Crimes against women increasing: Rajnath Singh

Home Minister Rajnath Singh today said there has been an increase in crimes against women, most of which related to cruelty by husband or relatives, besides stalking in cyberspace and morphing of images for pornographic contents.
Addressing a meeting of the consultative committee of MPs attached to the Home Ministry, Singh said a number of steps have been taken by the government to tackle crimes against women by amending the criminal law to provide for quicker trial and enhanced punishment for criminals committing sexual assault of extreme nature against women.
There has been an increase in the number of crimes against women, he told the members of the Parliament.

During the meeting, the Home Ministry made a detailed presentation on the subject -- Human Trafficking and Safety and Security of Women -- for the members.
Quoting the National Crime Records Bureau, the Home Ministry presentation said the maximum number of crimes against women registered was related to cruelty by husband or relatives, which constitute more than 1/3rd of the total registered crimes followed by assault on women to outrage their modesty and kidnapping and abduction.
"Crimes against women in the cyber space are also on the rise and women can be victimised in the cyber space. Some perpetrators try to defame women by sending obscene e-mails, stalking women by using chat rooms, developing pornographic videos where women are depicted adversely, morphing of images for pornographic content etc," an official release said.

Referring to the Home Ministry's campaign 'Operation Smile' launched in January this year throughout the country to rescue missing children, the Home Minister said after its remarkable achievement, a similar campaign titled 'Operation Muskaan' was rolled out in July and over 27,000 children were rescued.
Singh informed the members that the Home Ministry has taken various initiatives such as setting up of Anti-Human Trafficking Units (AHTUs) to investigate cases related to human trafficking and capacity building of law enforcement agencies and regular meeting with State Nodal officers.
The Ministry has also issued various comprehensive advisories to all States, UTs, border states and Border Security Force, Sashastra Seema Bal to involve in district crime meetings to improve the effectiveness in tackling human trafficking and to increase the response of the law enforcement machinery, he said.