Dipak Kumar Dash, TNN | Jul 2, 2012, 03.08AM IST
NEW DELHI: Divorce, “illegitimate pregnancy” and professional/career problems seem to be pushing more people to commit suicide. According to the NCRB report, in 2011, at least 16 people committed suicide every hour and the total figure was 1.35 lakh.
While family problems accounted for almost one-fourth of suicides, illness was another major reason.
Interestingly, suicides due to divorce and “illegitimate pregnancy” saw a rise of 54% and 20% respectively in 2011.
The report showed that 70% of victims were married and Rajasthan recorded maximum mass family suicides in the country. Statistics and trends compiled by the board showed that social and economic causes led most men to commit suicide whereas emotional and personal causes mainly drove women to take the extreme step.
Underlying the economic angle to suicides, the report said 38% of victims were self-employed whereas the share of those with permanent jobs (government jobs) committing suicide was negligible at 1.2%.
West Bengal, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka accounted for 56.2% of the total suicides in the country while West Bengal recorded the highest number of suicide victims. Among 53 mega cities with over 10 lakh population, Chennai registered 2,438 suicides while Bangalore (1,717), Delhi (1,385) and Mumbai (1,162) followed. The four cities reported almost 36.7% of the total suicides.
The report showed Nagaland reporting the highest increase of 175% in suicides in 2011 compared to the previous year while in Chandigarh, it increased by 47.9%.
The data showed 72 mass/family suicides in Rajasthan and 19 in Kerala. Using poison and hanging were the two most common modes of committing suicide across the country.