The Demon Of Drug Abuse Among Students

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[{"type":"txt","id":"rich_1500545929080","data":"Disclaimer: Due to the sensitive nature of the matter at hand, all names appearing in this article have been changed to protect their privacy. <\/i><\/b><\/p>Talking about drugs over a cup of Irani chai was not how I thought I would be spending my Sunday morning (more like Saturday night, really), but there was a story to tell, a story teller with desperate, bloodshot eyes looking at me, hoping that his story would bring a change because he believed it was 'too late for me.'<\/p>19 - year old Suhas, an engineering student, agreed to meet me after much persuasion and repeated assurances of anonymity. He has been 'burned' before, he tells me as we sip our chais early in the morning at Nimrah cafe, right next to Charminar, a symbol erected to celebrate the end of a deadly plague that ravaged the city in the 16th century. Whoever said life is inherently ironic was perhaps thinking of moments like these, talking about a new kind of plague in the 21st century in the shadows of one erected to celebrate the end of another in the 16th. <\/p>\"You never buy your first joint or blot,\" Suhas said, almost mournfully. <\/p>\"What do you mean?,\" I asked, knowing full well what his answer would be, considering I myself was once addicted to nicotine.<\/p>Suhas then launched into his story, explaining about how he first came across drugs and his slow descent into madness, desperate for his next fix, \"The only thing on your mind when you're 14 years old is how cool you'll look in front of your friends, how much you can impress your crush, and so on,\" he explains, \"I was the quiet kid in class, I was never part of the 'cool' group, the ones who used to smuggle alcohol into school, the guys who got all the attention, the girls who were the most beautiful or the most attractive.\"<\/p>\"So when I was invited to one of my classmate's parties, it felt like all my wildest dreams had come true. I was now part of the cool club now. Only, I didn't realise that to be considered cool, I needed to get high,\" he says, speaking slowly, collecting his thoughts, \"At first it was just Marijuana, and that was fine, it wasn't addictive, it wasn't harmful, it was a happy high and went away quickly enough. But apparently, that wasn't cutting it enough with the rest of my newly minted friends.\"<\/p>Suhas's friends, as he tells it, started experimenting with harder drugs, \"At one point, weed was too boring, LSD was too boring, and suddenly someone, a friend, of course, drops a packet of cocaine in a party and we're all on it like bloodhounds on a hunt.\" <\/p>"},{"type":"img","id":"img-uid-1500548337561","data":"59708d6ecdb92"},{"type":"txt","id":"rich_1500548380316","data":"Unearthing Abuse: <\/b><\/p>The Hyderabad Police, after long drawn out efforts, managed to break the back of one of the biggest drug peddling operations in the city. While drug busts are almost a routine for any urban city in the world, this one was different: the client list unearthed a laundry list of celebrities and students, in some cases as young as 13. It was as if the issue was a ready-made powder keg, with the public attention and ire being the fire and the fuel to blow the issue into the forefront of every local media news outlet for days to come. <\/p>It made enough noise to be picked up by media houses across India, however, the local TV media is gearing its focus towards drug abuse by the members of the film fraternity while ignoring and, in some cases, completely glossing over the more vulnerable victims of this issue: the students. <\/p>Students are also often preyed upon by peddlers who often ask for sexual favours in exchange for drugs should the victim have no money for their next fix, \"At one point, I was so desperate for my next fix that I relented, subjecting myself to sexual assault by the guy who sold me heroin,\" says 22 year old Shruti, a former drug addict, told me over a cup of coffee in one of the many coffee shops that dot Banjara Hills, \"Heroin hurts. When the high is going away, your body starts hurting, every inch of your body is on fire, you feel like you want to claw your eyes out, and the only way to get rid of it is to take the drug once again,\" she continues, shaking her head, ghosts of the past coming back.<\/p>At this point of the interview, I was unsure how to proceed. Sexual assault is a sensitive topic, throwing in drug abuse further complicated matters. However, Shruti noticed my discomfort and said, \"I will live with the decisions I made till the end of my days, and I can only hope that I can turn more people away from this path. Nobody really tells you the road you're going to be walking when you're just starting to abuse drugs. Why would they, the setting in which you get to experiment with drugs is one where everyone around you is into drugs as well,\" she says, bitterly.<\/p>\"Do you blame yourself for what happened?\" I asked, carefully speaking, unsure of my tone or the tone of the question. She looks at me briefly before speaking, \"The only blame I can put on myself is not listening to well-wishers and getting out when I can. By the time I wanted out, it was too late, I was already a slave to the drug and, in many cases, it is easier to blame everything else in the world rather than yourself for what you're doing to yourself.\" <\/p>"},{"type":"img","id":"img-uid-1500551694707","data":"59709c6c921d7"},{"type":"txt","id":"rich_1500551696916","data":"Chasing the High: <\/b><\/p>An old friend caught up with me after I had sent out feelers that I was looking for drug addicts to do a story on them. A former addict, we spoke about the times we both chose differently, the kind of crowd we mixed with while at college made us drift apart despite having practically grown up together. He started abusing drugs, whereas I had my own vices to deal with.<\/p>The reasons behind our vices, as it turns out, were quite similar. \"Escapism, what else,\" he laughed, \"We're all trying to escape from one thing or another. That is how life is, or at least, was.\" <\/p>\"Escapism explains why an addict continues to abuse drugs, not why one starts,\" I said, looking up from my notes, \"It doesn't explain how kids start abusing drugs at all.\"<\/p>My friend laughed again, \"Does it really now? You know my parents have a horrible marriage, don't they?\" <\/p>When I nodded, he continued, \"In college, it had become unbearable. Not a single day would go without my parents trying to rip each other's heads off,\" he starts, smirking as he tells me his next bit, \"I was desperate for an escape. I had money, one of the advantages of having warring parents, just tell them the other won't give you money for some college work, and find money in your hands. They'd have found out if they remembered they had a son during one of their arguments.\"<\/p>\"So when I heard that there was even a sliver of possibility of getting my hands on drugs, drugs that would make the miserable existence I had to go away and make me happy once again, of course, I was gonna jump at the chance. Then I found a group of similar people who were as disturbed as I was, and we experimented\" he finishes. <\/p>At one point, chasing the high had become a daily occurrence. Building up a tolerance to Marijuana led my friend, along with his friends, on a darker path that finished with him stealing from his girlfriend's house, selling off his gold chains, just for their next fix. <\/p>\"There is nothing more infuriating than realising you're building a resistance to marijuana when the entire point of you smoking it was to be happy and forget the world and its troubles,\" my friend says as I'm preparing to leave, \"you want to constantly chase that high, always be high, because the alternative is you dealing with issues in the real world, and that is the very last thing we ever wanted.\"  <\/p>"},{"type":"img","id":"img-uid-1500554212608","data":"5970a46da2099"},{"type":"txt","id":"rich_1500554264105","data":"Recovery: <\/b> <\/p>In a conservative society, it is commonplace to place the blame of an addiction on the addict, instead of the substance they are abusing. In many cases, an addict realises how deep a hole they've dug themselves into, just ask the nearest smoker. <\/p>The attitude towards addicts (and the lack of same contempt for smokers, who are also abusing a drug, technically speaking), causes more problems than solutions. Drug abuse has only one victim, the abuser themselves, and their addiction leads them to commit more crimes to fuel their habit. That is, of course, if they do not have access to ample money, which wasn't the case with many of the younger students that were buying from the peddlers arrested recently. <\/p>The Times of India <a href=\"http:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/india\/Infrastructure-for-drug-rehabilitation-in-India-is-dismal\/articleshow\/52889387.cms\" target=\"_blank\">reported<\/a> that the state of drug rehabilitation is nothing short of abysmal in India, and even amongst the ones that exist, there are more concentration camps where addicts are beaten and broken rather than helped and guided on a path to recovery. <\/p>Of course, the first step with fighting any addiction is to recognise there is one, and then seek help. This is a steep battle where an addict is fighting against their own body craving for the next fix, despite knowing that it would continue to drag them on a dark path. <\/p>"},{"type":"img","id":"img-uid-1500555114763","data":"5970a7daeb720"},{"type":"txt","id":"rich_1500555145580","data":"Light at the end of the tunnel:  <\/b><\/p>Indian parents do not understand their children. From personal views to political, to habits and favourite movies, very few parents are involved with their child's life to the point that they can be seen as a friend rather than an authority figure around whom one must go to hide their habits. <\/p>But there is light at the end of this tunnel, parents are starting to get more involved with their child's lives, and I'm not talking about micromanaging their every move. I'm talking about being there for them as a friend, a confidant that can be trusted. This will enable parents to be there for their kids when they need them the most, especially in formative and angsty teenage years when we think we're the only ones who are right and the whole world is wrong. Yeah, we've all been there. <\/p>Here's hoping that the issue being in the forefront of Telugu media changes the attitudes people have towards drug abuse, but then again, this is me being optimistic. Drug abuse tears families apart when the family is unwilling to believe or unwilling to do anything about the abuse, constantly doubting your brothers, sisters or sons and daughters is no way to live. <\/p>So sit down and talk to a drug addict today, you might just save their life. <\/p> <\/p>"}]

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