HYDERABAD: With 29.2 economic offences per 1 lakh population in Telangana, the State recorded the highest crime rate for the same, according to recently released National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) 2017 data. There has also been a consistent increase in the number of economic offences in the last three years.
Crime rate shows the density of crimes in proportion to its population. So though the total number of economic offences in the State (10,840) is much lower than that of Uttar Pradesh (20,717), when the population of the States are taken into consideration, the rate of Telangana is much higher. The only other State with equal rate of economic offences as that of Telangana is Tamil Nadu.
Meanwhile, the State also saw a steady increase in economic offences, even as many other states saw a decrease. In 2015, the State reported 8,979 cases, in 2016, the number increased to 9,286 and in 2017, the cases stood at 10,840.
In the State, the maximum number of economic offence cases were related to forgery, cheating and fraud (10,147). There were many people who were booked for ‘criminal breach of trust’. Majority of the forgery, cheating and fraud cases caused citizens loss of property below Rs 1 lakh. The State has also reported 62 high profile cheating cases where a sum between Rs 50 lakh and Rs 10 crore was reported to be stolen.