KNB News Desk
Srinagar 03 June (KNB): Suicide cases in Kashmir valley have again picked up a pace in the backdrop of Covid lockdown, with some victims taking their lives by keeping their reasons in obscurity for always and others manifesting the same.
In May last month, several suicides were reported from different areas of the valley. In these suicides, females outstripped the number of males as mostly females gave up their lives for a reason which may always remain in murky waters.
On May 6th, a teenage girl from Srinagar’s Batamaloo jumped from Budshah Bridge into the Jhelum river, and her body was recovered after several days from Panzinara.
Later, on May 20, a woman silenced herself for always embracing the water of river Jhelum. She took her life after plunging into Jhelum at Safakadal.
To keep the string of suicides intact, another woman in the Ganderbal district followed suit and jumped into a river Sindh on May 29. This incident happened just before when a teenage orphan girl consumed a poisonous substance and allegedly committed suicide on May 30.
A consultant Psychiatrist Dr Junaid Nabi said that in most suicide cases, there is often an emulation, which a person learns from other similar acts. “A person sometimes sees a celebrity committing a suicide which he or she follows whenever coming under a pressure.”
The month of May came with another suicide when a youth hailing from South Kashmir’s Kulgam sacrificed his life on the altar of seeking a salary of his father, a teacher. This suicide was committed by putting forth a reason which seemingly had been distressed him for a long.
When KNB asked Dr Nabi about the relation between the surge in suicides and lockdown, he said that children and teenagers had been stuck in their homes during the lockdown, which increased their stress levels. Losing of jobs by private workers, which he implied of making people or their dependents to suicide, during lockdown also affect their mental health.
Dr Nabi replied — suicides committed more by females last month — that it is not right that suicidal tendencies are more in females than in males. He said that rather both genders get affected and could take an extreme step.
Questioning Dr Nabi that is there any unusual things to be noted in the behaviour of an individual who may be thinking of committing suicide, he said that such people often spent time alone, develops reticent character, the sudden outburst of anger and other behaviour changes. He said that family members noting such things should take the person for Psychiatric counselling. (KNB)