Community Mental Health · Research · Rehabilitation

35 years of healing, research & community.

SAWAB is a community-rooted mental-health movement from Kashmir, founded by Dr. Mushtaq Ahmad Margoob and shaped through decades of care, evidence and collaboration.

Discover SAWAB Explore the Library

35+years of sustained work 1998–2003Defeat Depression Programme 20 yearsWaltengo Nar follow-up

An ecology of care Two hands holding a continuous thread that forms a human profile and growing leaves

Archival SAWAB image of a child from 2006 — Community mental-health archive, Kashmir — 2006

Holding space

Care begins with attention, continuity and trust.

A living field archive

Presence is part of the practice.

Moments of listening, learning and collaboration—held together as one continuing movement of care.

Participants and facilitators gathered after a community awareness and engagement programme

Our Work In the Community

Care, closer
to community.

Connecting with people in the places they know and trust.

Explore our community work

SAWAB team members walking through a community in Kashmir

SAWAB members speaking with residents and students during a field visit

Participants at a SAWAB community awareness and engagement programme

Care compass

Explore how one need can open into many forms of care.

Move through the five areas to see how clinical practice, research, learning and community life stay connected.

01 / 05

Clinical

SAWAB advances culturally sensitive mental-health care by strengthening the people and systems already present in communities, including general clinicians and frontline health workers.

Identification and management of common mental disorders
Integrated care through general healthcare systems
Mental-health support within neurorehabilitation

Explore clinical work

Our continuing purpose

“Knowledge built through care.
Care strengthened by knowledge.”

To advance evidence-based community mental health while restoring dignity, building capacity and supporting emotional resilience across society.

How care moves

Listening becomes knowledge.
Knowledge returns as care.

Two connected pathways show how SAWAB holds community experience and scientific inquiry within one living practice.

Five people seated in a listening circle with mountains and leaves behind them

01 / Community

A circle wide enough to hold many voices.

Support grows through attentive spaces, local relationships and shared responsibility.

An open book growing roots and branches as people help one another upward

02 / Knowledge

Evidence with roots in lived experience.

Research, learning and follow-up turn experience into knowledge that can serve communities again.

Our journey

A journey of hope, people and impact.

From a simple conversation to a growing movement for mental health.

Different times.
New challenges.
The same belief —
that mental health matters.

The beginning

1990–1998

Seeds of awareness

Where the conversation began.

Knowledge carried forward

1998–2003

Defeat Depression Programme

Bringing knowledge and care to those who needed it.

From individuals to community

2000

Community mental-health programme

Care that reached communities.

A voice becomes visible

2003

Advocacy for mental-health infrastructure

Turning experience into systemic change.

Continuity

2005–Present

A continuing journey

Sustained care, research and a wider impact.

From the press archive

A public record of care, change and continuity.

Reporting across three decades preserves how Kashmir spoke about mental health—and how the work kept moving forward.

Explore all press stories

Kashmir Times21 March 1995

Mental hospital shrinks as patients multiply

An early record of rising patient numbers, crowded wards and the need for trained staff, public awareness and humane mental-health care.

ClinicalRead in the archive

Greater Kashmir26 June 2015

Recognition of a breakthrough research programme

Coverage of research presented at the 12th World Congress of Biological Psychiatry on PTSD treatment response, recovery and resilience.

ResearchRead in the archive

Kashmir Life24 September 2025

Kashmir: Faith and Psychiatry

A special report on the meeting point of clinical care, faith, cultural meaning and community support in Kashmir's mental-health landscape.

CommunityRead in the archive

Kashmir Observer2025

Conference charts roadmap for community-based mental healthcare

Coverage of a multi-institutional conference on decentralised, culturally relevant and stigma-free mental-health services in Kashmir.

CommunityRead in the archive

The Hindu9 January 2011

Scars of war

A field report from Srinagar's psychiatric hospital on conflict-related distress, the rising need for care and the people working inside a stretched system.

ClinicalRead in the archive

Greater Kashmir2026

Addressing mental-health challenges in Kashmir

An overview of adolescent mental health and SAWAB's practical self-help modules for students, parents and teachers, including anxiety and depression.

AcademicRead in the archive

SAWAB Archive / Programme record

Archive montage of the Defeat Depression Programme, 1998 to 2003

Defeat Depression Programme and community education archive

Work in focus

Programmes built for the realities of place.

Capacity building1998–2003

Defeat Depression Programme

A strategic response to the shortage of mental-health professionals, equipping general clinicians to recognise and manage common mental disorders.

01 View this area of work

Trauma research & careSince February 2005

Waltengo Nar long-term follow-up

A rare population-wide, long-term engagement with survivors, linking compassionate follow-up with knowledge for disaster mental health.

02 View this area of work

School mental healthCurrent initiative

MISSION SHAFQAT

A collaboration with Kashmir Welfare Trust focused on emotional education, prevention and resilience from the grassroots level.

03 View this area of work

From the SAWAB Library

An archive becoming a living repository.

Research, publications and records developed through clinical, academic and community engagement.

Institutional publication2025

A Brief Introduction to SAWAB

An institutional overview of SAWAB’s sustained work in community mental health, scientific knowledge generation, capacity building, rehabilitation and collaborative care in Kashmir.

View library record

Research paperUndated

Psychiatric Disorders Among Children in Kashmir

A study examining the psychological impact of conflict on children in Kashmir, led by Dr. Mushtaq Ahmad Margoob.

View library record

Research record2005–present

Waltengo Nar Snowstorm: Long-term Survivor Follow-up

A two-decade follow-up of survivors of the February 2005 Waltengo Nar snowstorm, combining sustained care with trauma and disaster mental-health inquiry.

View library record

Explore all research

Working through collaboration

Care is stronger when institutions learn together.

SAWAB’s work has grown through relationships across healthcare, education, rehabilitation and community life.

Explore affiliations Six hands weaving green and ochre threads into a shared floral circle

VMSVoluntary Medicare Society

Mental-health care and neurorehabilitation brought together to support recovery, family wellbeing and long-term rehabilitation.

IMHANS-KIMHANS-K / GMC Srinagar

A partner in medical education programmes, mental-health care protocols and postgraduate training in Kashmir.

SKIMSDepartment of Psychiatry, SKIMS Medical College Bemina

A partner in developing and sharing medical education programmes and practical care protocols.

KWTKashmir Welfare Trust

Collaboration supporting vulnerable families and the school mental-health initiative MISSION SHAFQAT.

CICHINAR International

Collaboration in community psychosocial transformation, youth education and resilience building.

Mental health beyond hospitals

Healing belongs in the social fabric of everyday life.

SAWAB’s community approach brings mental-health knowledge into places people already trust: schools, rehabilitation centres, community organisations and faith institutions.

The work is not framed around passive recipients. It is built with clinicians, educators, families and local leaders as active partners in care.

Read about community work

SAWAB community and Continuing Medical Education sessions — Community and Continuing Medical Education archive

The next chapter

Deepen the evidence.
Widen the circle of care.

A Kashmiri woman tending a young chinar sapling with woven supportive roots

SAWAB’s stated direction is to strengthen scientific knowledge generation, advance evidence-based community interventions and foster emotional resilience across all segments of society.

People behind SAWAB

Clinical insight.
Community commitment.

Meet the people

Because healing is not a moment.
It’s a mission.

Begin a conversation

35 years of healing, research & community.

Presence is part of the practice.

Care, closer
to community.