Gulshan Devaiah reacts to Nawazuddin Siddiqui calling depression an urban concept: Not right to generalise mental health

Actor Gulshan Devaiah doesn’t want to sound like a critic or call out Nawazuddin Siddiqui’s remarks around depression, dubbing it an urban concept. But, he can’t stop feeling amazed by his views. In fact, the Dahaad actor feels the statement has generalised the whole issue of mental health, which is not right.

In a recent interview, Siddiqui said that rural India doesn’t suffer from mental illnesses: “No one gets depression in villages, everyone is happy there. But I learnt about anxiety, depression, bipolar after coming to the city.” To this, Devaiah tweeted that although he has immense respect for Nawazuddin because of “his craft”, he could not possibly take his recent statement about mental health seriously. Now, in an interview with us, he explains what made him react that way.

“My intention was not to critique Nawaz bhai’s views, also because it is a very popular view. A lot of people have this thought to some extent. They believe people living in an urban setup and the pressures they encounter are very different from the pressures that somebody living in a rural setup might experience,” Devaiah continues, “So, it is possible that people are more susceptible to mental health in urban areas because biologically we’re not evolved to keep up with technology, and our lives revolve around that.”

While the 44-year-old says he does notice a point Siddiqui is trying to make, he adds, “But at the same time, we can’t discount the fact and generalise mental health. It is a problem. I’m no expert on the issue, neither can I diagnose. What I can certainly do is talk and have a conversation about it, and urge more people to come forward and talk about it.”

The Badhaai Do (2022) actor further emphasises that calling mental health an urban problem and stating that it doesn’t exist in rural areas is generalising the whole issue and rather a scary viewpoint because many people feel this subject is already over hyped.

“The conversation should be something else only. I am not taking a dig at Nawaz’s views, but just saying that we should not have our blinders on while talking about an issue. Instead, we need to talk about it to simplify the concept so that people can understand it,” he ends.