Kerala figures among the top five States and Union Territories with high suicide rates in the country, reporting 8,556 suicides during 2019.
While the national rate of suicides (number of suicides per one lakh population) was 10.4 during last year, it was 24.3 in Kerala. In 2018, the rate of suicide in the State was 23.5 when the national average was 10.2 and it was 22.6 in 2017.
In 2019, Andaman & Nicobar Islands had the highest rate of suicide (45.5) followed by Sikkim (33.1), Puducherry (32.5), Chhattisgarh (26.4) and Kerala (24.3), as per the “Accident Deaths and Suicides in India in 2019” of the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB).
Case in cities
The number of suicides in Kerala has gone up from 8,237 in 2018 to 8,556 in 2019, the percentage variation being 3.9. The suicide rate in cities (13.9) was on the higher side compared the national suicide rate (10.4). Kollam followed by Asansol have reported the highest suicides rate of 41.2 and 37.8. Kollam had reported 457 suicides last year, Thrissur 405, Thiruvananthapuram 331, Kozhikode 258 and Kochi 222. In all, 22,390 suicides had been reported from the 53 cities.
Of the suicides committed by unemployed persons, 14% were in Kerala (1,963 out of 14,019 suicides), 10.8% in Maharashtra (1,511), 9.8% in Tamil Nadu (1,368), 9.2% in Karnataka (1,293) and 6.1% in Odisha (858 suicides)
Out of 32,427 suicides committed by persons educated up to matriculate/secondary level, 17.6% were reported in Maharashtra followed by Kerala and Tamil Nadu (10.4% each) and Karnataka (8.6%). An increase in suicides during 2019 (1,39,123 suicides) has been observed as compared to 2018 (1,34,516) in the NCRB statistics.
Maximum cases of mass/family suicides were reported in Tamil Nadu (16 cases) followed by Andhra Pradesh (14), Kerala (11), Punjab (9) and Rajasthan (7) during 2019, with a total 43 persons in Tamil Nadu, 36 in Andhra Pradesh, 24 in Kerala and 22 persons in Rajasthan losing lives in such instances.
Major reasons
Family problems (other than marriage-related problems) (32.4%), marriage-related problems (5.5%) and illness (17.1%) together accounted for 55% of total suicides in 2019.
Of the victims, 12.6% were illiterate,16.3% were educated up to primary level, 19.6% up to middle class level, 23.3% up to matric level and 3.7% were graduates and above.
Housewives accounted for 51.5% of the women victims and constituted nearly 15.4% of the total suicide case. A total of 10,281 persons involved in farming sector committed suicides during 2019.