Madhya Pradesh and West Bengal stand at the forefront of this concerning trend, raising urgent questions about women's safety and prompting calls for further measures to address the issue.
In a shocking revelation, more than 13.13 lakh girls and women were reported missing across India between 2019 and 2021, as per data presented by the Union Home Ministry in Parliament last week. The compiled data, sourced from the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), indicates that 10,61,648 women above 18 years and 2,51,430 girls below the age of 18 went missing during the three-year period.
Madhya Pradesh emerged as the state with the highest number of missing females, accounting for 1,60,180 women and 38,234 girls who went missing during the said period. Following closely, West Bengal reported a total of 1,56,905 missing women and 36,606 missing girls. Maharashtra witnessed 1,78,400 missing women and 13,033 missing girls during the same period, as PTI reported.
The data also revealed concerning figures from other states, with Odisha reporting 70,222 missing women and 16,649 missing girls, and Chhattisgarh recording 49,116 missing women and 10,817 missing girls.
Among the Union Territories, Delhi recorded the highest number of missing females. The nation's capital reported 61,054 missing women and 22,919 missing girls between 2019 and 2021, while Jammu and Kashmir saw 8,617 missing women and 1,148 missing girls during the same period.
Responding to concerns over women's safety, the government informed Parliament about initiatives undertaken to combat crimes against women. These include the enactment of The Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, 2013, for effective deterrence against sexual offenses, and The Criminal Law (Amendment) Act, 2018, which prescribed stringent penal provisions, including the death penalty, for the rape of girls below the age of 12 years. The government has also launched the Emergency Response Support System with a single internationally recognized number (112) for all emergencies, as well as Smart Policing Projects in select cities, among other measures.
In addition, the Home Ministry introduced a cybercrime reporting portal in 2018 to allow citizens to report obscene content, and the National Database on Sexual Offenders, facilitating the tracking of sexual offenders across the country by law enforcement agencies.