DhyanaIndia is a volunteer-led organization that creates awareness of mental health issues to start a meaningful dialogue among Indian youths while providing access to reliable information and support.
“I have struggled with mental health issues. I was privileged enough to have supportive parents who ensured I had access to professional help when I needed it. This experience opened my eyes to the widespread nature of mental health challenges and the sheer number of people who were struggling in isolation,” Vinit tells
India has a severe paucity of mental health professionals — less than one psychiatrist for 100,000 Indians. Samiya says they believed community-led initiatives and technology could play a great role in leveling this gap.
“As one of the earliest youth organizations to start working in this space — as a bunch of inexperienced youth just armed with passion — we didn’t think we’d get very far. Yet, we were unafraid to ask for help from professionals and other mental health advocates. Over time, we built a team of dedicated volunteers and launched multiple initiatives, refining our efforts through trial and error,” Vinit adds.
With no experience and academic background in mental health — He was not taken seriously early on in their journey. They reached out to a lot of non-profits to help in developing the initiatives. However, they thought the students would not last for long. Additionally, they had a few concerns about their plans to leverage technology to make the initiative scalable and accessible. But two organizations, MINDS Foundation, and LonePack believed in His vision. Samiya says, “Dr. Raghu and Pragya Lodha helped design our volunteering training and evaluation module. The course we developed trains people on the basics of mental health and equips them to be empathetic listeners.” As part of its initiative to improve awareness and create engaged communities, the startup conducted numerous workshops, webinars, and discussion forums on different aspects of mental health at school, college, and corporate levels
“Our flagship on-ground awareness campaign, dhyanaIndia Letters, reached over 20,000 people in over 15 Indian cities in 8 months across three editions,” Vinit says.
The pandemic shift Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, everyone was unprepared for the huge impact it had on the mental health of young people across India. Many were cut off from their regular coping mechanisms and support systems while often being stranded in hostile domestic environments. In fact, the lockdown put an end to all in-person campaigns and workshops. “Lots of people reached out on our social media pages seeking emotional support. Realizing the scale of the problem, our team worked on a war footing to help people whose mental health was severely affected,” Vinit says.
DhyanaIndia started two initiatives:
Mental Health Professional Listing Platform: It created a curated list of mental health professionals, which were crowd-sourced and later verified by the startup.
Dhyana App Buddy: An anonymous peer-support initiative.