Sheikh Saqlain

Flashbacks, insomnia, anxiety and panic attacks make life feel hellishly miserable for Dia, a 22-year old college student.   Musa, another student, frequently screams in terror in a corner or under a bed, trying to isolate himself from everyone else.  Murtuza, a teenager, regularly complains of mysterious pains, flashbacks, and nightmares.

Dia, Musa and Murtaza have two things in common: One – they are all people I know personally. Two – all of them were born and raised up in Kashmir, and have been witnesses to numerous traumatic events in their lives.

Mental illness plagues half of the adult population in the Kashmir valley, which has endured nearly three decades of brutal conflict. The violence involving separatist militants and Indian troops has killed tens of thousands of people and left nearly two million survivors scarred mentally.

Thousands of people, once part of an easy going society, witnesses to killings, rape and torture both by militants and security forces, suffer emotionally and psychologically.

According to a survey conducted by Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors without borders), decades of conflict in Kashmir have taken a heavy toll on the population’s mental health.

Though other reports suggest Kashmir has one of the highest rates of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in the world but the survey by MSF in 2015 says nearly 1.8 million adults (45 per cent of the adult population) in the Kashmir Valley show symptoms of significant mental distress.

Most survivors do not know or do not wish to admit that they have mental problems due to stigma surrounding the issue, but talking with them quickly reveals a history of violence, sexual abuse, and accounts of relatives killed or tortured, or of near misses in gunfights and bomb attacks.

Trauma does not spare Indian forces either, and many of the hundreds of thousands of soldiers fighting militants in Kashmir face psychological problems. In a series of incidents across Kashmir valley, stressed members of the Indian army and paramilitary forces have turned their guns on their colleagues and on themselves.

Read full story here
https://www.ourlostparadise.com/mental-illness-plagues-bloodied-kashmir-where-are-our-healers/