Sunit Pratap, Institute of Law, NIRMA University
Introduction
According to the statistics of WHO (world health organization) around 7.5 % Indians suffer from some or the other mental disorder, around 56 million Indians suffer from depression and approximately 38 million Indians suffer from anxiety disorders. Globally India is in the top three countries where people are most affected by anxiety, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, Accordingly it reveals that how mental health has always been neglected in our society and also the existing societal stigma around it wherein people are very much afraid to even talk about it which is why these diseases even though treatable becomes fatal as the sense of acceptance of the mental health problems among people is not present but things have changed a bit , since the past few years various organizations and also people have come up who are not shying away from talking openly about the various mental health problems existing around us that anyone in their respective lives can face one such prominent example is when Naomi Osaka who is a world class tennis player was reportedly to be facing depression and how difficult was for her to cope with it this shows that mental health problems are a real thing and it can occur to anyone in the society and it is also a high time that we should stop ignoring these problems and start talking openly about it. The legislation also felt that the Mental Healthcare Act is the need of the hour so that the patients are able to have a sense of recognition and they don’t feel neglected. So finally in 2018 the MHA was enacted. Even though India had a Mental Health Act in 1987 but it was repealed soon after the enactment of this act as the former was not able to address the rights of persons with mental illness and was not able to promote their access to mental health care in the country.
