Self-immolation bids
across state
It's all in mind and should be treated:
Psychiatrists
On August 16 Bharat Rao, a BJP worker from Nadiad, self-immolated in
protest against rampant corruption in the municipality there, which
according to him facilitated illegal constructions. He succumbed to
the burns the next day. An inquiry followed and action was taken against
one of the responsible officers.
Within a few days of Rao’s
death, a woman into ironing clothes, from a roadside shop, in Vadodara
stood up against the Vadodara Municipal Corporation’s demolition squad
that came to remove the larris. The self-immolation threat by
the woman forced the civic staff to backtrack and with great difficulty
the nearby hawkers prevented her from taking the extreme step.
Be it a matter of seeking
party ticket or a petty quarrel with manager of a cooperative bank,
people have found threats of self-immolation one of the best tools to
seek attention for redressal of their grievances. No wonder four cases
of threats, excluding the case of Bharat Rao, have been reported from
Ahmedabad and Vadodara.
Head of the psychiatry
department of the NHL Medical College Dr M.V. Chudgar says, "Such
threats are alarming. It should be treated as mental illness and could
be infectious."
Referring to series of
self-immolation threats, in connection with Mandal Commission report,
during Prime Minister V.P. Singh’s time, Dr Chudgar said, "The
recent threats in Gujarat reflect people’s frustrations and their inner
feeling of being cheated."
On Sunday, a Congress worker
in Vadodara, Harshad Vachharajani, threatened to self-immolate if the
party failed to give him ticket for the civic polls. Vadodara Congress
president Ashwin Shah complained to the police and Mr Vachharajani was
detained and later released on bail.
Dr Laxman Dutt from the
psychiatry department of the VS Hospital said, such instances should
be treated seriously. People with certain personality traits are sensitive
and have high expectations. If their wishes are not met with, their
impulsive nature forces them to give such threats, he said. However,
those suffering from hysteria only issue threats but do not follow them.
State home department secretary
and spokesman K. Nityanandan said it is difficult to take action in
such cases unless the time and place of self-immolation are known. He
further said in 90 per cent of the cases the persons end up not self-immolating.
These are attention seeking tactics and are aimed to make the government
and other concerned departments bow down to their demand, he adds.
In the Alvi Co-operative
Bank case in Vadodara, the manager rightly brought the instance to the
police’s notice.
After Akbari Samsuddin
Musliwala poured kerosene over himself in the bank to protest against
the manager, who did not take action against an "errant" clerk,
he was handed over to the Police. Similarly, a few days ago Congress
workers prevented fellow workers from self-immolation. They were reportedly
unhappy over one Vinod Kantharia being denied ticket.
