When around 1 lakh new criminals were detected last year in Odisha, the State police with a depletion of around 1,000 personnel in their ranks had to pass through trying times. The result was obvious as Odisha recorded around 245 IPC crimes per one lakh population in 2015 up from mere 172 in 2013.
The strength of Odisha police was down to around 49, 990 in 2015 against over 51,000 in 2014. The data available with the State police comes as a rude jolt to the safety of the citizens in the State.
Significantly, with a steep rise in crime load over the years, the sanctioned strength for Odisha police was pegged higher at around 60,258 in 2015 - up from over 55,000 in 2012. But the State is sitting over with around 10, 270 vacancies last year, up from only around 9,000 vacancies in 2012 vis-a-vis the sanctioned posts. This shows the vacancies in police force have worsened over the years in the State to the citizen’s nightmare as in every 24 hours, the State police registered a whopping 283 cases of cognisable offences last year.
The data throws more skewed statistics. For around 811 civilians, there is only one constable to guard. The State has around 20 policemen to cover every 100 sqkm area. It’s no surprise then to see Odisha registering a violent crime rate of over 30 per cent, much higher than the national average of around 25 per cent.
An actual security audit reflects more scary facts. The State’s around 203 urban police stations need a whopping over 15, 600 civil policemen to prune the rising crime rate; whereas the rural police stations need around 16,000 personnel. When data shows a steep rise in crime load under rural police stations by recording maximum of the rioting cases in the State, Odisha has over two dozen less police stations than required in rural areas.
Sample the slip-ups then. Around eight girls/women in every one lakh female population being kidnapped in the State are from the rural areas. Similarly, around 20 females per lakh women population filing outrage of modesty cases in Odisha are from rural areas. And, the rate of murder and attempt to murder in rural Odisha menacingly moved a notch higher in the last two years.