OPINION | Save adolescents from gaming addiction
A suicide note was left by the Ghaziabad sisters for their father with a written apology - "Sorry Papa". He was asked by the daughters to read their diary.
The unfortunate triple suicide by three half-sisters in Ghaziabad has come as a shock to people in India. They jumped to their death from the ninth floor of an apartment. The sisters were adolescents. The eldest sister Nishika was 16 years, Pakhi was 14 and Prachi was 12 years old.
According to an eyewitness neighbour, Nishika sat on the window sill with her back towards the compound, and her two sisters had hugged her tightly. The two sisters prevented her from jumping. But soon after, they came back. Nishika leaned back from the window sill and fell to her death. Within seconds, the two other sisters jumped. All of them died on the spot.
A suicide note was left by the sisters for their father with a written apology - "Sorry Papa". He was asked by the daughters to read their diary.
The diary revealed that the three girls had a deep obsession for all things Korean, from Korean pop to Korean gaming. They wrote: "Sorry papa, Korea was our life. How did you even dare to take this from us?"
On the wall of their room was scribbled, "I am very, very alone...My life is very very alone..Make me a heart of broken".
The three girls have not been going to school since 2020 when Covid epidemic broke, nor did they study at home. They remained aloof from other children in the neighbourhood.
There were photographs found strewn on the floor of the flat and sentences scribbled on the wall. Their father Chetan Kumar is a stock trader. He is reportedly deep in debt. He took away the cellphone of his daughters 15 days ago and sold it.
Chetan Kumar says, he was asleep in his room, when he woke up on hearing screams. Chetan has married three sisters. He has five offsprings from the first two wives.
For the last two and a half years, the girls were playing Korean love game on their mobile phone. In this game, they were given different tasks. One sister became the seniormost in the group and she used to give instructions to the other two.
Their parents thought the girls were playing harmless online games on phone, but they did not know that the girls were being given dangerous tasks in the game.
Why did the three girls commit suicide? Were they under pressure or depression?
It has been scientifically proven that gaming addiction can cause adverse effects on brain. MRI scans show that video game addiction, like drugs or alcohol addition, causes similar effects.
The innocent adolescents died because of gaming addition. They were sucked into onlive gaming, where they were assigned tasks and when the tasks were not fulfilled, they took the extreme path.
China has set up game detox centers to tackle gaming addiction among youths. At these centers, gaming addicts undergo a 22-day course.
In India, too, we need to create public awareness about online gaming addition. Parents will have to play a key role in this. This awareness among children and parents must begin from the school level itself.
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