Mumbai: As crime in the city goes up and the conviction rate for serious offences goes down to a dismal seven per cent in 2012 from 10 per cent in 2011, a large percentage of Mumbai’s residents say they feel unsafe in their own city and even more find their neighbourhoods unsafe for women, children and senior citizens.
Crime against women in particular has risen, with cases of rape and molestation going up from 43 per cent in 2011-12 to 57 per cent in 2012-13, according to a survey — State of Policing and Law and Order in Mumbai by Praja Foundation. Even molestation of women in trains rose by 200 per cent in 2012 from the previous year.
The non-partisan organisation’s founder-trustee, Nitai Mehta, said, “In our last year’s report on the state of crime in Mumbai, we had argued the need for Mumbai Police to augment its investigation prowess. Alas, our report on the state of policing in Mumbai this year finds that the city is woefully short of investigative personnel.”
He said the quality of investigation is suffering due to a shortage of officers. In addition, due to delays in cases in courts and hostile witnesses, a low conviction rate is affecting people’s morale. “Is this a kind of society we [want to be] building that allows criminals to go scot free? When a criminal knows that he or she has a 93 per cent chance of not being punished, he’ll certainly commit crime again.”
Investigation for crimes is generally carried out by police sub-inspectors (PSI) and assistant police inspectors (API). Data garnered from all police stations within the Mumbai region reveals that a shocking 50 per cent gap exists between personnel sanctioned and actual postings of these two designations. Of the 3,125 PSIs sanctioned across all police stations, only 1,319 PSIs are actually posted as of July 2013 — a gap of 58 per cent. APIs fare only slightly better — of the 1,002 sanctioned only 732 APIs are actually working.
“With such a huge shortage of PSIs and APIs, it is little wonder that charge sheets are not being filed for lack of investigation of crimes,” Milind Mhaske, project director, said.
In 2012, Mumbai Police had registered a total of 6,151 serious offences including murder, rape, grievous harm, kidnapping and others, that are pending investigation. The researchers also found out that there is a 14 per cent shortage of police personnel across all departments and the worst hit is the Police Control Room at 52 per cent. “The Control Room is the heart of policing process in a city. Unfortunately, of the 267 personnel sanctioned for the control room, only 127 are working as of July 2013. This needs to be addressed urgently,” said Mehta.
Praja’s survey of 24,694 households revealed that 21 per cent of residents feel unsafe in their own city and over 22 per cent feel their own neighbourhoods are unsafe for women, children and senior citizens. People living in South Central Mumbai — that includes Chembur, Sion-Koliwada and Mahim — feel the most unsafe whilst residents of North Mumbai — Borivali, Dahisar and Malad West — feel the most safe.
