Understanding the psyche of acid attackers

Srinivas, an engineering college dropout in Warangal town of Andhra Pradesh, attacked a girl who spurned his love, with acid. The reason -- he could not take no for an answer. Some undergraduate college students also helped him in the act.

Hours before being killed, the accused said they had plotted the attack for one month. Srinivas said he practiced throwing water on a doll 17 times over 10 days to get an accurate throw and cause maximum harm.

Srinivas's father disowned him and even refused to take his son's body for last rites.

"Whenever someone seems abnormal, parents also have to take some responsibility, monitoring the person's actions and may be getting psychiatric help. Otherwise this will not stop," said a local.

Parents of Swapnika who suffered 55 per cent burns said they empathised with the parents of the accused but say there is a lesson there for other parents.

"Parents have to take at least 50 per cent responsibility. The parents need to monitor what the child is upto. When he does something wrong, you should not continue supporting him. The child needs to know that he is doing wrong," said Sreelatha, mother of the acid attack victim.

But, could parental and societal monitoring of the activities of youth to stop them from taking a road to nowhere minimise acts of violence? And are there any warning signals that one can get from the personality profile of such youth?

"They are selfish, very demanding and self-centred. They want all wishes fulfilled immediately. They want immediate gratification, low frustration-tolerance, so they resort to these acts. When their wishes are not fulfilled, they have extreme anger and hatred. They would like to ruin somebody else's life. We hear of people sending bad SMS, letters to defame, they show anti-social traits," said Dr Gowri Devi, Superintendent at the Institute of Mental Health.

Behaviour patterns and habits get set over time; the earlier the intervention, the better.

"It becomes a habit and behaviour pattern. When I demand, I cry, scream and threaten for it. As a result, I get it. When parents identify such violent behaviour, breaking articles, sulking when wishes are not fulfilled, they have to be taken to psychologist. Go for behaviour modification. Limit-setting of behaviour. How much parent should accept? How child should develop frustration-tolerance. But this is not being screened, identified or accepted. Only when behaviour becomes very destructive, attacking parents, other children, by that time it is generally too late," Dr Gowri said.