Riots decrease in India, but shoot up in states like J&K, Haryana

Riots in India have decreased over the last three years, shows the latest data released by National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). In 2016, number of riot cases registered under various sections of the Indian penal Code (IPC) went down by 5 percent to 61,974 compared to 2015.

This is a considerable drop as riot cases have only risen from 2005. However, the cases started decreasing marginally from 2014 onwards. In 2015, number of riot cases went down by 1.2 percent to 65,255 compared to 2014.

While the rate has dropped in India overall, cases in states like Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, and Jammu and Kashmir rose significantly. J&K reported the highest rise of 193.4 percent in 2016, followed by Haryana (51.7) and Uttar Pradesh (19.9).

Other states that reported rise in riot cases last year include Bihar (18.7 percent of total riot cases), Maharashtra (12.7 percent), Karnataka (10.1 percent) and Kerala (8.2 percent).

Riots accounts for 85 percent of cases of offences against public tranquility wherein a total of 72,829 cases of such offences were registered in 2016. Indian Penal Code (IPC) crimes relating to public order include riots, unlawful assembly and offences promoting enmity between different groups.

In Kerala, riots offence have decreased, but crime rate against public tranquility remained high at 14.2 percent, coming only second to the highest crime rate of 27.4 percent in Jammu and Kashmir.

The data on different causes of riots reveals that Kerala tops the number of political cases (1,171) and student riots (167) while Bihar tops number of agrarian riots (2342), followed by Uttar Pradesh (1709).

Uttar Pradesh also saw the highest number of riots resulting from caste conflicts (899) and sectarian (211) reasons. Haryana (250) registered the highest number of communal riots, followed by Jharkhand.

On occasions of riots, the police resorted to firing 74 times over the year, which is the highest, killing as many as 57 civilians and injuring 308. In the process, over 600 policemen were injured while none lost their live.

Interestingly, between 2014 and 2015, no case of riot was registered in Punjab.