Aubaid Mir
Player Unknown’s Battlegrounds or PUBG is reportedly causing mental illness among students as their PUBG addiction is hampering their sleeping cycles while also increasing stress levels.Player Unknown’s Battlegrounds or PUBG has become one of the most popular online multiplayer games ever seen and since the game was released for smart phones in the form of PUBG Mobile, it has seen a massive reach among youngsters as well as gaming enthusiasts. The popularity of PUBG can be measured with the fact that smart phone manufacturers and the developer itself have sponsored more than a couple of gaming events for PUBG fans, which were well received.
With the increasing popularity of Player Unknown’s Battlegrounds, a debate has also started around the world where people are worried about addiction to this online game and the kind of mental damage it can cause. Now, some schools in Bengaluru have started warning parents against letting their kids play the online game PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds or PUBG for extended hours after cases of addiction came to light in the city. We will ask our member schools to write to parents about this. We have, in the past, had discussions with the education department on imposing restrictions on the number of hours a child spends playing such games. We want the police to also play an active role and take precautions to ensure measures are put in place to ensure children do not play such games.
According to Dr. Manoj Sharma, Professor of Clinical Psychology, there were just three to four cases of PUBG addiction related to mental health in the initial months, however, the count has increased to 40 cases a month. Dr. Manoj Sharma highlighted the fact that students are playing PUBG overnight to compete with players from different time zones and there is a 19-year-old engineering student who starts playing PUBG at 12 midnight and continues till 4 am which has completed destroyed his sleeping cycle.
( The author is a student at Government Degree College Baramulla. Views are his own)
