Hyderabad: Karnataka has witnessed a sharp rise in the number of cases of crimes against members of Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) communities over the last five years. According to a report by The New Indian Express on Thursday, the number of cases has increased by 41 percent from 2018 to 2022.
The number of cases has been rising despite the SCs and STs (Prevention of Atrocities) Act and other preventive initiatives in place to reduce the offences against members of these communities.
The report highlights that one of the various reasons for the increased number of cases is the low conviction rate in these cases.
As per data from Karnataka state police, 1536, 1585, 1691,1744, and 2167 cases were filed respectively in 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022.
The report further stated that due to the low conviction rate perpetrators commit similar crimes, according to a former member of state-level vigilance and monitoring committee under the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
The former member pointed out that while most of the offences are related to the attack, attempt to murder and rioting, there are cases of murder, rape, and molestation of SC/ST women.
The number of cases increased to 210 in 2019, came down to 153 in 2020, and went up to 188 in 2021 and 222 in 2022, said the report.
In 2023 so far, 28 rape cases and 299 other cases have been reported till February.
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