Most of the research institutions and universities in the west have counselling centres, social support and redressal systems in this regard. However, in India, this isn’t the case. Although India is a scientific superpower, most of our universities and research institutions have dysfunctional social support systems in place.

Many Indian research institutions and universities do not even have any counselling centres where research scholars can go and open up about their mental health. This is specially worrying because mental health problems among both junior and senior scientists are pretty common in our country.

In the few top-notch institutes where counsellors and student-welfare officers exist, students often find it difficult to open up. Broadly speaking, there are two reasons for this.

Firstly, there is a lot of unnecessary stigma and taboo involved in confessing mental health problems.

Secondly, those officials or staff aren’t independent, fair or unbiased enough to handle such issues. Young researchers hesitate that the details of the discussion will soon leak into senior faculty and management circles; which is often the case.

Such a dysfunctional student welfare and social support system results in students hiding and ignoring stress, intense mood swings and sleep-related problems.

Unlike regular college students, most PhD scholars typically spend about five years in research institutions. The absence of a friendly support system often means that scholars hit rock bottom, bottling up months of mental stress to a point of saturation.