How India’s Low Conviction Rates are Fueling the Rape Pandemic
In 2012, the brutal gang rape of a 23-year-old in the heart of Delhi shocked the nation and led to collective outrage as people took to the streets to demand justice for ‘Nirbhaya’. The convicts were eventually awarded the death penalty and it was widely believed that capital punishment would act as a deterrent against such heinous crimes.
Cut to 2020 and we are on the roads again over the alleged rape and murder of a 19-year-old Dalit woman in UP’s Hathras by four upper-caste men. As our conscience is once again left bloodied and brutalised, we tried to tap into the mood of the society about the punishment that should be meted out to the accused.
According to a poll conducted by Original Women Network, majority of participants agreed that capital punishment was the way forward for India to nip the menace of crimes against women in the bud. But as the Hathras case as well as the Balrampur and several cases after that show, death penalty is never a deterrent.
It has been over a month since the 19-year-old lost her life but all we’ve heard so far is political mudslinging, defaming the victim and the cacophony of TV channels debating caste politics. Amid the din, what seems to have escaped the notice of all is the desperate cry for justice by the woman’s family.
Rape is the fourth most common crime against women in India. According to the 2019 National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) report, the year saw over 4 lakh reported cases of crimes committed against women, up from 3.78 lakh in 2018 and 3.59 lakh cases in 2017. NCRB reported 32,033 rape cases, which translates to a shocking 88 rape cases a day — and this is just 10% of all crimes against women.
To add to this, NCRB says 71% of rape cases go unreported. The reasons for this vary from stigma, family pressure to influence exerted by the accused.
According to a Thompson Reuters survey in 2018, India was ranked first and named the world’s most dangerous country for women. That’s certainly a dubious distinction for a country that worships women as goddesses.
What makes matter worse is not just the nature of the crime but also the country’s poor conviction rate. In India, conviction rate stood at just 27.2%. Nine of 10 accused of sexual offences are let off in states like West Bengal, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Gujarat, Odisha and Karnataka, say statistics.
Even among those convicted and awarded capital punishment, for instance in the 2012 Nirbhaya case, the jury stands divided on the efficacy of death sentence to rapists.
Vani Subramanian, from women empowerment group Saheli, was quoted as saying by news agency PTI that sexual assaults occur “with frightening regularity in this country”. “We need to evolve punishments that act as true deterrents to the very large number of men who commit these crimes,” she said, adding, “The low conviction rate shows that perpetrators of sexual violence enjoy a high degree of impunity, including being freed of charges.”
Her sentiment was echoed by Annie Raja, women’s rights activist and CPI leader, who said increasing the number of fast-track courts cannot be the only solution to the low conviction rate in cases of sexual violence. “Cases come to courts after inquiries and witness report and then only court gives its verdict,” she said. “You need to sensitise the police. Even among Delhi Police personnel, you should ask about the awareness of the anti-rape law. That is why we are demanding complete overhauling and judicial reforms,” she said.
This article is authored by Ranjekha, 17, part of the Own It Tribe. Ranjekha is constantly analysing the world around her, its developments and their implications and gives supreme importance to awareness.
