New Delhi: One in every four women arrested in India go behind the bar for harassing their ilk for dowry and even leading the victim to death.
Out of the 1,79,294 women arrested in 2009, the National Crime Records Bureau said, 25.95 percent were apprehended under heads of dowry deaths and cruelty by husband and relatives.
According to the `Crime in India` report, 41,351 women were arrested in 2009 under Section 498A of IPC (cruelty by husband and relatives) while 5,182 went behind bars for dowry deaths (Sec 304B).
A total of 1,74,395 persons were arrested under Section 498A while the figure for arrest under Section 340B was 23,374.
Interestingly, the largest group of arrested women comes from the age group of 30-45 years.
While 15,137 women in the age bracket of 30-45 years were arrested on charges of cruelty, 12,996 belonged to 18-30 years, 10,743 from 45-60 years and 2,290 were in the bracket of above 60 years.
Similarly, the figures for dowry deaths in these age-groups were 1896, 1751, 1295 and 184 respectively.
"185 girls below the age of 18 years were arrested on under Section 498A while 56 were arrested for dowry deaths," the report said.
The largest number of women arrested for various crimes were from Maharashtra (28,818 women) followed by Tamil Nadu (17,065), Madhya Pradesh (16,344), Andhra Pradesh (16,203) and Gujarat (13,938).
In the national capital, 1,110 women (3.1 percent) were arrested for their involvement in crimes while the number of men were 35,153.
A total of 28.49 lakh people were arrested and only 6.3 percent of them were women, the report said.
According to the report, 4,007 women, including 84 girls under 18 years, were arrested on charges of murder while 2,748 were apprehended for attempt to murder.
PTI
