PANAJI
The National Crime Records Bureau’s (NCRB) annual report for the year 2022 has revealed a significant surge in economic offense cases in Goa with a sharp increase from 153 First Information Reports (FIRs) in 2020 to 260 in 2022 year, indicating a concerning upward trend.
The rate of total economic offenses for last year stood at 16.6 per cent while the chargesheeting rate by Goa Police was recorded at 47.4 and the pendency of cases was much higher at 62.6 percent.
Out of the total economic offenses in 2022, 'forgery, cheating and fraud' cases constituted the highest with 230 FIRs whereas 'Criminal Breach of Trust' accounted for 30 cases.
Further delving into the forgery, cheating and fraud cases, it was found that 64 involved amounts ranging from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 10 lakh while 56 cases were reported for amounts less than Rs 1 lakh. There were also cases where the losses were in crores as 16 cases dealt with financial fraud in the range of Rs 1 to 10 crore, and two cases with amounts between Rs 10 to 25 crore.
The NCRB statistics also revealed a substantial number of cases pending investigation from the previous year. At the start of 2022, there were 209 cases pending investigation from the previous year, and an additional 260 cases were reported last year. In an unexpected turn, Goa Police reopened one case for investigation, marking the total cases for probe at 470.
Regarding the disposal of cases, Goa Police submitted final reports in 91 cases but filed chargesheets in only 83 cases.
