The capital recorded a 15% decline in criminal cases registered in 2024, with nearly 2,75,000 cases filed under the Indian Penal Code and its successor Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), down from an odd 324,000 cases in 2023, according to the National Crime Records Bureau’s annual report released on Wednesday.
The 2024 edition is the first to collect data under the BNS, which took effect on July 1, 2024.
However, this decline has not changed Delhi’s position among India’s 19 cities. D.C. continues to lead in all categories of violent crime.
Delhi recorded 504 murders in 2024, down slightly from 506 in 2023 and 509 in 2022, but far ahead of Bengaluru, which reported 176, and Surat, which reported 114. Of the 522 people killed in 504 cases, personal enmity was the main motive, followed by illicit relations and theft.
Kidnapping and kidnapping cases fell to 5,580 cases in 2024 from 5,715 cases in 2023, but Delhi topped all major cities again – Mumbai reported 1,854 cases and Bengaluru 1,215 cases. Only 8.5% of kidnapping cases are charged in the capital. The victims were mostly girls between the ages of 12 and 18 years.
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Theft remains the dominant property crime. Delhi recorded 180,973 cases of theft in 2024 – nearly 496 cases per day – accounting for 73.3% of theft cases across all cities. It is followed by Mumbai with 10,854 cases (4.4%), Bengaluru at 9,229 (3.7%), and Jaipur at 9,051 (3.7%).
Kidnapping accounts for nearly 3,105 cases of robbery in Delhi and vehicle theft for about 40,000 cases. Street crime has fallen: cases of theft fell to 1,510 from 1,660 in 2023.
However, extortion cases rose to 228 from 207.
BNS has introduced two new categories of offenses relevant to Delhi’s crime profile. Organized crime, defined under Section 111 of the Social Services Act as kidnapping, robbery and extortion carried out by gangs, resulted in 20 cases in Delhi in the six months following the implementation – the highest among metro cities, ahead of Lucknow and Surat with nine cases each.
Petty organized crime – gang-related theft and robbery under Section 112 of the BNS – produced 180 cases over the same period.
Police recorded 33 riot cases in 2024 compared to 44 in 2023. No cases were filed under the Terrorism or Unlawful Assembly Act.
Missing children
10,843 children were reported missing in Delhi at the end of 2024. Of these, 5,491 cases were registered during the year and 5,352 cases were carried over from previous years. Girls made up 7,649 of the total, boys 3,192, and two cases of transgender children.
The previous year (2023), there were 6,284 missing children in total.
Delhi’s missing child recovery rate was 62.4% in 2024, and the capital accounted for 7.36% of the 147,175 missing child cases pending nationally by the end of the year.
New registrations fell – 5,491 new cases were reported in 2024 compared to 6,284 in 2023 – and the total number of cases fell from 12,324 to 10,843.
Sanjay Gupta, director of Chetna, an organization that works with street children, attributed the high numbers of missing children in Delhi to large-scale migration and the lack of childcare support for working parents. “While both parents go to work, the children are unattended. These are basically street children who have no safety net. We receive multiple cases of missing children from railway stations, immigration centers like Sarai Kale Khan, spaces under bridges and major intersections,” he said.
Gupta called for a stronger anganwadi system and voluntary nursery facilities for daily wage workers.
He also pointed to the existence of a police gap: “The percentage of missing girls is much higher, and we found that the police treat them in many cases as runaway cases. This situation also needs to change.”
Overall, Delhi had 55,939 missing persons cases at the end of the year – including adults – of which 23,058 were registered in 2024 and 32,881 cases were pending from previous years. The recovery rate of all missing persons reached 50.8% in 2024, compared to 47% in the previous year.
Separately, the total number of cybercrimes in 2024 was 404, the same as the previous year, according to NCRB data.
