New Delhi, Sunday 21 Dec 2008: Delhi seems to be the most unsafe city among the four metros in India, with the national capital witnessing a rape in every thousand minutes, if one goes by a latest government data. The Delhi city, excluding rural areas, witnessed a rape every 1003.1 minute last year while for Mumbai the figure was 3020.7 minutes, the statistics prepared by National Crime Records Bureau said.

The number of cases in the three metros last year was:

Chennai — 46
Kolkata — 44
Mumbai — 174

The Delhi city last year recorded 524 incidents of rape in which 483 cases were chargesheeted as against 695 and 533 respectively in 2006.

The whole of Delhi, including rural areas, registered 598 rape cases in 2007, that is, every 878.9 minutes, a rape is taking place.

Interestingly, in Goa, which reports high-profile sexual abuse cases, a rape case was reported only in 26,280 minutes.

Nagaland topped the list of the safest states, with a rape reported only in 40,430 minutes. Among the safest Union Territories, Daman and Diu, and Lakshadweep topped the list with a rape only in 5,25,600 minutes.

The worst scenario was in Madhya Pradesh where every 174.6 minute, a woman was raped.

A total of 20,737 cases of rape were reported last year registering a 7.2 per cent increase, with Madhya Pradesh topping the list of such incidents.

Madhya Pradesh accounted for 14.5 per cent of the total cases, with 3,010 incidents of rape followed by West Bengal (2,106), Uttar Pradesh (1,648), Bihar (1,555) and Rajasthan (1,238).

Offenders were known to the victims in as many as 19,188 cases (92.5 per cent) that included 6,902 incidents in which neighbours were involved.

Parents or close family members were involved in 405 cases while in 1,448 cases relatives were on the wrong side.

Women in the age group of 18-30 years were the largest chunks among the victims (11,984) followed by 3,530 in the age group of 30-50 years.