Government launches National Database on Sexual Offenders

September 21, 2018

Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has launched India’s National Database of Sexual Offenders (NDSO). With this, India became the ninth nation to maintain such thorough database. NDSO will not be available for general public but only to law enforcement agencies for effectively tracking and investigating cases of sexual offences

National Database on Sexual Offenders (NDSO)

NDSO is initiative under National Mission for Safety of Women aimed at curbing crimes against women and children. It will mainly include database sexual offenders in the country convicted under charges of rape, gang rape, POCSO and eve teasing 2005 onwards.
It will have database of containing key details of convicted sexual offenders such as their names, residential address, photographs, fingerprints, DNA samples, Aadhaar numbers and Personal Account Numbers (PANs).
It will be maintained by National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) for regular monitoring and tracking by State Police. The database will not compromise any individual’s privacy. At present database contains 4.4 lakh entries. State Police will regularly update the database from 2005 onwards. As of now, it does not have records of juvenile offenders, but they are likely to be included in at later stage.
NDSO will maintain database of cases classified as posing low danger for a period of 15 years. The database of cases, which are classified as moderate danger, will be stored for 25 years. The data for cases involving repeat and habitual offenders, criminals, convicted gang rapists and custodial rapes will be stored permanently.