Jamshedpur : In an attempt to control the rising suicide rates among school going children in the city, Jeevan, a Jamshedpur-based suicide prevention centre, has decided to focus on students through its helpline service.
Over the past few years, Jamshedpur has seen a significant rise in suicide cases.The year 2014 has so far witnessed 73 suicides. Eight of the victims were students. The number of calls that Jeevan receives in a year shows a growing trend of stress.
The suicide prevention centre, which received 263 calls on its helpline in 2012, got 503 calls in 2013.Officials of Jeevan said that the idea is to provide proper guidance to the students who are depressed either of failure or securing low marks.
It may be mentioned that the centre at present is running a helpline (0657-6453841) through which depressed, desperate and suicidal persons are provided emotional support. Mahabir Ram, director, Jeevan said that their efforts to control the rising suicide rate in city is showing results, however there is an urgent need to extend their services.
“We want to cater to more people. I think that just four hours service is not enough to combat such a serious issue. We wanted to extend our services so that people can call us and proper receive guidance,” said Ram The director further said that suicide is on the rise amongst adolescents. This madness over marks and cut off percentages can drive anybody to end their lives and these are just kids we are talking about.
On one hand there is this tough competition – scoring high marks to get admission in a good college, and then crack entrance tests to get into a professional institute, then getting placed in a good job. Ram added that the 24 hour service to target school students so that they can create awareness among about the cause of Jeevan and lead a healthy life.
It may be noted in view of a high suicidal death rate in the city, ‘Jeevan’ was founded in 2006 to prevent suicide deaths in and around Jamshedpur. The city has a very high rate of suicidal deaths that is 9.5 persons per lakh of population per year, which is more than the rate at metro like Kolkata( 1.52) and Mumbai ( 6.6).
Meanwhile several illegal jhuggis and shops have been raised in areas in Mango, Golpahari, Loco Colony, Karandih, Jugsalai, Sakchi and Bistupur. Though several times the anti-encroachment drives have been carried but due to support of local goons the people are able to intrude the land again.
