Srinagar, Sept. 2: The government is worried about frustrated soldiers in Kashmir ending their lives, but the problem may have overshadowed suicides among the state’s youth.

The state witnessed 110 suicides in the first seven months of this year against a total of 240 in the previous two years, a study by a government medical college says.

Every year, the Shri Maharaja Hari Singh Hospital receives over 1,000 patients who have attempted suicide or deliberately wounded themselves.

“Our study shows that over the past three years, an average of three to four such cases have been reported by our casualty wards every day. There are many others who go to other hospitals,” said Dr Arshad Ahmad, a psychiatrist at the government hospital and a co-author of the study.

Ahmad and his colleagues studied some 14,830 cases. Most were men between 25 and 34 years, although suicide rates are high also among young women.

The most common method was swallowing chemicals such as phosphorus, or an overdose of a benzodiazepine (often used as sedatives) or a tri-cyclic anti-depressant, the study said.

But many chose more grisly ways. “We found people burning themselves. Other violent methods, such as slitting throats, were also seen but predominantly among those suffering from schizophrenia or melancholic depression,” Arshad said.

For men, the triggers were psycho-social factors: high stress, poverty and unemployment. For women, the reasons were often domestic violence and multiple traumas.

The reasons for some of the suicides were trivial. Mushtaq cited Class VIII student Riyaz, who hanged himself because his wish to have a mobile phone was not instantly fulfilled.

“His parents had promised to get him the mobile and his mother had borrowed money from a neighbour, but Riyaz would not wait.”

Many feel the roots of the problem go back to the eruption of militancy in 1989. The violence and frustration have intensified suicidal tendencies.

Bashir Ahmad Dabla, who teaches sociology at Kashmir University, says militant violence “has added fuel to the fire. People are on edge”. According to global NGO Medecins Sans Frontieres, a third (34 per cent) of respondents in a suicide survey in Kashmir last year said they had thought about ending their lives in the month before their interview.

Local experts said the annual suicide rate in Islamic nations is 0.1 to 0.2 per 100,000. In Muslim-dominated Kashmir, the figures are much higher.

“Before 1990, the suicide rate here was 0.5 cases per lakh, among the lowest in the country. We believe it has shot up to around 13 now,” Arshad said.

He may console himself with the example of Bengal, which topped the country with 15,015 cases in 2005. The trend in the Valley, however, is an eye-opener for insurgency-wracked states.