Hathras Rape Accused Claim Innocence But Nearly 95% Accused Known To Victims, As Per NCRB

The four accused in the gangrape and murder of a 19-year-old Dalit woman in UP’s Hathras, have written a letter to the police, claiming they are innocence and accusing the victim's mother and brother of harassing them.

The main accused, Sandeep Thakur, has claimed that he and the victim were 'friends' and often spoke on the phone. Many news channels are giving priority to the fact that the victim and the accused have talked over the phone more than 100 times.

But according to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), 94.2% of the accused in rape cases are known to the victim. Moreover, this holds not much substance in court.

The NCRB 2019 report states a total of 32,033 rape cases were reported across the country and 30,165 of them were cases in which accused are known to victims. Not only this, the report states that in most of the cases, the accused are either friends, online friends or live-in partners.

According to the NCRB data, in 16,311 rape cases recorded in 2019, women were raped on the promise of marriage.

In 10,938 cases, accused was either family friend, colleagues or other acquaintances. Most frighteningly, last year, in 2,916 rape cases, the accused were family members. Only 1,868 such cases were registered in total rape cases where there was no relationship between the accused and the victim.

These figures show that in 94.2% of rape cases in the country, the accused and the victim were known to each other. Obviously, if the victim’s relationship with the accused is made a ground of ‘innocence’, then many accused will easily get acquitted from crimes.