After sunset in India’s cities, women begin to make quiet calculations — which street to take, what time to return, whether to travel alone at all. These small, daily negotiations shape urban life far more than crime statistics suggest. A major national survey released last September puts numbers to that reality, revealing why some cities feel like refuge while others feel like risk for women navigating public space.
The NARI 2025 (National Annual Report & Index on Women’s Safety) surveyed 12,770 women across 31 Indian cities, asking not only whether they had experienced harassment or violence, but how safe they felt moving through their cities. The results are sobering. Only about 65 percent of respondents said they felt “सुरक्षित (surakshit, safe)” overall. The remaining 40 percent reported feeling “असुरक्षित (asurakshit, unsafe)” in routine situations — particularly at night, on poorly lit streets, and while using public transport. The survey underscores a persistent gap between official crime data and lived experience, where fear is often shaped by everyday harassment rather than headline crimes.
At the top of the safety rankings are cities where women report a strong sense of confidence and autonomy in public life. Kohima in Nagaland emerges as the safest city in the country, followed by Visakhapatnam, Bhubaneswar, Aizawl, Gangtok, Itanagar, and Mumbai. Completing the top ten are Indore, Thiruvananthapuram, and Panaji, all of which cluster around or slightly above the national safety benchmark. Women in these cities consistently describe greater ease moving alone, returning home late, and using public transport without constant vigilance. What stands out is not the absence of risk, but the presence of सुरक्षा (surakshā, safety/security) as a shared civic expectation rather than a personal burden.
In cities like Kohima and Aizawl, respondents frequently cited community trust and social closeness — a form of स्नेह (sneh, mutual care or social warmth) — as central to their sense of safety. These are places where women’s presence in public space is normalized, not questioned, and where harassment carries social stigma rather than silent acceptance. Mumbai’s relatively strong showing, despite its size and density, reflects decades of women’s participation in night-time work, crowded suburban trains, and public life, suggesting that visibility and normalization can matter as much as infrastructure.
The bottom of the rankings tells a harsher story. Patna, Jaipur, Faridabad, and New Delhi appear among the least safe cities, joined by Kolkata, Ranchi, Srinagar, Dehradun, Meerut, and Ghaziabad in perception-based analyses linked to the survey. Women in these cities describe constant self-monitoring — avoiding certain routes, timing movements carefully, dressing strategically, or relying on male accompaniment. Here, insecurity is less about rare violent crime than about the accumulation of everyday threats: staring, stalking, verbal abuse, and the expectation that women must manage risk themselves.
Cultural context weighs heavily on these outcomes. In many of the lowest-ranked cities, deeply पितृसत्तात्मक (pitṛsattātmak, patriarchal) norms continue to frame women’s mobility as conditional. Being out late still invites scrutiny, suspicion, or blame. When this social policing is paired with weak infrastructure — broken streetlights, erratic transport, slow police response — it produces an environment where fear becomes routine. The survey makes clear that safety is not just about enforcement, but about whether a city accepts women as legitimate users of public space.
Another striking finding is how rarely women report harassment. Many respondents said they did not trust authorities to act, feared being dismissed, or worried about social consequences. Younger women, particularly those under 24, reported even higher levels of anxiety, suggesting that India’s next urban generation is growing up alert to danger rather than confident in freedom.
“Women’s safety is not just a law-and-order issue,” said Vijaya Rahatkar, chairperson of the National Commission for Women, at the report’s release. She stressed that safety directly affects शिक्षा (shikshā, education), रोज़गार (rozgār, employment), and women’s स्वतंत्र आवाजाही (svatantra āvāgāhī, freedom of movement) — without which equality remains abstract.
Perhaps the most uncomfortable conclusion of the NARI 2025 survey is this: modernity, wealth, and global reputation do not guarantee safety. Smaller cities with strong social accountability often outperform major metros burdened by anonymity and institutional fatigue. As India’s urban population continues to grow, the survey offers a clear warning. Until women can move without calculation — without fear — the idea of a सुरक्षित भारत (surakshit Bhārat, a safe India) will remain uneven, fragile, and dependent on geography rather than rights.
Spicy Auntie has read the survey, nodded grimly, sighed loudly, and poured herself another cup of coffee. Because honestly, none of this is shocking — and that’s exactly the problem.
Every time India releases a “women’s safety” ranking, people argue about methodology, defend their favourite city, or complain that it makes the country “look bad.” What nobody wants to admit is that women already know these rankings by heart. We carry them in our bodies. In our routes. In the way we stop answering messages after dark so nobody knows we’re outside. In the way we pretend to be on a phone call. In the way we grip keys like weapons and still call it “normal.”
What the NARI survey confirms — again — is that women’s safety is not about crime statistics. It’s about permission. Who is allowed to exist in public without explanation? Who gets questioned, watched, blamed? In cities where women are still expected to justify why they’re out late, alone, or dressed “like that,” no amount of CCTV will save us. Patriarchy doesn’t need darkness; it works perfectly well under streetlights.
I’m not surprised that smaller cities with strong community accountability score better. When people actually know each other, men are less brave about being predators. When women are visible everywhere — at work, on buses, in markets, at night — harassment becomes deviant instead of routine. Safety isn’t magic. It’s normalization.
What does make me angry is how often responsibility quietly slides back onto women. Don’t go there. Don’t go late. Don’t take that road. Don’t trust strangers. Don’t provoke. Don’t complain. Don’t exaggerate. Don’t embarrass your family. Don’t ruin a man’s future. Don’t, don’t, don’t. Meanwhile, the same cities wring their hands and ask why women don’t feel safe. Sweetheart, we just told you.
And let’s talk about underreporting. Women don’t avoid the police because we’re shy. We avoid them because we’ve been there. Because filing a complaint can feel like a second assault. Because the questions always circle back to us — what we wore, where we went, who we were with — as if public space still comes with moral conditions for women only.
The most damning thing about this survey isn’t which cities rank worst. It’s that fear has been normalized as a female personality trait. Caution mistaken for virtue. Restriction sold as protection. If a city’s safety depends on women staying home, staying silent, or staying scared, that city is not safe. It’s just controlled.
Spicy Auntie’s conclusion is simple: a city is safe for women when women don’t have to think about safety all the time. Until then, these rankings aren’t news. They’re receipts.