Srinagar, Kashmir from the Indian -Choose the weak Avia fingers in its loose strands of its dark brown jacket. She sits on the edge of her bed in the rehabilitation suite at the Sherja Harry Singh Hospital (SMHS) in the main city of Srinjar, which is run by an Indian.

While dull and stained clothes were loosely hanging on her thin frame, and with her lower eyes, she says: “I dreamed of flying over the mountains, and touched the blue sky as a flight attendant. Now, I am stuck in a nightmare, a high degree of drugs, I fight for my life.”

AFIYA, 24, is only one of the thousands of people addicted to heroin in the disputed area where an increasingly consuming a young drug addiction consumes a young life.

A study conducted in 2022 conducted by the Ministry of Psychiatry at the Governmental Medicine College in Srinhajar found that Kashmir had crossed the Punjab, northwestern India, fighting the drug crisis for decades, in the number of cases of drug use per person.

In August 2023, the Indian Parliament’s report estimated that approximately 1.35 million people of Cashmeer, who were 12 million people, were drug users, indicating a sharp increase of approximately 350,000 users in the previous year, as destined to a survey from the Institute of Mental Health and Neurology Science in the Government College of Government, Serenagar.

The IMHANS survey also found that 90 percent of drug users in Kashmir are between 17 and 33 years old.

SMHS, AFIYA Hospital in, attended more than 41,000 drug-related patients in 2023-on average one person who was brought in every 12 minutes, an increase of 75 percent over the number in 2021.

The increase in the cases of drugs in Kashmir was mainly nurtured by its proximity to the so -called “golden crescent”, a region covering parts of neighboring Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran, where opium is widely grown. Experts also say Chronic unemployment – It caused the loss of the area Partial autonomy In 2019, the Covid-19 was followed, nourishing tension and despair, prompting the Kashmiri youth towards drug use.

As a result, Dr. Yasser says instead, the professor responsible for psychiatry, hospital and treatment centers in the region are extended. He said that while addiction treatment facilities have been created throughout Kashmir since 2021, only a handful of hospitals has internal patients for severe addiction patients such as AFIYA, who often need hospital.

“It looked harmless”

“She will skip this,” the mother of Avia, Rabia*, whispering to her daughter, and cleaning wet hair from the face of Araia. I just got a bathroom. Afiya’s father, Tabish*, sit on a chair in a corner, watching them silently.

AFIYA barely listens to her mother’s reassuring words and it seems more focused on removing the blue blanket that the hospital provides again and again to allow some deep and black wounds on her hands, legs and stomach, caused by tingling the needle in her veins from heroin injection. The wounds are now wandering of blood and thick yellow measurement, as doctors warn that they can affect her parents and attend.

More than six years ago, Affiya was a bright high school student dreaming of becoming a host. After the twelfth grade has passed, 85 percent of great marks, she responded to a work announced by a leading Indian airline.

“This is not the real for me in this bed,” I told Affiya Al -Jazeera. “I used to drive my car. I was an elegant woman known for beautiful handwritten, thought and strong communication skills. My quick memory made me highlight. I can remember the details effortlessly, and you never missed anything. I was independent and confident.

“But now, I lie here without mobility, like dead fish, as my brothers said. They cannot even ignore the smell that remains around me.”

She says she was chosen for the function of the airline and sent to New Delhi for training. “I stayed there for two months. It looked like a new start, an opportunity to fly, to escape.”

But her high dreams passed on the ground in August 2019 when the Indian government canceled the special situation of Kashmir and imposed a security closure for months to inhibit the protests in the streets against the shock step.

Thousands of people, including senior politicians, were arrested and imprisoned. The Internet and other basic rights were suspended, as New Delhi placed the area under its direct control for the first time in decades.

The situation in the homeland was dark. There was no contact with my family, no phones, and there is no way to see if it is safe. I couldn’t stay in New Delhi, separately. “I took a week vacation and went home,” said Avia.

When she left the capital with the help of other Kashmiris, she only knew her flight, as a flight attendant ended even before she started.

“by the time [in Kashmir] I improved, I opened the roads, and I can think about returning to New Delhi, and five months have passed. During this period, I lost the function of my dreams, and with her, I lost myself. ”She says in her eyes well.

I have applied for jobs in other airlines but nothing works. With every refusal, I began to lose hope. Then he struck Kofid and the jobs became scarce. Over time, I lost your interest in working completely – my mind is no longer in it. I did not feel the desire to do anything. “

Avia says that with every month it passes, her frustration has turned into despair. She started spending more time with her friends, looking for consolation in their company.

“Initially, we just talked about our struggles,” she says. Then I started with small temptations, with a little blowing of hemp to deal with tension. It seemed not harmful. Then one of them gave me frustration [of heroin]. I didn’t think twice. I felt euphoria. “

“The only thing that gave me peace is the drug – everything else felt that he was burning me from the inside.”

“Harsh hunger”

But the escape was short -term, as you say, and took over.

“The dream quickly turned into a nightmare.” The euphoria faded and replaced with ruthless hunger, “she says describing the miserable measures and risks that began to take to find drugs.

“Once, I traveled 40 km (25 miles) from Srinagar to the Choufian area in southern Kashmir to meet a drug dealer. My friends were running out of the stocks and gave me one of them.

“When I got there, he presented me to something called” Tichu ” [local slang for injection]. He was the first person to give me injection. “I injected it into my stomach there in the car,” she says. “The rush was intense – it looked like the sky, but for a moment only.”

The moment of euphoria was characterized by the beginning of its rapid descent into deeper addiction.

“Heroin fist is unfamiliar. Avia says:“ It is not just a medicine, but your life becomes. ”I will stay awaken all night, and coordinate with friends to make sure we have enough for the next day. It was exhausted, but the passion was stronger than all other types of pain. “

Heroin is the most used drug in the region, where addicts spend thousands of rupees every month to buy it.

“Heroin has spread widely, and we see a large number of affected patients,” says IMHANS instead.

The professor says that he noticed a rise in drug use between women, and attributed them to mental health and unemployment conflicts.

Before 2016, we rarely saw cases including heroin. Most people used hemp or other soft medications. But heroin is spreading like the virus, and it reaches everyone – men, women, even pregnant women, “he says to meet the island.” Now we see between 300 to 400 patients per day, both new and follow -up conditions, most of which involve heroin addiction. “

But why heroin?

“Because of its fast and intense rapid effects,” he says, instead, “which many found more urgent and enjoyable in morphine.”

“It is easy to use, has a higher effectiveness, and the wrong belief that it was safer or more accurate than other drugs that have only been added to their attractiveness, despite its very addictive nature.”

“Wireless to search for a last shot”

For addicts like Affiya, which has been accepted for rehabilitation five times so far, the battle against heroin is a daily and difficult battle.

“Every time I leave the hospital, my body pulls me to the streets,” she says. “It seems as if my mind is wired to find a last shot.”

It remains healthy intentions for their recovery. She left the hospital repeatedly during rehabilitation to search for heroin, or asked other patients that during her hospital daily career.

“Drugs have a way to communicate with each other,” Rabia, her mother, told Al -Jazeera. “I once saw her talking to a male patient in English and realized that she was asking him for drugs.”

Rabia says she once found the drug hidden behind the flow in a women’s toilet. “I found the hideout and knocked on it, but it is [Afiya] I still can get it [heroin] Again, she says. She knows how to process the system to get what you want.

A nurse in the SHMS rehabilitation has revealed how patients have often bribed security guards. “They give money or reach excuses to leave, even while eating,” the nurse says, asking not to be identified because she is not allowed to speak to the media. She says the female wing is approaching the hospital entrance – which makes it easy for patients to go out without anyone noticing it.

“It is a tragic thing because we are trying to help, but some patients only find ways to leave.”

“she [Afiya] A security guard, who also did not want to reveal his identity for fear of losing his job, says.

But Affiya is still challenging. “These medications do not bring the peace that I get from one snapshot of heroin,” she told the island, and her hands and nails tremble in the hospital bed.

The physical losses on her body were severe. Open wounds on her legs, arms and abdomen. When Dr. Mukhtar, plastic wounds in SMHS, examined it for the first time, he says he was shocked.

“She was unable to walk due to a deep wound on her own parts and a large scar on his thigh. She was suffering from serious health problems, including damaged veins and infected wounds. The liver, kidneys, and heart were also affected. It has struggled with memory loss, anxiety and painful withdrawal symptoms, and left it in critical condition.

Avia’s parents say that bringing her to SMHS rehabilitation was a desperate step. “To protect it and the reputation of the family, our relatives told us that it is dealing with stomach issues and an outbreak of an accident,” says Rabia.

“No one marries the drug addict here,” she added. “Our neighbors and relatives are already doubts. They notice their scars, unstable appearance and frequent hospital visits.”

Afia’s father says that he often hides his face in public places, “unable to withstand shame.”

Health experts say that the pursuit of drug addiction is still a challenge for Kashmiri women because the stigma of social shame and cultural taboos keep many women in the shade.

“Rehabilitation of women is often done secretly because families do not want anyone to know, and in Kashmir, everyone knows everyone,” Dr. Zoya Mir told a clinical psychologist who runs a clinic in Srinagar, on the island.

“Many wealthy families send their daughters to other states for treatment, while others are silent or delayed until it is too late,” she says. “These women need sympathy, not judgment. Just then they can start recovery.”

*The names have been changed to protect identities.