Military psychiatry in India

Military personnel, because of the unique nature of their duties and services, are likely to be under stress which at times has no parallel in civilian life. The stress of combat and service in extreme weather conditions often act as major stressors. The modern practices in military psychiatry had their beginning during the two World Wars, more particularly, the II(nd) World War. The GHPU concept had the beginning in India with military hospitals having such establishments in the care of their clientele. As the nation gained independence, many of the military psychiatrists shifted to the civil stream and contributed immensely in the development of modern psychiatry in India. In the recent years military psychiatry has been given the status of a subspecialty chapter and the military psychiatrists have been regularly organizing CMEs and training programs for their members to prepare them to function in the special role of military psychiatrists.