Mental Notes: August 2007

MELBOURNE–You thought your job was sh*t… A spate of suicides has prompted India to increase perks for soldiers deployed to a glacier in disputed Kashmir. About 120 soldiers killed themselves last year, most of them posted to the 6,300-metre high Siachen glacier. Government officials say allowances will be increased by 80 per cent in a bid to reduce stress levels in the soldiers who work in a region where temperatures often plummet to minus 50 degrees Celsius. India has about 5,000 troops on the freezing wasteland, and about 600 soldiers and officers have turned their guns on themselves since 2003. Besides the string of suicides, the army is also plagued by frequent murders of military personnel by men in their own command. [Radio Australia News 3/8/2007]