PANAJI
Economic offences in Goa climbed again in 2024 after a brief decline the previous year, but what stands out more starkly in the latest National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data was the State’s inability to carry cases through to conviction.
The NCRB figures show 206 economic offences were registered in Goa in 2024, up from 155 in 2023. The number remains below the 260 cases recorded in 2022.
Fraud-related offences dominated the crime profile. Of the 206 cases, 173 involved cheating, forgery, or fraudulent transactions under the provisions of the Indian Penal Code and the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita. Criminal breach of trust accounted for the remaining 33 cases.
The financial scale of the alleged wrongdoing ranged from relatively modest sums to extraordinarily large losses. NCRB records showed that 128 cheating and forgery complaints involved amounts ranging from below Rs 1 lakh to Rs 50 crore, while one case crossed the Rs 100-crore mark. Breach of trust cases involved losses extending up to Rs 1 crore.
The numbers also reveal a struggle to keep pace as Goa police began 2024 with 275 economic offence investigations already pending. Another 206 complaints were registered during the year, taking the total caseload to 481. Yet only 84 cases resulted in charge sheets, including 62 from older investigations and just 22 from fresh complaints lodged in 2024.
By year’s end, 310 investigations remained unfinished, leaving nearly two-thirds of all cases pending. The State’s chargesheeting rate stood at 50.3 per cent, while pendency reached 64.4 per cent.
Trial courts handled 1,290 economic offence matters in 2024, including more than 1,200 cases carried forward from previous years. However, only two convictions were recorded, both tied to older prosecutions. No case sent for trial during 2024 ended in conviction within the same year. Meanwhile, 22 accused were acquitted and six cases ended in discharge.
The conviction rate consequently fell to 6.7 per cent, while pendency in trial courts climbed to 96.9 per cent.
The NCRB data further shows 151 people were arrested in connection with economic offences during the year, while 146 were eventually chargesheeted.
