Terrorism and Mental Health

It is indeed a great honour delivering the presidential address here at the " 56th " annual conference of our esteemed society in the city of palaces, Mysore. I am grateful to the honorable members of the IPS who have reposed their faith in me and provided me an opportunity to work for the highest office for a year. I feel overwhelmed whenever I think about the day when I joined psychiatry as my career and since then each day has added depth and meaning to my life. I take this opportunity to convey gratitude for whatever little I am, to the blessings and guidance of my teacher Late Prof. B.B.Sethi, an eminent psychiatrist, a great academician, a visionary and founder of our department at Lucknow. In more than two decades of my professional career as a clinician and as a teacher, many illustrious psychiatrists and stalwarts have inspired and guided me. Whenever I think of those distinguished figures I feel inundated and ponder if I could imbibe even a fraction of their virtues. I owe greatly to all of them. I felt on crossroads while choosing the topic for presidential address. It was indeed very alluring to speak on one of my areas of research. However " considering the current socio-political scenario, which is effected frequently by terrorism. We routinely see, hear and read about terrorism and its consequences through media. We as the mental health service providers would have an important role to play in training, advising and assisting 'front-line responders 'as well as helping in the management of those with psychiatric and psychosocial problems. It also provides us a unique opportunity and challenge to sensitize the general population to vulnerability of all people to mental disorders and the scope for recovery and healing. I would like to address some of the major issues in relation to a terrorist attack, including its likely psychological effects and the possible intervention strategies to mitigate such effects Introduction Our nation has been the victim of terrorism since long. Almost all the regions of our country including north, south, east and west have been affected by the menace called 'terrorism' on different occasions. In few areas like Northeast and now Jammu and Kashmir it has almost become a perpetual problem. In the post colonial era one of the first insurrections was encountered in Telangana led by the communist. The state of Punjab …