New Delhi: They are fearless and bold, are beautiful minds! Yet, some of them take the ugly course of life towards doom – on their own accord. Suicide among teenagers is a syndrome that was identified only with West till recently.
But it’s no longer so. India is already witnessing an alarming upward trend of suicides among the younger generation.
In terms of attitude, the young generation is always fearless and bold when it comes to issues like sexuality, career and independence. But they tend to bow to the pressures of exams and competition.
What is it that leads these beautiful lives to the self-chosen path of death? IBNlive takes a close look at the factors responsible for such dangerous behaviour.
- Competition and Peer Pressure:- Fierce competition and peer pressure still manage to break the strongest teenage souls. Exam time sure heightens the pressures. And while schoolteachers and counselors talk about their various stress-busting initiatives, morales are still breaking, resulting in some instances where students take their own lives. Amita Chaddha, mother of Tanya who recently gave her XIIth boards, feels that no amount of counseling can eradicate the fear of board exams. “It gives the parents sleepless nights. So just imagine what students themselves must be going through.” Tanya, who was a student of Ryan International, is only too glad that the ‘nightmarish’ exams are over.
- Stress:- What is a matter of concern is that though many schools are taking great care in ensuring a stress-free atmosphere for students, there exist certain schools where the drive to secure excellent records among other factors results in teachers themselves putting pressure on students. In some cases, they even take the form of intimidation and threats. Praveen Chopra, who runs a tuition centre in West Delhi, has a few such students in his batch. “There was a boy who used to get his homework done in my classes. The poor guy was really apprehensive about it, so much so that he ended up concentrating more on just getting the work done on his notebook rather than actually taking time to grasp the concepts. He used to talk about how strict his school was with homework – they used to get loads of it and if a student failed to deliver on time, he/she was subject to a string of insults and humiliations, besides physical punishment too.”
- Pressure to Perform:- Boarding school students, too, have their share of horrors. Recalls Swati Sharma who studied in a Delhi boarding school from class VIIIth to XIth, “My warden’s daughter used to study in my class and the warden wanted her daughter to do better than her competitors. So she ensured that we couldn’t study properly – imposing restrictions like switching off the lights by 10 pm, getting up early for hours of morning exercise, and then various useless activities post school hours, that used to leave us with very less time for studies. Such schedules are very stifling for students. That’s why I left the hostel and stayed as a paying guest for my class XIIth boards.”
Dr Samir Paarikh, psychiatrist, agrees that teachers intentionally or unintentionally end up putting a lot of pressure on youngsters. He attributes it mostly to the unhealthy student teacher ratio in Indian schools.
“Teachers as a result fail to deal with students on an individual basis. And students who spend a large part of their time in schools require appropriate feedback from their teachers. It is imperative to build their self-esteem. Corporal punishment is known to be detrimental whereas a positive feedback raises the self-esteem of the student,” he elaborates.
Comments
0 comment