At a time when Parliament witnessed heated debate over gangrape of a medical college student in Delhi, alarming figures related to crime against women in Maharashtra were disclosed in the state Legislature on Tuesday.
More than 46,000 such cases were registered in the state in two years. But State Home Minister R R Patil said that the figures were not high. Patil said that there was no increase in numbers as being claimed by the Congress MLCs. Patil justified his claim by citing the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) statistics according to which Maharashtra stood at sixth position in crime against women.
The state had logged 46,153 cases of crime against women in two years from 2009 to 2011. Patil was confronted by the MLCs with statistics sourced the NCRB.
Interestingly, the embarrassing statistics were provided by the Congress MLCs in the Legislative Council. Congress MLCs Mohan Joshi, Sanjay Dutt and Bhai Jagtap had raised the issue.
Patil said that state has been taking several measures to prevent crimes against women including setting up helplines and appointing a committee headed by retired Justice C S Dharmadhikari. The Dharmadhikari committee which has set up to suggest measures to prevent crimes against women has already submitted two interim reports. The figures related to missing children were also high in the state with 40,516 such cases in the same period.