Invisible Scars in Kashmir

20 years of conflict have left scars on the people of Kashmir. Not just the scars some carry from bullet wounds and tear gas shells but the invisible scars of dealing with daily fear, insecurity and often unbearable loss. Dheera Sujan writes for the RNW.

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There are only 20 psychiatrists and a handful of clinical psychologists working in a region of four million souls. And most of them are based in the capital, Srinagar. That leaves the vast majority of people in the remote rural areas, stranded.
  
Dr Arshid is a psychiatrist with the Government Mental Health College in Srinagar. He says that there’s little data on the rise of mental health problems in Kashmir since the conflict, but empirical evidence – what he and his colleagues have witnessed in recent years – points to a definite increase.
  
Suicide
“Kashmir had the lowest suicide rate in India according to one study” he says. “It was .01% of the population. In fact we didn’t even have a word for suicide in the Kashmiri language. But now if you visit any hospital in Srinagar the doctors will tell you that they’re seeing four, five, six people a day who have attempted it…and the figures state that for every seven attempts you see and save, there was one successful suicide.”
  

There are only 20 psychiatrists and a handful of clinical psychologists working in a region of four million souls. And most of them are based in the capital, Srinagar. That leaves the vast majority of people in the remote rural areas, stranded. Dr Arshid is a psychiatrist with the Government Mental Health College in Srinagar. He says that there’s little data on the rise of mental health problems in Kashmir since the conflict, but empirical evidence – what he and his colleagues have witnessed in recent years – points to a definite increase. he says. 

Dr Arshid

Photo: RNW/Dheera Sujan

Dirty linen
Dr Arshid says that the conflict is directly and indirectly responsible for the increase in suicide, depression, psychosis and drug abuse. “We used to have a society where women would go to the river to wash their clothes – and there they would wash all the dirty linen. They would talk about their problems in the family and society, and together the women would suggest solutions and s€upport each other. But now the conflict means that no one trusts each other anymore.”
  
Dr Muzaffer Khan is clearly tired. He left his house on the outskirts of Srinagar at 5 a.m. to try to get to the city before the curfew. For three months now, Kashmir has been shut down because of the curfews enforced by the security forces, and Dr Khan was worried about the patients he has not been able to see. It’s late afternoon, but since his dawn breakfast, he’s not had time to eat. He rushed from his private practice to the drug addiction clinic where he works and then drove 15 kilometres out of Srinagar for a group counselling session at the Shehjar boarding house for orphan boys.
  
Boys home
One of the boys at the session was seven-year-old Aurangzeb. He was five when his father was poisoned by a woman from his village, for being a police informer. In a small, timid voice, Aurangzeb told the doctor that when he grew up, he was going to kill the woman who killed his father. But for now, he settles for just beating up her children every time he visits his family in the village.
  
When I ask the doctor to try to guess how many people in Kashmir have mental issues because of the conflict, he turns his melancholic eyes to me and answers instantly, “almost all of them.”
  
“Even you?” I ask. ”Yes, even me, my colleagues, friends, family – we all have things we’ve seen and experience which come back every time we witness more violence here.” Posted by collective at October 03, 2010 03:06 AM