Stronger together: How a supportive society can help prevent suicides and save lives

"Nowadays, suicide is just a way of disappearing. It is carried out timidly, quietly, and falls flat. It is no longer an action, only a submission."
-Cesare Pavese

According to the National Crime Records Bureau, on an average, more than one lakh people commit suicide every year in India. Experts suggest that for each adult who has committed suicide, there are 20 others attempting it. Today, more people are dying from suicide than from war and murder. 

But suicide is preventable. Wednesday, September 10, was World Suicide Prevention Day, and students from the social psychology department of the University Department of Applied Psychology (UDAP), University of Mumbai began their month-long campaign on suicide prevention with a panel discussion on this year's World Suicide Prevention Day theme 'One World Connected'.

These students have been organising activities like creative writing, poster making and short film making. They have also visited schools and colleges to invite them for these activities and have conducted seminars to make students aware of the nature of the myths, facts, warning signs and preventive measures of suicide. They also performed a flash mob and street play presentation on Monday, September, 9, 2014 at Shivaji Park,  Ruparel College of Arts, Science and Commerce, SIES -College of Arts, Science and Commerce, CST and Marine Drive. 

While coordinating permissions for these activities they had a face many difficulties. Madhawa Galgali, student moderator for the panel, said, "One of setbacks we had was the mindset of the people. We had many saying suicidal people were cowards, so why save them?" 

When it comes to any problem the first thing that many people do is look for support. "People who think of suicide are those who are going through tremendous pain and are unable to cope with it," informed Eshita Mandal, practicing psychologist, adding these people don't really want to die. "No one really wants to die, but what they want is to put an end to the pain, and to put an end to the pain is to end their life. However, given a choice, they wouldn't want to do that."  

Bankim Trivedi, volunteer and trainer with The Samaritan Mumbai agreed. "One of the major causes of suicide is expectation. It could be anything life, academic, peers etc," he said. He added that when these expectations are not met by an individual, it starts annoying him/her and they end up isolating themselves into a shell. "Staying alone is a choice but feeling lonely is sometimes not an option." 

Suicide is a problem of the society and we as a society should take more responsibility for making people's lives bearable, and focus on supporting more concrete ways to prevent suicide, like helping people contact professional help, supporting research and treatment of depression, and fighting for social justice. "Apart from being an individual problem, this issue also needs to be addressed on a national level and policy makers need to bring this to the forefront of policy making," advised Satishchandra Kumar, HoD, UDAP. 

Shalini Sharma, police inspector, Extradition Cell- Mumbai's Crime Investigative Unit (CIU) also agreed. "As a law enforcing agency we have to see that we maintain discipline and ensure the safety and security of the people," she said, adding that when there is an obstacle people look at the police for help and there have been incidents when they have used force. "However, when it comes to prevention, the police weren't being used, and that's why in 2011 a hostage and crisis negotiation team was formed to handle this situation," she added. 

When a suicidal incident occurs in public, the police can intervene, but there are ways to prevent it before it reaches that extreme stage. "Family support is extremely important. When parents close the door, they have nowhere to go," said Mandal, advising that we, as a society, need to help people learn to cope with the situation rather than saying "Don't worry, it will be fine, you can adjust". "If the person could adjust, he/she wouldn't have come to you. We need to give them a ray of hope on how to cope and how to make things work," she added. The police are one part of it, but all of us need to collectively work towards preserving life. Ending one's life doesn't help, so learn ways to live instead of ways to die.