India reported an average of 381 suicides daily adding up to 1,39,123 fatalities in a year (2019), an increase of 3.4 per cent as compared to 2018 (1,34,516) and 2017 (1,29,887), according to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data.

The figures revealed by NCRB which works under Ministry of Home Affairs states that suicide rates in cities (13.9 per cent) was higher as compared to all India suicide rate (10.4 per cent) in 2019.

Majority of the suicides were reported from five states accounting for nearly 50 per cent of the total cases. Maharashtra led with 18,916 cases, followed by Tamil Nadu (13,493), West Bengal (12,665), Madhya Pradesh (12,457) and Karnataka (11,288).

Uttar Pradesh is the most populous state reported a comparatively lower percentage of suicidal deaths. It accounted for only 3.9 per cent of the total deaths in the country.

According to the NDTV report, the data analysis showed that hanging (53.6 per cent), consuming poison (25.8 per cent), self-immolation (3.8 per cent) and drowning (5.2 per cent) were the prominent means of committing suicide in 2019.

Family problems except for marriage (32.4 per cent), marriage related issues (5.5 per cent) and illness (17.1 per cent) were the reasons behind approximately 55 per cent of the total suicide deaths.

‘For every 100 suicide deaths, 70.2 were male and 29.8 were females,’ the NCRB data added.

The maximum number of mass/family suicides have been recorded in Tamil Nadu (16 per cent) along with Andhra Pradesh (14 per cent), Kerala (11 per cent), Punjab (9 per cent) and Rajasthan (7 per cent).

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), suicide is a serious ‘public health problem’ which can be prevented with timely and sensible interventions.

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