Epidemiological study of hanging deaths in Imphal

Abstract

Hanging deaths is common in the day to day practice of Forensic expert. According to National Crime Bureau Report of 2016, in India, death due to hanging constitutes 46.2% of suicide. A retrospective study of 205 cases of autopsies done for hanging cases in the mortuary of Regional Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS), a Tertiary Care Hospital in Imphal, Manipur were studied from the period between January 2008 to December 2019. This present study throws some light on the emerging trends that hanging is increasingly being adopted by a relatively younger age group between 21-30 years and males constituted 60% while females constituted 40%. Most of the victims were married 60.49% and were settled in urban areas. The place of occurrence was mostly indoors both for males (40.49%) as well as for females (32.68%). Soft ligature was the most commonly ligature material used by hanging victims. Findings of this study will help in highlighting the present scenario of hanging deaths and thus will help in solving many crimes by the law enforcing agencies.