I want to die! India is a Suicide hotspot
OK, I don’t want to die!
Suicide, the intentional or voluntary determination to end one’s life, is especially prevalent in India. Southern India is known to have one of the highest suicide rates in the world. Thousands of farmers in Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra have committed suicide recently and the government’s response was extremely lackadaisical.
A recent study by Trivedi, Srivastava and Tandon the Indian Medical Association (IMA), has put suicide in an Indian perspective with the following figures:
With the present rate of 11 per 1,00,000 suicides per year, an increase
from 6 per 1,00,000 (Fig 2) during the 1980s, India occupies the second
highest rate of suicides in South East Asia region.
Kerala (29 per 100 000), Karnataka (21 per 100000) and Tripura as well as
West Bengal (19 per 100 000) have highest rates of suicide. Among the
cities, Bangalore (17%), Mumbai (14%), Chennai (11%) and Delhi (7.5%)
accounted for nearly 50% of total suicide in the country.
This in spite of suicide being illegal in India - there are innumerable cases of persons who have attempted suicide being imprisoned. And that is the official response of the Indian government. One would expect that psychological counselling and prevention workshops would be offered, but instead they are put in jail (for a short duration, of course).
It is appalling that with such high suicide rates, there do not exist any suicide hotlines or helpgroups even in the major cities. Suicide hotlines are extremely simple in being call centres where trained personnel offer a confidential and patient listening opportunity to people seeking help and also direct them towards counselling or other modes of help. All major cities ought to have hotlines or centres that suicide-prone people may resort to when the urge to end their lives strikes.
But we keep hearing about women committing suicides due to family issues, students committing suicides after having failed examinations and men resorting to suicide when faced with financial losses. And we go “Tch, tch…”, and a sympathetic head-shake, conveniently forgetting the episode within seconds.
Globally, the most common methods of suicide are hanging. In
India it is poisoning. Self-burning (immolation) is a method commonly
adopted in India, especially by females. Otherwise it is rare elsewhere
On the other hand, I think it is necessary that suicide be legalized in India. Not only because I believe you have the right to kill yourself anytime you choose, but also so that the government and NGOs can recognize it as a plague affecting India and cater to the suicide-prone populace which is the 15-29 years age-group more effectively in terms of intervention approaches.
What most suicidal people need is a sympathetic ear where they can pour out their miseries. After a few minutes of irrational thinking, it is only human psychology that when the worries are shed in a confidential manner, the person should resume rational thinking. Thereby, a few minutes of sympathetic listening can go a long way in prolonging thousands of lives. If not the government, are at least any NGOs listening to this plight and willing to offer suicide hotlines in India?
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I thought Kerala is the topper in this scenario too!