Trying to contain suicides among paramilitary forces and to ensure mental toughness among jawans, the Border Security Force (BSF) has made it compulsory for all its security personnel to undergo an annual “mental health test” or “happiness test”. The test aims at assessing the soldiers’ mental fitness and will also try to bring in corrective measures based on their scores.

Based on how they fare in the test, soldiers will be assigned duties and corrective measures taken. Until now only annual physical tests are held to see if soldiers are fit to discharge their duties.

The forces’ headquarters here has prepared a multi-point wellness quotient assessment test (WQAT) tool that helps “identify stress precipitators and physical and mental health issues that need interventions”. They also ask field commanders to undertake yoga, meditation, counselling and have a buddy system (one person responsible for the other) to check stress among the personnel.

The force has also published a 62-page booklet titled ‘Happiness and Health: Endeavour towards holistic well being’. The mental health test and other initiatives were designed after an extensive study and a year-long research. These initiatives by the BSF are trying to create a platform for soldiers to share their personal stories and build a mechanism to solve mental health issues.

Officials said their research showed that cases of suicide were higher among personnel from poor socio-economic background, and mostly among the 25-35 age group. However, there was not much difference in suicide rates when it came to the marital status of personnel or whether they belonged to nuclear or joint families. “Poor motivation, alcohol dependency, sleep disorders, problems with spouse or other relatives at home, unfavourable working conditions, financial issues, anger and helplessness” were identified as factors leading to stress and depression and eventually suicides.

The new policy measure has been introduced by BSF Director General (DG) KK Sharma after he got a major research project conducted by UK-based experts with the help of force Inspector General (IG) Satwant A Trivedi to analyse various triggers behind suicides and other stress factors suffered by troops and their possible solutions. According to officials, around 200 BSF security personnel were interviewed and trained by clinical psychologists and psychiatrists from London. The psychiatrists drafted tests based on studies that they did on the pattern of suicides and other mental issues that the security personnel face. The training programme will also give guidelines to the security personnel, chart out a good and healthy diet to follow.

Field units will soon be issued booklets containing the string of guidelines to help de-stress soldiers, including group games, and good diet and proper healthcare. Among the additions is asking commanders to ensure their “troops get time for recreation and that facilities (games, TV, movies and books) are available”. Commanders are also being asked to ensure that grievances are addressed by them informally as the formal channel takes too long and frustrates the personnel.

As per official data, a total of 173 BSF personnel have committed suicide in the last five years, while over a dozen such deaths have happened this year. These figures are much more than operational deaths in the line of duty that took place during the same period.

The BSF jawans are deployed for long stints in inhospitable and harsh climate areas along the Indo-Pak and Indo-Bangladesh borders, where they cannot keep their families for years together and all these factors contribute to complaints of stress and fatigue among them. The supervisory commanders of the force have also been directed to undertake a number of other intervention techniques like interviewing the jawan as soon as he is back from leave.

Courtesy: The Pioneer, Thursday, 24 May 2018 | Rajesh Kumar | New Delhi