There has been an alarming rise in the number of suicides ever since a separatist campaign erupted in Jammu and Kashmir way back in 1989 . Unfortunately, most such incidents have gone unnoticed.

Although police records show that there were 736 cases of attempted suicide from 2001 until May this year in the Kashmir Valley, the picture may be quite different.

The records of just one major hospital in the summer capital Srinagar, the SMHS hospital, show that it admitted 1,124 patients who had attempted suicide in 2004 alone.

"During the last 18 years, more than 13,000 patients of suicide (where a person ended his/her life), para-suicide (where a person made a serious attempt to end his/her life) and deliberate self-harm were admitted in the SMHS hospital," said Arshad Hussain, a consultant psychiatrist at the government medical college.

Hussain blamed depression, schizophrenia and panic disorders for these cases.

"Depression is the fourth common mental disorder in the world at present. Trauma, unemployment, family breakups and cultural breakdowns are the main reasons for depression among the local youth," he pointed out.

Quoting data, he said the ratio of males and females in suicide cases was 3:1, in para suicide it was 1:4 and in deliberate self-harm it was 1:7, indicating that males outdid the females in committing suicides in the valley while more females made attempts to end their lives and deliberately harming themselves.

Interestingly, Hussain said there are just 12 specialist psychiatrists in the entire valley to cope with the problem.

Records of the valley's only psychiatric ailments hospital in Srinagar show that over 60,000 patients with psychiatric complaints visited the out patients' department in just 2006.

"It is a colossal problem. Patients with multiple psychiatric disorders have been coming to us for treatment an
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