Jeevan, a city-based suicide prevention centre, organised a workshop on 'Reasons of Stress and Depression and How to Handle Them' at Graduate School College for Women at Sakchi. A total of 150 students of intermediate took part in it.

Dr Manoj Sahoo from department of Psychiatry, TMH, stressed upon limiting the screen time, importance of interaction and communication and healthy parent-child relationship.

In the second part of the workshop, volunteers of Jeevan comprising Gurpreet Kaur spoke on the signs of depression and requested the students to contact Jeevan on 9297777499/500 in case they identify some near and dear ones with behavioural changes. They also taught some stress relieving exercises to the students.

Director of Jeevan, Dr Jeoraj Jain and Principal of Graduate College, Davinder Dhanjal, were also present for the inauguration of the workshop.

An official of Jeevan said the need of the hour is to create a stress free environment for the students to learn and grow. Simultaneously, the teachers and parents are also required to be empowered through training so that they are able to recognise the signals being sent by the students in stress and take appropriate follow up actions to help them to recover.

“Creating awareness among students and teachers on what is stress, why stress, what will happen if not controlled, and how to identify and deal with a stressed person. Most of the educational institutions in Jamshedpur are coming forward to organise an awareness campaign for their students, teachers and parents,” he said.

"I think we need to change our perceptive about education. The students are taught only about bookish knowledge and not about the values and moral lessons. Example engineering students are taught much about engines, motion and conservation of fuel but nothing about the person driving the engine. Similarly, everyone talks about self-respect, self-control but nothing is taught about knowing the self," said the director.