Bhubaneswar: The state government's plan to include chapters on evil impacts of witch-hunting in school textbooks has remained a non-starter though the number of cases related to witchcraft is on a rise in the state.

Last year, the home department had asked the school and mass education department to develop story-based lessons for students on evils of witch-hunting and include it in the syllabus in appropriate classes for the academic year 2017-18. Though the state government promulgated the Odisha Prevention of Witch Hunting Act, 2013, to check witchcraft, statistics revealed the number of cases increasing in past three years. While 58 cases had been registered in 2015, the number went up to 83 in 2016. The number of such cases went up to 99 in 2017, out of which Mayurbhanj, Keonjhar and Nabarangpur accounted for 70 per cent of such cases.

The plan to include the subject in textbooks was a composite action plan for curbing such crimes and creating awareness among the citizens against such blind belief. Several other departments, including police, have been asked to do their part.

While the information and public relations department was asked to start an awareness campaigns through hoarding, posters, banners and wall paintings, the women and child development department was asked to take up a sensitisation programme involving anganwadi workers and members of self-help groups. Similarly, the police were asked to take swift action against the accused involved in such cases.

The report of the National Crimes Records Bureau also placed Odisha in second place after Jharkhand in terms of murders related to witch-haunting in 2016. While Jharkhand witnessed 27 murders, Odisha registered 24 murders in 2016. School and mass education minister Badri Narayan Patra said he would shortly convene a meeting to discus the progress of the plan.

Additional director-general of police (crime branch) Santosh Kumar Upadhyay said concerned district police had been asked to take stringent action against such incidents in vulnerable districts. "Besides, we have also been conducting awareness programmes for our men for strict implementation of the act," said Upadhyay.