-fastest spurt of 8.2% to nearly 317,000 cases. Offences relating to documents and property marks, which is made up almost completely of forgery cheating and fraud, soared 6.2% to over 182,000 cases in 2023.

Cases relating to murder, Culpable homicide not amounting to murder and attempt to commit murder decreased by 1%-3%. To be sure, cases registered under “attempt to commit culpable homicide” made up for this decline, as it leaped 18%; increasing the overall figure under the four murder and homicide related sections by a marginal 0.23% to 99,781.

Bodily offences that specifically relate to women – dowry deaths, rape, attempt to commit rape, and assault on women with intent to outrage her modesty – also declined as a category. Only outraging modesty registered a modest growth of 0.7%. Attempt to commit rape dropped 15%, rape” declined 5.9%, and dowry deaths 4.6%.

What were the miscellaneous crimes that rose?

Among major heads in the group that have a 5% share, cases under obstruction on public way increased fastest: 62% over the 2022 figure to 151,469. Criminal intimidation and rash driving on public way increased 10.8% and 7.5% to 167,000 and 526,500, respectively.

Among the common SLL groups of crimes, cases under information technology or intellectual property-related acts registered the biggest jump (36%).

This spike was largely because of cases under the Information Technology Act, as it made up over 96% of the cases in this group. This was followed by cases under environment and pollution–related acts, which registered a 30.4% growth, and children and related-acts, which recorded a jump of 15%.

The upswing in IT Act cases directly relates to an important theme-based statistic that the Crime In India report publishes: Cybercrimes. Cyber crimes soared 31% to 86,420 cases in 2023, faster than the 24% growth registered in 2022.

IT Act related cases were majorly responsible for this. They held a 35% share in the growth of cyber crimes between 2021 and 2022 but contributed 60% to the growth between 2022 and 2023. The biggest chunk of IT Act cases was related to cheating by personation by using computer resource, which almost doubled between 2022 and 2023, increasing from 13,506 cases to 25,334 cases.

Crimes against women increased 0.7% to 448,211 and those relating to scheduled caste people increased 0.4% to 57,789.

The report also noted the police and court disposal of cases, both of which changed only marginally. The proportion of disposed IPC cases where charge sheets were filed increased marginally from 71.3% to 72.7%. But IPC cases pending investigation also rose: From 28% to 29.2%. Chargesheeting rate and pendency percentage was 91.9% and 27.9%, respectively for SLL crimes. These numbers were 92.9% and 25.6% respectively in 2022.

Conviction rate of IPC and SLL crimes by courts was 54% and 78%, respectively. These numbers were 54.2% and 77.3% respectively in 2022.