National Annual Report & Index on Women’s Safety (NARI) 2025

The Paradox of Women's Safety: Lessons from the NARI 2025 Report

14 per cent of women under 24 years of age reported harassment in public spaces in 2024. That number is double the national average of 7 per cent, underscoring the vulnerability of younger women. The National Annual Report & Index on Women’s Safety (NARI) 2025, released by the National Commission for Women (NCW), has laid bare worrying trends in gender safety, particularly in high-density urban areas. The report’s ranking of safest and least safe cities further exposes growing safety divides, with northeastern capitals such as Kohima and Gangtok scoring high, while Delhi and Kolkata languish at the bottom. But the real question is: does this index truly capture the structural barriers that perpetuate insecurity?

NARI 2025: Policy Instrument or Cosmetic Label?

The NARI index provides a city-level safety assessment using a composite score that includes crime data, enforcement measures, infrastructure audits, and perception surveys. Kohima, for instance, tops the index, while Delhi—the national capital—remains one of the least safe cities for women, a stark indictment of urban governance failures. The benchmark for the national safety score is pegged at 65 per cent, which masks alarming inequities: overcrowded public transport has emerged as a hotspot for harassment (29 per cent), and neighbourhoods accounted for an even higher share (38 per cent).

Despite the government’s initiatives like the Nirbhaya Fund, the structural deficits highlighted in the report remain under-addressed. These funds have often been underutilised—with disbursement bottlenecks at both centre and state levels stalling critical projects such as last-mile safety measures in urban transport. Meanwhile, the much-touted SHe-Box Portal was designed to improve accountability regarding workplace harassment complaints, yet its outreach remains limited in peripheral cities compared to larger metropolises.

The Case For: Grounding Safety Interventions in Multi-Layered Institutions

Advocates argue that city-level indices like NARI provide spatial visibility to safety concerns that often remain buried in aggregated national data. For instance, by ranking cities, policymakers gain actionable insights into areas requiring infrastructure upgrades, judicial reform, and gender-sensitisation programmes. Kohima’s success is partly attributed to its community-based enforcement model combined with active collaboration between municipal agencies and civil society—a reflection of governance accountability.

Further, the integration of initiatives such as mandatory Internal Committees (ICs) under the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace Act, 2013 has shown incremental improvements in reporting at organised workplaces. Mumbai, rated among the safer cities in the index, owes its rank to investments in integrated transport safety, including mandatory CCTVs in buses. Evidently, urban density does not automatically mean insecurity; robust institutional arrangements matter.

The Case Against: Numbers and Narratives That Obscure Accountability

But the NARI index is far from a panacea for women’s safety. First, reliance on official crime data fails to capture perception-based insecurities—a fact acknowledged by experts but under-accounted for in policy design. For instance, despite systemic under-reporting (with only one in three women filing complaints), cities such as Patna and Srinagar are ranked among the least safe largely on statistical metrics, ignoring qualitative indicators like lived experiences and systemic biases.

Institutional silos further dilute the impact of the report’s findings. As highlighted, Delhi’s multiple implementing authorities—from municipal agencies to police departments—often operate without effective collaboration, leading to fragmented safety enforcement. The irony here is stark: despite having the highest allocation under gender-sensitivity training modules for police, Delhi remains near the bottom of the index.

Additionally, judicial delays compound these failures. Investigations into harassment complaints stagnate, and prolonged trials often discourage women from pursuing justice. This gap between legal intent and institutional execution perpetuates safety deficits rather than addressing them.

An International Lens: Lessons from Sweden

Sweden offers a compelling counterpoint. The country faced a similar dilemma in urban women’s safety during the mid-2010s, particularly public transport harassment. Its government introduced a “Safe Commute Program,” embedding accountability measures directly into municipal transport governance. CCTV surveillance, rapid-response mechanisms, and online harassment tracking created measurable deterrents across cities such as Stockholm and Malmö.

Crucially, Sweden’s gender-sensitisation programmes targeted both perpetrators and observers, challenging cultural norms that trivialised harassment. The results were striking: public transport harassment declined by 37 per cent within five years, suggesting that policy success hinges on addressing social attitudes as much as infrastructure gaps.

Where Things Stand: Balancing Policy Vision with Ground Reality

While the NARI index is a step forward in prioritising women’s safety within urban governance, it risks becoming statistical theatre without addressing institutional frictions. Urban planners must integrate perception-based audits alongside enforcement measures; otherwise, safety scores will misrepresent the very women they intend to protect. Additionally, the governance bottlenecks that compromise the effectiveness of funds like Nirbhaya must be streamlined with penalties for states failing utilisation benchmarks.

The immediate risks lie not in misallocation of resources but in public distrust. Only 25 per cent of surveyed women expressed confidence in authorities’ response—a glaring statistic that undermines the credibility of new initiatives.

Prelims Integration: Test Your Knowledge

• Q1: What does the NARI Index primarily measure?
  (a) Women’s labour participation rate
  (b) City-level women’s safety benchmarks
  (c) Gender disparity in income levels
  (d) State-wise progress on women’s political representation
  Correct Answer: (b)
• Q2: Under the Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace Act, 2013, which entity handles complaints for workplaces with fewer than 10 employees?
  (a) Local Committees appointed by the Appropriate Government
  (b) Central Enquiry Bureau
  (c) Independent Arbitration Panels
  (d) Women-specific police desks
  Correct Answer: (a)

Mains Integration: Evaluative Question

Q: Critically evaluate whether city-level safety indices, such as NARI 2025, effectively address the structural limitations of urban governance in tackling women’s security.

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