Workplace Suicide on Rise in India

Bangalore: A suicidal attempt is a clear indication that something is seriously wrong in a person’s life. Most of the people who commit suicide have a mental or emotional disorder. The most common underlying disorder is depression, 30 to 70 percent of suicide victims suffer from major depression or bipolar disorder.

At present, competition has taken a tremendous leap in every field and most significant among them is the IT sector. The onset of globalization and MNC’s rushing with high numbers into the country; the struggle to remain at the top is at the peak for the techies. Everyone wants to remain at the top position and deliver their best and get appreciation from their bosses for their hard work. In that race the techies tend to get far and too determined by getting overly immersed in the mechanical world.

This mechanical world ultimately affects the psyche of the techies and they automatically become the victims of various psychological disorders. Though these disorders seem very common, they are very serious if they are not been detected and counseled at the right time. If they are not detected at the right time nothing else can be more serious than committing suicide. In India, the death rate has increased among the techies because many of them are into depression and other psychological reasons, it can be their problem related to their profession or personal life. Sometimes the professional pressure may have resulted in personal problems.

At present, one in every fifteen people approach a doctor for psychiatric counseling, who is either a software professional or working in call centers. The number of young techies who approach them for counseling has increased tremendously in the past one year.

Recently this year, a 31 year old software engineer Santosh Sarade, who had resigned from Infosys committed suicide after slipping deeper into depression following the loss of his job. He committed suicide when his request to re join the company was denied by the company. The police told that Sarade worked with two top IT companies earlier and had joined Infosys. His health problems were affecting his ability to work and he was also been treated for depression, but his performance at work was being hampered and he was asked to resign from the company. He was worried about his families’ future.

Techies from Infosys like, 32 year old Smita Rao, who worked there as an Assistant Manager, hanged herself last week and 23 year old Sahithi Vyasam, who commited suicide for various reasons.

From Wipro, few techies committed suicide like; 27 year old Prince Singla committed suicide last year, 23 year old Lakshmi Nair, 28 year old Vishal Yadav had committed suicide in the year 2009.

A techie named Bikash Kumar Sharma, a senior network analyst in HCL had committed suicide in the year 2009.

Many of the techies have committed suicide over the years due to various reasons from their professional problems as well as personal problems. Sometimes many of the employees have experienced harassment from their seniors like in the year 2009, an ex-employee from Wipro by name Ram Manohar G, had filed a complaint on his senior officials who were forcing him to resign every time and it had all started during the time of recession where many of the employees were being sacked in that year.

Few employees take bold steps for fighting for their injustice and some of the people find no other way than committing suicide. The stress levels at work, competition, family issues and disturbing habits of IT professionals have made them prone to suicide tendencies. 

In a study conducted by NIMHANS showed that around 1 in every 20 IT professionals contemplates suicide and 27.6 percent of them in India are addicted to narcotic drugs to control their depression level. When Siliconindia tried reaching them for further information, they were unable to comment on it.