Health · Sub-pillar 2.4

Mental health and addiction

Awareness of mental health, access to care, freedom from stigma, the pressure on students and young people, and protection from alcohol, drugs, gambling and other addictions.

What is mental health and addiction?

Mental health and addiction is sub-pillar 2.4 of the 47 BH framework for a developed Bharat by 2047, the fourth of five sub-pillars under the Health pillar. It asks whether Indians understand mental health, whether care is available and can be sought without shame, how heavy the pressure on students and young people has become, and whether people are protected from alcohol, drugs, gambling and other addictions.

Why it matters for 2047

47 BH treats mental health as part of health, not apart from it. Depression, anxiety and severe mental illness shorten lives, break up families and keep people out of work as surely as any physical disease, and they are far more common than the silence around them suggests.

India is a young country, and its young carry a particular weight: competitive examinations, uncertain work, migration away from family, and a culture that often reads distress as weakness. Every student lost to suicide is a failure of the systems around them, and the numbers have been rising.

Addiction is the other face of the same question. Alcohol, drugs and, increasingly, online gambling and gaming draw in millions, hollow out household budgets and fuel violence at home. A developed Bharat protects its people from these harms and treats those caught by them with care rather than contempt.

Where India stands

  • 1,71,418

    people died by suicide in India in 2023, a rate of 12.3 per lakh population, according to the National Crime Records Bureau. The count was 1,70,924 in 2022.[1]

  • 13,892

    of those who died by suicide in 2023 were students, 8.1% of all suicides and the highest number in a decade, up from 13,044 in 2022.[1]

  • 70-92%

    of people with mental disorders in India receive no treatment, the treatment gap found by the National Mental Health Survey of 2015-16, which put current mental morbidity among adults at 10.6%.[2][3]

  • 16 crore

    Indians aged 10-75 use alcohol, 14.6% of that population, and about 5.7 crore need help for harmful or dependent use, according to the national substance use survey of 2019; about 2.26 crore use opioids.[4]

The need is large and mostly unmet. One adult in ten has a current mental disorder, and between seven and nine in ten of them get no treatment, according to the only national survey so far, which is now a decade old. [2][3] The suicide rate has stayed above 12 per lakh for several years, and student suicides reached their highest level in ten years in 2023. [1]

Care is beginning to scale. The national tele-mental-health service, Tele-MANAS, had handled more than 32.84 lakh calls through 53 cells in every state and union territory by February 2026, alongside the District Mental Health Programme. [3] India also has a Mental Healthcare Act (2017) that decriminalised attempted suicide and gave people a right to care. The gap between that right and the number of trained psychiatrists, psychologists and counsellors remains wide.

On addiction, the 2019 survey found 16 crore alcohol users, 3.1 crore cannabis users and 2.26 crore opioid users, with 77 lakh people needing help for opioid use alone. [4] Online gambling and gaming have grown since and have no national prevalence estimate yet. A note on the numbers: suicide figures come from police records and are widely considered an undercount; the mental health and substance use surveys are both several years old, and 47 BH will update them when their second rounds are published.

On the 47 BH report card

Every 15 August, 47 BH reports how far India has come on each sub-pillar. For this sub-pillar, the headline indicators are:

  • Suicide rate per lakh population, and the number of student suicides (NCRB, Accidental Deaths and Suicides in India).
  • Treatment gap for mental disorders (National Mental Health Survey).
  • Share of people with harmful or dependent use of alcohol and drugs (national substance use survey, AIIMS for the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment).

Two lenses on mental health and addiction

City and village

47 BH asks whether a farmer in distress or a young person in a small town can find someone to talk to, and whether a student in a coaching hub or a migrant worker in a city has anyone watching for the signs. Mental health care is concentrated in big cities; the need is everywhere.

Learn, avoid, protect

Learn
What can India learn from countries that trained community health workers and teachers to spot distress early, that placed counsellors in schools and colleges, and that treated addiction as a health condition rather than a crime?
Avoid
Which mistakes should it avoid, such as building psychiatric hospitals instead of community care, letting examination pressure be normalised as the price of success, or allowing gambling and gaming apps to target the young unchecked?
Protect
What of its own should it protect, such as the family and community ties that hold people up in hard times, the traditions of yoga and meditation that are now studied worldwide, and the de-addiction and self-help networks run by volunteers?

What this sub-pillar does not cover

Each topic has one home in the framework. These related topics sit elsewhere:

Questions about mental health and addiction

How many suicides are there in India each year?

1,71,418 people died by suicide in India in 2023, a rate of 12.3 per lakh population, according to the National Crime Records Bureau's Accidental Deaths and Suicides in India 2023, released in September 2025. [1]

How many students die by suicide in India?

13,892 students died by suicide in 2023, 8.1% of all suicides and the highest number in ten years, according to the National Crime Records Bureau. The figure was 13,044 in 2022. [1]

What is India's mental health treatment gap?

The National Mental Health Survey of 2015-16, conducted by NIMHANS for the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare across 12 states, found that 70% to 92% of people with mental disorders receive no treatment, and that 10.6% of adults had a current mental disorder. [2][3]

How many Indians drink alcohol or use drugs?

The national survey on substance use conducted by AIIMS for the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment in 2019 found that 14.6% of Indians aged 10-75, about 16 crore people, use alcohol, with about 5.7 crore needing help for harmful or dependent use; 3.1 crore use cannabis and 2.26 crore use opioids. [4]

Where can someone in India get help now?

Tele-MANAS, the national tele-mental-health helpline run by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, is free and available round the clock on 14416 or 1-800-891-4416 in Indian languages. It had handled more than 32.84 lakh calls by February 2026. [3]

Sources

  1. National Crime Records Bureau, Ministry of Home Affairs, "Accidental Deaths and Suicides in India 2023", released September 2025. https://www.ncrb.gov.in/uploads/files/1ADSIPublication-2023.pdf
  2. National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS), "National Mental Health Survey of India 2015-16: Summary", for the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, 2016. Twelve states, 34,802 adults; current prevalence 10.6%, lifetime 13.7%. https://indianmhs.nimhans.ac.in/phase1/Docs/Summary.pdf
  3. Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, "Tele MANAS: Revolutionizing Mental Health Care in India" (Press Information Bureau feature, 13 October 2024, citing the 70-92% treatment gap) and "Update on Tele-MANAS" (Rajya Sabha reply, 6 February 2026, 32.84 lakh calls, 53 cells). https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2224522&reg=3&lang=1
  4. Ambekar A, Agrawal A, Rao R et al., National Drug Dependence Treatment Centre, AIIMS New Delhi, "Magnitude of Substance Use in India", executive summary, for the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, 2019. https://ndusindia.in/downloads/Magnitude_India_EXEUCTIVE_SUMMARY.pdf

47 BH cites every figure so that it can be checked. If you find an error, it will be corrected openly and the date below will change.

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