White-collar crimes on the rise

Economic offences and cyber crime constitute a major chunk of the crimes reported in the city last year. Mumbai commissioner of police Sanjeev Dayal sent a note of caution warning about the gradual growth of white-collar crimes.

Economic offences and cyber crime constitute a major chunk of the crimes reported in the city last year. Mumbai commissioner of police Sanjeev Dayal sent a note of caution warning about the gradual growth of white-collar crimes.

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“Cyber crime and economic offences are going to be the trends (of criminal activities) of tomorrow. Watch out for these,” Dayal said at the annual police press conference on Monday.

While the total amount of property damaged or lost in other criminal activities in the state is around Rs 218 crore, Rs 361 crore was lost only in economic offences in 2010, Dayal revealed. In 2009, Rs 180.9 crore was lost in economic offences.

Dayal said it was because of the involvement of more and more educated people. “On failure to secure well-paid jobs, these educated youths resort to crimes such as frauds and cheating. Both economic and cyber crimes mitigate the risks of street crime where chances of getting caught loom large.”

Registration of cyber crime has witnessed a 12-fold increase since 2006, Dayal said.

While six cyber crime cases were registered in 2006, the figure shot up to 76 in 2010. A total of Rs 1.27 crore was lost in such crimes. Dayal attributed the rise in registrations of these cases to both the opening of an exclusive cyber police station at Bandra-Kurla Complex and an increase in cyber crime.

The overall crime scene in the city also witnessed a steep rise in 2010 as compared to the previous year. HT had reported about this on January 2.

As against 30,987 serious offences, such as murder, rape and extortion, registered in the city in 2009, the figure stood at 33,645 in 2010. Dayal claimed that the increase in crime rate was because of “freer” registration of offences by police stations.

On the positive note, he said detection of such cases serious offences was also on the rise.

According to statistics, the city seems to have become unsafe for women according to statistics. As against 178 rape cases registered in 2009, the figure rose to 192 in 2010, of which 140 victims were minors.

But Dayal insisted that Mumbai was safer than any other city in the country.