SRINAGAR: Jameela never imagined she’d be witness to the death of her beloved aunt. The 19-year-old witnessed her aunt die from her kitchen. Such was the impact of the incident, that even without any prior history of psychiatric problems, she began suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorders (PTSD): recurrent, intrusive and distressing recollection of the event, marked by irritability, outbursts of anger, difficulty in concentrating, sleeplessness and disinterest in all social and domestic activities.
Today, there are thousands of Jameelas across J&K—people with no history of mental disorder, who, as a result of the ongoing turmoil, now suffer from PTSD. According to some experts, two decades of political uncertainty is said to be the main contributing factor for it.
Dr Arshad Hussain, one of the Valley’s leading psychiatrists, in an interview, said very few people talk about their mental problems, as they fear others will consider them insane and therefore an embarrassment.
“There is no record of PTSD in Kashmir before 1989. It was during the conflict that such cases came to be noticed. Due to the continuing conflict, people get upset and tense every now and then.”
An academic paper by Dr Sarosh Ahmed Khan, MD, says that in many developed/developing countries, 30-46 per cent of patients who visit the OPD for other diseases are diagnosed with a psychiatric condition, but these figures are much higher in Kashmir. “In the Valley, more than 70 per cent patients have some form of psychological illness, and at least 40 per cent suffer from Generalised Anxiety Disorder, Panic Attack or PTSD,” it says. When asked about the reason for this, Dr Khan says, “The turmoil continuing for so many years is the main reason that has affected the lives of common people in the Valley.”
In 1998, there were 167 trauma cases registered by the Shri Maharaja Hari Singh (SMHS) Hospital, Srinagar’s main hospital. In 1999, it went up to 208. From April 2000 to March 2001, there were 567 cases.
Surveys by various groups confirm that psychological problems have increased manifold in the last three decades. According to the state mental health society, around 80,000 people from the Valley visited mental health professionals during 2005-2006, and nearly three-quarters were diagnosed with serious disorders.
Medecins San Frontieres (MSF), one of two foreign aid agencies in Srinagar, is focused on managing this problem. In a survey by this Swiss-based group for the period 1989-2005, a third of its respondents admitted to suffering from psychological disorder. Nearly one in 10 reported having lost one or more members of their immediate family to the violence. “There’s barely a family that’s not affected. There’s been a tenfold rise in trauma cases in the past decade,” says Paul van Haperen, MSF representative.
According to the National Crime Bureau Records (NCBR), one person commits suicide a day in the Valley. In 2008 there were 188 reported suicides, which increased in the 2009 to 239. Classic examples of PTSD, says Dr Hussain, are people who are visited by past events every now and then as flashbacks. They want to come out, but are unable to do so. Probably the reason why Jameela, after a minor altercation with her sister, consumed pesticide and ended her life.