Impact of Covid-19 Lockdown on Criminal Activities

Author: Mohammad Asif

Introduction:

History has proven a thing that whatever the reason it is when there is a rapid decline in the GDP of its nation there will be unemployment and growth in crime as well. As predicted by many economists across the world the pandemic has affected business globally and is bound to adversely affect the economy which will eventually lead to unemployment and push people towards illegal activities and petty crimes like theft to survive.

Domestic Violence against women:

India has been under a lockdown which started on March 24 due to Coved 19 and which has been announced by the Prime Minister who is in the middle of this entire lockdown process. There were many challenges as far as this entire lockdown across the country. Thehorrifying aspect of this lockdown which has now emerged and the reports still coming which is Domestic violence against women. There has been a rapidgrowth in the number of cases. According to NCW (National Commission for Women), it said that 69 cases were reported on domestic violence from 24thMarch to 1st April. This in comparison to the normal circumstances is a sharp increase. The NCW in fact attributed that these cases can be a result of frustration which is setting in men who are sitting at their homes and who are not able to go out, to their work and involve in other activities which in turn is taken on women in their homes. It is a very disturbing scenario in rising the number of domestic violence cases from women.

NCW chief Rekha Sharma in an interview quoted that at least one or two e-mails per day were received personally on the domestic violence in spite of sending many complaints on the official website of NCW. In complaints, many women said that they don’t want to approach the police because they were afraid of their husbands that the condition may become much worse if they come out soon after their conviction.

There are many women in the urban and semi-urban areas who don’t know how to read and write for them this became a tough situation. The reason why the Rural domestic violence did not get a larger picture across the country was due to the sudden block of transportation such as railways and postal services in some parts of the country because before the lockdown NCW used to receive many letters/complaints from rural villages but due to the lockdown, their voices were stopped from being heard.

Domestic Violence due to the pandemic is not only restricted to India but has become a global phenomenon.

The surge in domestic abuse and gender violence cases were recorded as below:

Name of the Country - Surge in the Domestic Violence cases

• South Africa - 37%

• United Kingdom -25%

• Australia - 75%

• France-32%

• United States of America- 20%

• Turkey- 38.2%

Cybercrime:

The reports as well as the surveys have indicated that the facts that cybercrimes have been increased to 86% and this is something which the Indian government has not been pre dedicated. So why there are more cybercrimes reported in India? First and foremost is due to the lockdown people have started to work from home and work from home is not practiced since the beginning so it is a clear picture of why there have more number cases. There are many cybercriminals who are targetingvulnerable people as well as private citizens who are using digital platforms and who are making financial transactions by the means of digital platforms.

In the name of donations, many people are coming with phony websites especially in the name of the PM cares fund. Nearly 8,000 complaints were received by the ministry saying that there have been taken lack of rupees from the people in India and also the people who are outside India. Therefore the ministry of home affairs hasreleased guidelines saying that there is a specific bank account number and an IFSC code for the PM cares fund. The National Cyber Crimes Diagnostic Centre also said that there are many OTT platforms that are ready to give discounts to a larger number of people. The two most used OTT platforms in India are Netflix and Amazon Prime and after that many other fake OTT platforms came and started to give discounts to the consumers. And these fake OTT platform's rates are being fixed from 999/- to 1000/-INR per year or month of subscription. So in the process of payment by clicking on the websites their bank account number, IFSC code, and their CVV code were all taken off by the fake OTT websites and their money was taken so soon within a few seconds and minutes from their bank account too.

Robbery and Burglary:

A decrease in robbery and burglary was also observed, at a glance, it may look like an opportunity to watch for robbers but the government had deployed the police to make sure that people were not going out of their houses which resulted in continuedplace presence on the roads and other public spaces increasing the risk of getting caught, and hence a fall was observed. Also, home burglaries will decrease as people are not leaving their homes empty.

Conclusion:

By the above results is that the rate and crime pattern have been considerably affected by the onset of the Covid 19 pandemic. The effect has been analyzed in two different circumstances.

Firstly, when the lockdown measures were in place to prevent the spread f the disease which brought a change in the environment in which a criminal operates.

Secondly, the effects of the pandemic on the economy and its effect on the crime rates are also analyzed.

Edited by R.Rangarajan, Editor-in-chief, Lawgic Stratum.