Delhi is said to be unsafe for women at night. A new study now says the city is equally unsafe by day. According to the Centre for Social Research (CSR), a non-government organisation, incidents of rape occur in the city during the
daytime too. “The research proves that Delhi is equally unsafe for girls even during daytime,” a statement from the CSR said Friday. The research is based on a study of 58 first information reports (FIRs) filed in rape cases in the southwest police district of the capital city. As high as 30 per cent of rape incidents were between 12 noon and 6 pm, and 12 per cent between 6 am and 12 pm. “This data reveals the lies of the Delhi police commissioner, who recently said, ‘You (women) can’t go out at 2 in the night and then say you were the victim of a crime’,” the CSR statement said. According to the CSR, 18 women are raped or molested every hour in the country, and most of the sexual offences are committed by close acquaintances. “Rape is soon becoming an increasing form of violence against women. As many as 18 women are battered in some form or other every hour across the country,” the CSR said. According to the study, some 22 per cent of the rape cases were of girls below ten years of age and 31 per cent of older school and college girls. The age group of the accused varied from below 18 years to above 50 years. “When CSR did an in-depth study of the relationship of the accused and the victim, it was appalling to find that in most of the cases, the offender was a close acquaintance of the victim,” the statement said. In 22 cases, the accused were neighbours of the sufferer; in five cases the attackers were relatives. — IANS