Campaigns target those battling debt

Workers are shown an anti-suicide video on World Suicide Prevention Day at a labour camp. Satish Kumar / The National

DUBAI // Anti-suicide messages are being broadcast in labour camps and on radio and television talk shows to offer a lifeline to workers and business people grappling with debt.

The UAE Exchange plans to revive its Mission Zero Suicide campaign following recent suicides.

“After 2012-13 it seemed quiet but things seem to have started again this year, and it’s not just Asians who are struggling with depression, so we are planning to restart this campaign,” said Vinod Nambiar, head of business associations and events at UAE Exchange.

An anti-suicide and financial literacy campaign was run by the money transfer and foreign-exchange firm in 2012 during which it reached a million people across the UAE. The drive targeted people with debt, emotional and psychological issues and focused on building economic discipline.

Financial and psychological experts are present when anti-suicide video messages are played out in labour camps or offices.

“We talk to workers in camps and employees in offices about how life is precious and how to stay away from the trap of credit.”

Expatriates send most of their income home and do not focus on saving. “The family thinks they are getting good money in the Gulf and spend everything so there is nothing for them when they go home,” Mr Nambiar said.

“We remind them about the need to save.”

Labour camp managements have called the team to counsel workers after incidents such as one last year, when a worker committed suicide in a camp in the capital.

The Indian community was shaken in July when a Dubai film producer, Santosh Kumar, and his wife Manju slit their wrists and ended the life of their nine-year-old daughter, Gauri. The police said unpaid bills and bounced cheques were a factor in the suicides.

About 100 of the 1,300 Indian deaths in the UAE each year since 2011 have been attributed to suicide, embassy figures show.

In the first half of this year, 37 Indians took their lives in Dubai and the Northern Emirates, out of 544 reported deaths. Psychological and personal problems, as well as debt caused by failed businesses or job losses were blamed for the suicides.

About three out of four expatriate suicides were committed by Indians, according to a study, Suicide Rates in the National and Expatriate Population in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, published two years ago by Dr Kanita Dervic and Dr Leena Al Amiri, from UAE University in Al Ain. The report studied registered suicides in Dubai from 2003 to 2009 and found the suicide rate among expatriates seven times higher than the rate among nationals.

“When a suicide happens we talk about it but that is not enough because, as a society, we have a responsibility to talk to people in trouble or needing psychological assistance,” said K V Shamsudheen, who dedicated a weekly radio programme and a television show to anti-suicide messages this week. Both were in Malayalam, a South Indian language.