Suicide prevention cell launched

Hyderabad: With a view to curb suicidal tendency in the community, especially among youth, and to provide free counseling services, the Telangana government started a Suicide Prevention Counseling Cell at 104 Seva Kendram on the occasion of World Suicide Prevention Day on Thursday.

As of now the 104 Seva Kendram provides non-emergency health and medical advice, guidance and counseling services to the needy callers. It has received as many as 980 calls from the people with thoughts of suicide since 2012. Of these, the number of men callers was 792 and women 188. The youth in the age group of 15 to 25 years contacted the Seva Kendram for advice to avoid suicide.

To reach out to people of Telangana in distress and to save precious lives, Group Captain GJ Rao, Command Education Officer and PRO of HQ Maintenance Command, Indian Air Force, has submitted a project titled ‘Bangaru Telangana through sustainable suicide prevention model for farmers and students in particular and others in general’ to Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao recently.

Speaking to The Hans India, GJ Rao said he urged the Chief Minister to set up a suicide prevention counseling centre at Hyderabad with 24x7 counseling services operated by highly qualified, trained and experienced counselors, which would be a key step in this direction. With the initiative of GJ Rao, KCR has given nod to the health department to launch a suicide prevention cell at the existing 104 Seva Kendram.

K Shashi Sri, General Manager, told The Hans India that prevention of suicides achieved by the efforts of counselling team was about 80 per cent and remaining 20 per cent of the cases could not be followed up due to non-availability of their phone numbers. She said a 12-member dedicated team was counseling the callers. Very shortly, the Seva Kendram would have two psychiatrists to help the callers medically, she added.

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