Crimes against women in India

Crimes against women include, among others, the following: Rape, dowry deaths, cruelty by husbands and relatives, sexual harassment and molestation of women. We have chosen particularly to highlight these crimes because of their serious nature.

All crime rates are per 100,000. See our notes on how the data was recorded and how we computed the crime rates for women to correct the error made by the Bureau.

Crimes against women

The chart below shows the rate of crimes committed against women in the entire country. Cruelty by husband and relatives was the most common crime against women in India from 2010 to 2014. Sexual harassment and molestation of women and girls is the second-most common crime women face. Rape is another commmon crime committed against women in the country.

Rape

This chart shows the cities with the highest rape rates. All of the top five cities are in the northern part of the country. Gwalior, Jabalpur, and Bhopal — all from Madhya Pradesh — have the top three cities with highest rape rates in India.

Notice the jump in rape rate after 2012. When the government toughened rape laws in 2013 and the media attention forced the police to look into complaints more seriously, more victims emerged and the crime rate shot up.

Scroll down to see how metro cities and non-metro cities compare on rape rates.

The top ten non-metro cities have a rape crime rate far higher than the national average. Gwalior, which has the highest rate of rapes in the country, is thrice the national average. Capital city Delhi also emerged as one of the cities with the highest rate of rape crimes in the country.

Dowry deaths

Again, cities in north India dominate dowry deaths. Agra has the highest average rate of dowry deaths from 2010 to 2014, followed by Patna and Gwalior.

Delhi has the highest rate of dowry deaths. Two south Indian cities, Bengaluru and Hyderabad, follow. As for the non-metro cities, four of the cities are from Uttar Pradesh. As we have seen from the other charts, cities from Madhya Pradesh also figure high on the list of crimes against women. Three of them (Jabalpur, Gwalior, Indore) show up here as well.

Cities with highest rates of sexual harassment and molestation

Here are the cities where women face the most sexual harassment and molestation in their everyday lives. Vijayawada is the top city i.e. the city with the highest average rate of sexual harassment and molestation cases. Again, note that Kollam, a city from Kerala, a state with a matriarchial societal structure, figures in the top five of the list.

Notes about the data

Major crimes against women

The following table shows all the major crimes against women recorded in India. This is not an exhaustive list, but covers most of the serious crimes committed against women. If you wish to see the complete crime table, you can go here.

City Crime 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014
Agra Cruelty by husband or his relatives 35.4 35.1 28.6 44.9 45.6
Ahmedabad Cruelty by husband or his relatives 40.9 46.3 48.2 58.5 26.7
Allahabad Cruelty by husband or his relatives 11.4 16.4 23.5 27.8 31.4
Amritsar Cruelty by husband or his relatives 15.7 18.2 19.0 18.2 27.1
Asansol Cruelty by husband or his relatives 52.1 77.5 40.3 78.5 82.4
Aurangabad Cruelty by husband or his relatives 21.4 21.1 26.5 28.8
Bengaluru Cruelty by husband or his relatives 9.8 11.3 12.9 11.9 12.1
Bhopal Cruelty by husband or his relatives 21.3 30.3 26.9 34.2 32.9
Chandigarh Cruelty by husband or his relatives 9.1 14.3 19.0 29.6
Chennai Cruelty by husband or his relatives 2.9 5.3 5.5 5.1 7.0
Coimbatore Cruelty by husband or his relatives 4.2 7.7 10.4 4.5 5.9
Delhi Cruelty by husband or his relatives 16.8 19.8 24.7 38.0 37.5
Dhanbad Cruelty by husband or his relatives 2.0 1.4 4.6 3.7 5.5
Durg-Bhilainagar Cruelty by husband or his relatives 18.5 18.7 27.2 27.8
Faridabad Cruelty by husband or his relatives 34.2 33.3 30.1 39.0 46.2
Ghaziabad Cruelty by husband or his relatives 12.3 20.1 43.2 50.9
Gwalior Cruelty by husband or his relatives 25.9 29.2 68.6 68.6
Hyderabad Cruelty by husband or his relatives 37.7 36.0 35.6 39.3 34.2
India Cruelty by husband or his relatives 16.0 16.9 18.2 20.1 20.5
Indore Cruelty by husband or his relatives 24.9 29.5 33.6 23.9 17.5
Jabalpur Cruelty by husband or his relatives 19.5 21.3 24.2 18.7 27.0
Jaipur Cruelty by husband or his relatives 49.5 64.4 64.8 76.3 79.4
Jamshedpur Cruelty by husband or his relatives 3.4 9.5 12.3 20.6 13.3
Jodhpur Cruelty by husband or his relatives 62.8 55.9 69.3 79.6
Kannur Cruelty by husband or his relatives 12.1 13.3 11.1 10.1
Kanpur Cruelty by husband or his relatives 33.5 21.3 19.8 16.9 33.0
Kochi Cruelty by husband or his relatives 13.6 12.6 11.8 11.9 15.4
Kolkata Cruelty by husband or his relatives 5.9 8.2 12.7 14.8 16.8
Kollam Cruelty by husband or his relatives 55.0 57.9 52.4 51.0
Kota Cruelty by husband or his relatives 87.6 90.8 108.6 114.0
Kozhikode Cruelty by husband or his relatives 16.1 13.5 12.8 17.3
Lucknow Cruelty by husband or his relatives 43.8 32.8 32.7 58.0 40.6
Ludhiana Cruelty by husband or his relatives 14.7 13.8 18.3 18.9 21.4
Madurai Cruelty by husband or his relatives 9.5 9.7 8.5 12.5 9.5
Malappuram Cruelty by husband or his relatives 14.2 13.2 11.4 11.2
Meerut Cruelty by husband or his relatives 32.1 14.8 43.0 0.0 59.6
Mumbai Cruelty by husband or his relatives 3.7 4.6 4.6 7.1 6.6
Nagpur Cruelty by husband or his relatives 14.3 14.2 13.6 17.8 19.1
Nasik Cruelty by husband or his relatives 16.8 15.6 19.9 24.5 27.1
Patna Cruelty by husband or his relatives 20.5 20.8 30.7 38.8 42.1
Pune Cruelty by husband or his relatives 9.0 10.5 9.0 14.4 16.4
Raipur Cruelty by husband or his relatives 10.8 15.8 26.6 15.3
Rajkot Cruelty by husband or his relatives 44.6 37.3 40.0 38.5 45.6
Ranchi Cruelty by husband or his relatives 8.0 8.5 9.6 17.0
Srinagar Cruelty by husband or his relatives 9.1 10.6 12.1 10.6
Surat Cruelty by husband or his relatives 13.6 14.0 15.2 24.9 20.5
Thiruvananthapuram Cruelty by husband or his relatives 17.9 18.2 17.5 15.4
Thrissur Cruelty by husband or his relatives 13.4 14.9 12.8 13.3
Tiruchirappalli Cruelty by husband or his relatives 5.4 4.7 4.9 5.2
Vadodara Cruelty by husband or his relatives 24.8 27.6 35.1 47.9 35.1
Varanasi Cruelty by husband or his relatives 7.4 7.9 15.6 34.6 26.7
Vasai-Virar Cruelty by husband or his relatives 2.1 4.5 13.3 8.9
Vijayawada Cruelty by husband or his relatives 84.5 144.0 153.4 165.7 86.8
Vishakhapatnam Cruelty by husband or his relatives 46.0 45.2 48.2 64.1 43.4
Agra Dowry deaths 4.9 7.0 3.9 6.0 4.5
Ahmedabad Dowry deaths 0.4 0.6 0.4 0.7 0.4
Allahabad Dowry deaths 2.5 1.8 1.6 2.7 2.5
Amritsar Dowry deaths 1.8 0.7 0.9 0.7 0.5
Asansol Dowry deaths 3.2 1.7 2.5 2.5 4.7
Aurangabad Dowry deaths 1.2 0.7 0.9 0.4
Bengaluru Dowry deaths 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.3 1.4
Bhopal Dowry deaths 2.8 1.6 1.6 1.6 1.8
Chandigarh Dowry deaths 0.4 0.9 0.2 0.4
Chennai Dowry deaths 0.4 0.5 0.3 0.3 0.2
Coimbatore Dowry deaths 0.1 0.2 0.0 0.1 0.0
Delhi Dowry deaths 1.5 1.5 1.3 1.7 1.7
Dhanbad Dowry deaths 2.1 1.4 1.8 1.4 1.6
Durg-Bhilainagar Dowry deaths 0.0 1.2 1.4 1.7
Faridabad Dowry deaths 3.5 1.5 1.2 3.4 3.1
Ghaziabad Dowry deaths 2.0 2.0 2.3 1.5
Gwalior Dowry deaths 4.3 4.9 4.5 5.5
Hyderabad Dowry deaths 1.2 1.0 0.6 1.0 0.6
India Dowry deaths 1.4 1.5 1.4 1.4 1.4
Indore Dowry deaths 2.5 2.0 1.7 1.9 2.2
Jabalpur Dowry deaths 4.1 4.3 1.5 3.0 2.8
Jaipur Dowry deaths 2.1 2.7 2.1 1.4 2.3
Jamshedpur Dowry deaths 2.0 1.9 2.2 1.6 1.3
Jodhpur Dowry deaths 2.4 3.0 1.3 1.5
Kannur Dowry deaths 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.1
Kanpur Dowry deaths 6.9 5.2 2.2 2.0 2.0
Kochi Dowry deaths 0.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
Kolkata Dowry deaths 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.2 0.2
Kollam Dowry deaths 0.2 0.7 0.2 0.2
Kota Dowry deaths 1.1 1.1 1.3 0.6
Kozhikode Dowry deaths 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.1
Lucknow Dowry deaths 3.6 2.3 1.1 2.8 2.2
Ludhiana Dowry deaths 0.9 1.8 1.4 1.8 0.7
Madurai Dowry deaths 1.5 0.7 0.4 0.4 0.1
Malappuram Dowry deaths 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
Meerut Dowry deaths 2.1 2.7 2.2 2.4 3.0
Mumbai Dowry deaths 0.2 0.2 0.1 0.3 0.3
Nagpur Dowry deaths 0.7 0.3 0.5 0.3 0.8
Nasik Dowry deaths 0.3 0.7 0.4 1.0 0.4
Patna Dowry deaths 3.1 4.7 5.7 6.4 4.3
Pune Dowry deaths 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.4 0.8
Raipur Dowry deaths 0.7 0.9 1.5 0.4
Rajkot Dowry deaths 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.2 0.0
Ranchi Dowry deaths 2.0 1.1 1.1 1.9
Srinagar Dowry deaths 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
Surat Dowry deaths 0.2 0.0 0.2 0.1 0.1
Thiruvananthapuram Dowry deaths 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.2
Thrissur Dowry deaths 0.0 0.0 0.1 0.0
Tiruchirappalli Dowry deaths 0.4 0.6 0.0 0.0
Vadodara Dowry deaths 0.0 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.1
Varanasi Dowry deaths 1.6 3.0 2.2 2.5 1.6
Vasai-Virar Dowry deaths 0.0 0.3 0.5 0.0
Vijayawada Dowry deaths 2.3 2.3 2.2 1.6 1.4
Vishakhapatnam Dowry deaths 1.3 1.4 1.3 0.9 1.5
Agra Rape 1.6 7.6 4.1 4.9 4.7
Ahmedabad Rape 1.6 2.0 2.1 3.9 3.3
Allahabad Rape 1.2 1.8 2.0 4.6 3.6
Amritsar Rape 4.3 3.6 4.9 5.2 6.1
Asansol Rape 3.0 5.2 6.0 5.2 2.7
Aurangabad Rape 2.8 4.0 3.9 4.7
Bengaluru Rape 1.6 2.4 2.2 2.0 2.6
Bhopal Rape 8.1 11.1 12.7 14.6 19.8
Chandigarh Rape 4.5 5.2 8.4 11.0
Chennai Rape 1.1 1.8 2.2 1.9 1.5
Coimbatore Rape 1.4 0.8 1.9 1.6 0.5
Delhi Rape 5.5 6.0 7.7 19.0 23.9
Dhanbad Rape 0.9 1.8 2.3 2.5 2.3
Durg-Bhilainagar Rape 11.8 13.5 15.6 10.2
Faridabad Rape 7.8 8.3 7.2 9.9 15.4
Ghaziabad Rape 0.5 1.4 4.6 6.8
Gwalior Rape 9.4 11.7 22.8 20.7
Hyderabad Rape 1.2 1.6 2.0 2.7 3.3
India Rape 3.8 4.1 4.2 5.7 6.1
Indore Rape 6.6 8.8 12.0 12.8 17.8
Jabalpur Rape 13.4 10.6 14.4 19.0 18.7
Jaipur Rape 4.9 6.3 9.2 13.2 18.1
Jamshedpur Rape 2.5 2.8 4.1 7.7 5.6
Jodhpur Rape 6.1 7.4 13.0 12.6
Kannur Rape 1.4 1.6 0.8 1.9
Kanpur Rape 3.1 5.3 1.6 1.2 1.4
Kochi Rape 1.9 2.8 2.6 3.7 6.0
Kolkata Rape 0.5 0.7 1.0 1.1 0.5
Kollam Rape 8.6 7.9 11.0 13.4
Kota Rape 5.1 9.5 18.2 21.2
Kozhikode Rape 1.3 3.4 2.8 3.3
Lucknow Rape 3.8 2.7 1.7 4.0 3.8
Ludhiana Rape 7.0 5.7 9.3 14.8 15.0
Madurai Rape 0.4 1.0 1.5 2.2 0.8
Malappuram Rape 1.8 1.2 1.8 1.1
Meerut Rape 2.8 3.4 3.3 9.3 6.0
Mumbai Rape 2.3 2.6 2.7 4.6 7.1
Nagpur Rape 4.7 3.7 4.7 7.5 9.2
Nasik Rape 4.1 3.4 2.7 2.7 3.8
Patna Rape 2.6 2.8 3.7 6.0 5.6
Pune Rape 3.8 3.3 3.6 7.2 7.9
Raipur Rape 4.4 11.8 15.6 16.2
Rajkot Rape 1.8 1.5 1.7 2.1 2.6
Ranchi Rape 6.3 6.3 8.3 8.5
Srinagar Rape 2.3 3.2 3.7 2.0
Surat Rape 1.2 1.8 2.0 3.9 4.8
Thiruvananthapuram Rape 4.5 4.7 6.2 6.4
Thrissur Rape 2.9 3.6 2.9 3.9
Tiruchirappalli Rape 1.2 1.4 1.9 0.6
Vadodara Rape 0.8 1.0 1.3 2.2 2.6
Varanasi Rape 0.3 0.7 1.6 4.3 4.0
Vasai-Virar Rape 3.7 3.5 9.6 10.5
Vijayawada Rape 3.4 5.0 6.3 6.5 8.6
Vishakhapatnam Rape 6.2 6.7 5.9 7.8 9.8
Agra Sexual harassment and molestation of women 14.3 23.6 12.9 20.8 25.7
Ahmedabad Sexual harassment and molestation of women 2.7 3.3 2.9 6.3 5.5
Allahabad Sexual harassment and molestation of women 1.6 2.1 3.0 16.4 17.3
Amritsar Sexual harassment and molestation of women 2.5 1.4 2.5 10.3 8.5
Asansol Sexual harassment and molestation of women 2.2 6.2 5.9 12.4 26.7
Aurangabad Sexual harassment and molestation of women 16.5 18.8 37.1 40.8
Bengaluru Sexual harassment and molestation of women 8.8 7.1 9.2 11.1 18.2
Bhopal Sexual harassment and molestation of women 17.8 12.1 25.7 38.9 33.6
Chandigarh Sexual harassment and molestation of women 5.8 14.3 34.8 17.1
Chennai Sexual harassment and molestation of women 1.6 4.5 5.4 4.9 5.0
Coimbatore Sexual harassment and molestation of women 3.4 3.4 1.8 1.8 0.7
Delhi Sexual harassment and molestation of women 8.2 9.3 10.8 51.2 65.0
Dhanbad Sexual harassment and molestation of women 1.1 1.6 0.7 1.6 3.2
Durg-Bhilainagar Sexual harassment and molestation of women 35.1 31.3 38.0 39.2
Faridabad Sexual harassment and molestation of women 16.0 13.8 17.6 22.3 16.8
Ghaziabad Sexual harassment and molestation of women 7.4 6.4 11.3 16.0
Gwalior Sexual harassment and molestation of women 21.4 23.6 59.8 56.7
Hyderabad Sexual harassment and molestation of women 6.1 6.6 7.6 8.4 12.8
India Sexual harassment and molestation of women 8.6 8.8 9.3 14.2 15.5
Indore Sexual harassment and molestation of women 24.9 26.8 37.3 29.4 32.0
Jabalpur Sexual harassment and molestation of women 27.0 32.8 33.3 35.6 41.7
Jaipur Sexual harassment and molestation of women 7.9 8.6 6.3 19.5 31.3
Jamshedpur Sexual harassment and molestation of women 1.1 2.8 3.1 8.4 4.7
Jodhpur Sexual harassment and molestation of women 10.8 8.0 26.2 39.9
Kannur Sexual harassment and molestation of women 5.8 5.1 7.1 5.9
Kanpur Sexual harassment and molestation of women 9.4 10.6 4.3 4.4 9.7
Kochi Sexual harassment and molestation of women 8.4 12.7 11.5 17.8 16.4
Kolkata Sexual harassment and molestation of women 5.3 5.9 12.7 16.5 12.7
Kollam Sexual harassment and molestation of women 36.4 36.5 37.1 51.7
Kota Sexual harassment and molestation of women 12.3 15.5 22.5 21.6
Kozhikode Sexual harassment and molestation of women 21.0 17.5 14.5 10.9
Lucknow Sexual harassment and molestation of women 7.0 7.5 8.1 19.0 16.7
Ludhiana Sexual harassment and molestation of women 5.1 4.3 6.0 13.8 15.8
Madurai Sexual harassment and molestation of women 4.4 3.6 4.9 3.4 3.2
Malappuram Sexual harassment and molestation of women 4.4 4.2 5.8 8.4
Meerut Sexual harassment and molestation of women 5.1 7.0 9.4 22.5 32.4
Mumbai Sexual harassment and molestation of women 7.2 8.4 10.0 18.9 23.3
Nagpur Sexual harassment and molestation of women 11.0 9.9 11.2 21.4 24.9
Nasik Sexual harassment and molestation of women 8.7 6.4 7.0 14.2 14.1
Patna Sexual harassment and molestation of women 0.7 0.2 1.7 1.8 5.8
Pune Sexual harassment and molestation of women 7.1 8.3 8.6 18.1 23.1
Raipur Sexual harassment and molestation of women 40.8 21.1 34.9 22.6
Rajkot Sexual harassment and molestation of women 3.2 3.0 2.0 3.3 5.5
Ranchi Sexual harassment and molestation of women 0.9 2.6 3.1 4.4
Srinagar Sexual harassment and molestation of women 40.4 47.5 59.7 44.0
Surat Sexual harassment and molestation of women 1.3 1.9 1.4 4.6 3.6
Thiruvananthapuram Sexual harassment and molestation of women 32.9 28.1 38.1 30.8
Thrissur Sexual harassment and molestation of women 13.1 14.6 10.4 12.3
Tiruchirappalli Sexual harassment and molestation of women 8.4 9.3 4.7 2.5
Vadodara Sexual harassment and molestation of women 2.1 2.0 2.2 13.1 13.4
Varanasi Sexual harassment and molestation of women 0.4 0.1 1.3 18.4 17.7
Vasai-Virar Sexual harassment and molestation of women 5.1 9.1 15.7 22.6
Vijayawada Sexual harassment and molestation of women 52.8 81.4 86.6 95.2 66.3
Vishakhapatnam Sexual harassment and molestation of women 13.0 9.5 4.0 29.1 30.3