20-fold increase of rape cases in 25 years in Nepal

KATHMANDU: The incidents of murder and murder after rape have increased drastically in the recent times. According to statistics, 17 women were murdered after rape in the past four years. Nepal Police spokesperson SP Basanta Bahadur Kunwar said that more cases of murder after rape are being reported to police in Province 1. He further said that five women were killed after they were raped in the past four years.

Similarly, the data shows that four women in Province 2, four in Far-West, two in Gandaki and two in Bagmati were raped and murdered in the same period. 11 women were murdered after being rape in the Fiscal Year 2075/76 which was the highest in the past four years.

17,000 rape cases, 5,000 attempted rape cases reported in the past 25 years

Nepal Police headquarters said that 17,000 cases of rape and 5,000 attempted cases were reported to the police in the past 25 years.

According to statistics, 16,986 cases of rape and 5,000 cases of attempted rape were reported to the police from the Fiscal Year 2053/54 to Fiscal Year 2077/78.

The statistics shows that the cases of rape have been increasing every year. Women, Children and Senior Citizen Service Center of Nepal Police said that the rape cases have increased by 20 fold in the past 25 years.

Spokesperson Kunwar said, “Only 112 cases of rape and 34 cases of attempted rape were reported in the country 25 years ago.” He further said that 2,144 cases of rape and 687 cases of attempted rape were reported in the previous Fiscal Year 2076/077.

Police attribute the increase in rape cases to more victims coming forward to lodge complaint against rape.

Police said that 2,230 cases of rape and 786 cases of attempted rape were reported to them in the current fiscal year. Of them, 544 cases of rape and 237 cases of attempted rape were reported in Province 1 which is the highest among all the provinces.

Rape and attempted rape case in the past four years

	Fiscal Year	Rape	Attempted rape
1	2053/054	112	34
2	2054/055	181	34
3	2055/056	141	18
4	2056/057	186	33
5	2057/058	122	35
6	2058/059	129	21
7	2059/060	157	18
8	2060/061	154	19
9	2061/062	188	25
10	2062/063	195	38
11	2063/064	317	70
12	2064/065	309	73
13	2065/066	391	75
14	2066/067	376	101
15	2067/068	481	151
16	2068/069	555	156
17	2069/070	677	245
18	2070/071	912	414
19	2071/072	981	562
20	2072/073	1089	452
21	2073/074	1131	536
22	2074/075	1480	728
23	2075/076	2230	786
24	2076/077	2144	687
25	2077/078	2321	666
	Total	16986	5877

 

The aforementioned table shows that the incidents of rape were reported more in the Fiscal Year 2075/076 in the past 25 years.

 

Incidents of rape and attempted rape in the past four years in provinces

	Province	2074/075	2075/076	2076/077	2077/078	Total Rape/Attempted rape
		Rape/ Attempted Rape	Rape/Attempted rape	Rape/ Attempted rape	Rape/ Attempted rape
1	Province 1	384/186	544/237	485/160	557/151	1970/743
2	Province 2	175/105	300/103	288/96	339/107	1102/411
3	Bagmati	191/98	230/58	256/86	271/80	948/322
4	Gandaki	119/60	181/79	161/62	190/54	651/255
5	Lumbini	270/131	369/127	384/99	399/116	1422/473
6	Karnali	59/33	140/45	139/57	143/43	481/178
7	Far-West	93/51	170/76	200/67	213/82	676/276
8	Kathmandu Valley	188/63	296/61	266/52	209/33	959/209
9	Bureau	1/0	0/0	1/0	0/0	2/0
	Total	1480	2230	2144/687	2321/666	8211/2867

Sources, Women, Children and Senior Citizen Service Center of Nepal

 Rape cases spike during lockdown

Police said that 4,448 cases of four types of violence against women were reported in the three months of first Covid-19 lockdown. A total of 717 that means 16 percent of rape cases were reported to the police. Of them, 169 cases of rape were reported in Province 1, 98 in Province 2, 86 in Bagmati, 53 in Gandaki, 123 in Lumbini, 45 in Karnali, 79 in Far-West and 64 in Kathmandu Valley.

According to the statistics of police, 199 cases of attempted rape were reported in all the seven provinces. Of them, 53 cases were reported in Province 1, 20 in Province 2, 25 in Bagmati, 15 in Gandaki, 34 in Lumbini, 14 in Karnali, 25 in Far-West and 13 in Kathmandu Valley.

Manoj Kumar Acharya, Secretary at the National Women Commission, said that the Commission has been investigating the rapes cases seriously.

Meanwhile, the Criminal (Code) Bill, 2074 (2017) criminalises rape under Chapter 18, article 219 which states that no one is allowed to commit rape.

The Bill states that if a person rapes a woman without her consent or any girl under 18 years of age with or without her consent by using force or showing threat shall be considered a rape.

If a person rapes a girl above 10 years of age and under 14 years of age, he shall be sentenced to 18 to 20 years in jail.

Similarly, if a person rapes a girl above 14 years of age and under 16 years of age, he shall be sentenced to 12 to 14 years in jail. Likewise, if a person rapes a woman above 16 years of age and under 18 years of age, he shall be sentenced to 10 to 12 years in jail and will be fined Rs 400,000.

The Bill further states that if a person rapes a women of age 18 or above the 18 years of age, he will be sentenced to 10 years in jail and will be slapped with a fine of Rs 200,000.

In addition to that, if a husband rapes a wife, he shall be sentenced to five years in jail. In case, if a person infected with HIV/AIDS or STD rapes any girl or woman with knowledge of the disease, such a person will be sentenced to more than five years.

If a person rapes a differently girl or woman, he will be sentenced to life in prison.