Drug Abuse And The Indian Woman

Its an epidemic.

- Gaver Chatterjee

Drug abuse in India has been a living reality for eons but the last couple of decades has seen it spiralling across socioeconomic classes. Significantly, the use of drugs by women has also seen a steady rise in the country during the contemporary era, across age groups, though facilities for de-addiction have not kept pace with this trend. In a society which is quick to stigmatize a woman, this makes for an interesting investigation.

Substance abuse…on the rise amongst Indian women

“I have been running a deaddiction centre for males for the past 12 years, but I am increasingly getting regular calls from families of women who are addicted,” says Avijit Roy who runs the Alyana Rehabilitation Centre in Kolkata. Roy who is the founder and owner of the centre is also a counsellor and he says that the number of drug users he encounters today are almost equal amongst genders. What is more, they exist across age groups. “Over the past 15 years or so, the women who have been coming to me for counselling have often been in the age range of 30 to 40 years,” he says. “But in the more recent years, while I am seeing more and more cases of females turning to substance abuse, I am also seeing women turning to drugs at an increasingly younger age. I would really like to set up a rehabilitation centre for women in Kolkata,” he says.

Substance use disorder in women