Surat:
Amid the negativity of positive counts, Covid-19 also managed to spread some positivity for the residents of the Diamond City. The one most serious cheer that it could spread was of lesser crime rate — a drop by more than 50 percent drop in top 10 major indicators of overall crime scenario of the city.
Going by the crime figures in the city, the dip takes the city back to almost a decade ago making it even more significant looking at the police strength in the city. In this span of around 10 years, the population increased by almost 20 lakh according to an estimate.
Against the 66 lakh estimated population, police has a force of around 4,000 in the city making it nearly 61 cops per lakh population. On the other hand, Ahmedabad has around 175 cops per one lakh population.
While in 2019, total 6,015 major crimes had been reported, Covid times count only 2,990 in 2020. City witnessed 22 percent rise in crimes in 2019, while in 2018 the number of serious crimes reported in the city were 4,950.
“Coronavirus and lockdown resulted in not only a drop in crime figures in the city, but the steepest fall among all the cities of the state in 2020. All other cities have less than 20 percent drop in crime while Surat has dropped by nearly 50 percent,” city police commissioner Ajay Tomar told TOI. In overall crime the drop is 45 percent, according to police.
“Speedy detections, presence of police on road and quick response to crime or incident are the other main factors for the dip,” Tomar added.