Self-harm has surfaced as a critical and pressing issue among India's youth, according to recent data released by a leading mental health support initiative. The CHAMPS helpline, operated by the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) through its iCALL program with UNICEF support, reports that non-suicidal self-injury is now one of the top concerns for young people seeking help.
Alarming Data from the Frontlines
The helpline, dedicated to children and adolescents, has recorded a significant volume of distress calls. From April 2023 to October 2025, the service received 27,706 genuine calls. An analysis of these calls reveals a troubling trend: nearly 10% involve individuals using self-harm as a mechanism to cope with intense emotional pain. This places self-harm as the second most prevalent issue among the top six concerns reported to the helpline.
Emotional distress remains the most dominant reason for calls, accounting for over 39% of contacts. The other primary concerns include relationship issues (5.68%), suicidal ideation (3.40%), experiences of violence (3.32%), and anxieties related to education and career (3.05%).
A Rising Concern Needing Attention
Professor Aparna Joshi, assistant professor at TISS's School of Human Ecology, which runs the iCALL services, emphasized the gravity of the finding. She explained that self-harm, or non-suicidal self-injury, is distinctly different from suicidal intent. It is often a maladaptive coping strategy employed by young individuals who struggle to manage overwhelming stress, powerful emotions, and psychological pain.
"Young individuals need to be supported in finding helpful and constructive ways of coping with their life difficulties," Prof. Joshi stated. She highlighted a significant gap in understanding, noting that research into self-harm in India is still at a nascent stage, underscoring an urgent need for further study.
Helpline Trends and User Demographics
The data also indicates a positive trend in the helpline's reach and credibility. The proportion of genuine calls has shown steady growth, increasing from 64.8% in 2023 (April-December) to 68.8% in 2024, and reaching 75.6% in the first ten months of 2025.
While the service offers multilingual support, an overwhelming majority of calls (95.3%) were conducted in Hindi. A deeper look at callers under the age of 25 shows that most reach out for their own issues, and a larger proportion of these callers are male.
Complementing this data, iCALL's chat-based youth suicide prevention service, ReYou, reported a 14% increase in average monthly sessions in 2025 compared to the previous year. This points to a growing reliance on and awareness of digital mental health resources among the youth.
The findings from the CHAMPS initiative paint a clear picture: self-harm is a substantial and growing challenge for India's younger generation. The data serves as a crucial call to action for policymakers, educators, and mental health professionals to develop targeted interventions, foster constructive coping mechanisms, and build a more robust research framework to address this sensitive issue.
