By Israruddin Israr (Translation: Chirgali)
Kudos to the youth of Ghizer district of Gilgit-Baltistan for organizing a grand dialogue on mental health amid increasing suicide cases in Gilgit-Baltistan (G-B). With acknowledgment of this great effort on behalf of youth, I would like to discuss the often-heard superstitions and stereotypes attached to suicide cases in G-B.
A perception has been created that suicides have something to do with the people residing in the Ghizer district only. This is a totally fallacious perception borrowed by people without a second thought. As per police records, suicides take place in all districts across G-B but for the most part, go unreported.
Last year out of a total of 29 suicide cases in G-B, 19 were reported from Ghizer and the rest from other districts. In light of these and similar reliable statistics, it would be inappropriate to associate suicides with the Ghizer district only. In reality, more cases are reported from Ghizer vis-a-vis other districts across G-B. Suicides do take place in other districts also. However, they go unreported for a number of reasons.
Suicide is not a new issue in human history. It has existed as a social problem from the beginning with the advent of Homo sapiens on this planet earth. Murder and suicide both have occurred simultaneously from day one. Murder is when a person kills another person whereas suicide is when a person ends life in his own hands. Both are difficult to commit but the latter is more difficult.
The Association of suicide cases with a particular religious sect is another superstition. Police record on suicides over the years negates this perception. According to the police record, suicides take place indiscriminately among people across sects in the region. However, the ratio varies from one religious sect to another. According to statistics, on average 10 thousand people belonging to all sectarian groups in Pakistan commit suicide in one year.
Thirdly, many of us believe that suicide cases do not take place in a Muslim society. But the available data says suicides are taking a huge toll on human lives in both Muslim and non-Muslim societies. However, the poor and developing nations experience more cases in relation to developed nations.
According to a survey, on average 1 million people (a person/second) end their lives by committing suicide in the world. This number is speculated to double by 2030 making it 2 million committing suicide every year.
Gilgit-Baltistan has witnessed a spike in suicide cases since 2000. It would not be wrong to state suicides have increasingly become a new social reality in the last couple of decades. Thus the recognition of suicides as a new reality is a prerequisite to addressing it. However, society does not seem ready for such recognition. It reacts with a conservative approach rather than responding with an analytical and critical approach.
People without having studied even a single paragraph of a relevant book start to make long commentaries on suicides. They would just pass judgments based on a number of superstitions and stereotypes. One can see the social media being poured into by such superstitions and wrong perceptions when a suicide case is reported.
Suicide is a very complicated social problem for everyone to talk about. Numerous research studies have been conducted but the problem still exists in society without a complete solution. However, there are some small populations which have been able to control the problem to a sufficient level vis-a-vis large populations.
In the context of Gilgit-Baltistan, the superstitions associated with suicides are very dangerous and worrisome. It is very difficult to approach the problem on an objective basis. Paradoxically, people want to look modern from the outside but do not want to abandon the centuries-old conventional approach. Consequently, a coping mechanism characterized by a conservative pattern of thinking in apparently modern people dominates the overall makeup of society.
For instance, when Covid-19 broke out, our people thought it was providence’s wrath invited by the non-Muslim developed world. But, when the virus spread to their doorsteps, they started to panic and adopt SOPs. Interestingly, they started to look at the same first-world people for vaccines. The majority of people got vaccinated but a small population still resisted until forced by the government to give in.
People in Gilgit-Baltistan would not visit a doctor or a hospital until they experience a health emergency. They would hope to recover even without visiting a hospital. In the same way, our people generously use technology to make their life better but when it comes to social problems they are not ready to abandon conservative thinking.
Another superstition associated with suicides is a perception that the ‘new generation is a coward generation, it cannot cope with challenges’. They compare the new generation with their forefathers who were brave. They would associate suicide with courage and cowardice. If you ask them ‘what was so good about the forefathers’? They would respond in such a way as if all were very brave and lived heroic life. As if there was no illness and people coped with challenges. According to them, there was no problem with their ancestors. Finding myself in this nonsense, sometimes I wish I could send such people back to the old times. But alas, it is not possible.
The people advocating a return to the old days actually draw superficial knowledge from fantasy tales rather than an analytical study of previous generations. They live mentally in the old days narrated in fictional stories. Old times seem good for them, it’s a psychological issue. People glorify the past because they do not want to accept the realities of the present. They rather want to escape the reality which demands hard work and labor to get an in-depth understanding.
Today many of us call the present full of odds and problems. It’s quite possible future generations would glorify our time. They would not know what we had been through. They would not know about the worst economic conditions we face today owing to the spike in petroleum prices and devaluation of the Pakistani rupee. This is what exactly many of us do when we compare ourselves with our forefathers.
Those recommending old solutions to new problems are the people who do want to invest their energy, time, and labor to address problems as per the need of the hour. Problem-solving is the process involving high-order thinking skills. One needs to intensively study available literature and engage in critical discourse. Only after a rigorous process of learning, a person can claim to possess the authority to speak on something.
Another popular superstition associated with suicide is a general perception: people commit suicide because of a lack of religious practice and faith in God. We often hear such statements when a suicide happens. On such arguments, I just start to think if the person committing suicide was the only person with a lack of faith or without any faith in a sea of people with song faith.
Are all others so good in religious practices and faith that nobody lied or committed corruption, murder, stole anything, etc? The reality is otherwise. People perform the worst sort of misdeeds but still only one in many resorts to suicide. Thus the people recommending solutions based on conservative lines rather than scientific research and study need to consult a psychiatrist. Ignorance of scientific objective knowledge and understanding in itself is a fundamental social issue. This has led to a myriad of similar problems, e.g. practices like visiting shrines, drinking spring waters, wearing amulets, magic, torture, etc.
Work on mental health started centuries ago in the world. Unfortunately, in our context, it has never been considered a problem. According to mental health experts, anger beyond a certain limit is one of the basic signs of mental illness. In our society, every other person seems to carry this basic sign of mental illness. Unfortunately, there is neither any facility to promote mental health nor any awareness in Gilgit-Baltistan. To aggravate the problem, people are even not ready to accept there exist mental health issues in society.
Physical and mental health are equally important departments of the health sector. The mental health department seeks the same attention as the physical health department. According to research, mental health issues are at the core of suicides taking place throughout the world. But as mentioned in the above lines, instead of accepting mental health as a reality, people try to live in a world full of superstitions and stereotypes.
In Gilgit-Baltistan, schools and home environments are no less different than a police station. Teaching emotional intelligence skills, effective parenting, and teaching how to fulfill emotional and physical needs are very hard to find. In modern times, parents and teachers cannot nurture and develop their children as balanced personalities by subjecting them to torture. Today kids and young people carry a sense of dignity and do not want anyone to violate it. They are not centuries-old young people who did not know about anything. The young people of today know about the world (more than their parents) because of the internet.
Moreover, today a child seeks human-friendly treatment from people around them. You cannot impose anything on him/her by force, he will resist anything imposed against his will. Thus, the solution to all the social problems including suicides lies in adopting a scientific approach rather than being stuck to the conservative solutions.
Old and conventional totkas are not the solution to suicides and other problems. The solution rather lies in scientific knowledge. We can see that majority of the Muslim population does not get tired of talking about the achievements of Muslim scientists but they themselves would not adopt scientific life. Because, adopting an objective and scientific approach demands an investment of energy, time, and labor.
Those interested in talking about suicides should study some books analyzing the reasons behind suicides so that they would have some basic information about this topic. Suicide is not a simple topic you will talk about without in-depth knowledge and practical engagement with the victims. Discussions and debates with superficial knowledge will serve nothing except to increase the cases even more. Therefore, better to avoid this stereotyping.
This problem of suicide is a problem being studied and dealt with by different branches of social sciences i.e. sociology, psychology, and anthropology. This is not a work of water channel of a village which needs solution according to local customs. The problem is new, thus the solution will also be in new knowledge. Ghizer youth is trying to find a solution on an objective basis which will be a good omen in addressing issues related to mental health.
The writer is a prominent human rights activist, journalist, and writer from Gilgit-Baltistan
