Shojon, a Bangla word, when roughly translated means a dear one, or maybe a near one. With the promise to hold your hands in your darkest times -- like a loved one, SHOJON is a mental health service, an initiative of the SAJIDA Foundation.

After the July uprising, this tele-counselling platform has changed its initial agenda from ensuring mental health care for poor and ultra-poor individuals for a nominal fee, to an expanded program with increased human resource capacity to help any individual, irrespective of class hierarchy, sustaining mental distress, particularly in the aftermath of the revolution. And that too, free of cost. Their service window is open till as late as 10:00pm.

"Shojon's work frame has three tiers, with the first one being done by a lay counsellor, one who is empathetic and non-judgemental. Tier two is referred counselling sessions by professional counsellors, this service is currently free of cost. Then, if need be, tier three is their psychiatric service. The tier three service, however, is not free, but Shojon has partnered with organisations to provide this support at a minimum fee," says Amena Akter, a lay counsellor of two and half years at Shojon.

"Initially, we charged Tk 200 for the service and depended on incoming calls mostly. However, with this new approach, we make more outgoing calls to reach the distressed. To address the national crisis of the need for mental health support, the organisation initially provided tele-counselling through its Shojon platform, reaching 500 individuals from a list provided by July Smrity Foundation (JSF) and Students Against Oppression (SAO)," she added.

"We almost reached out to 1,900 plus students and 500 of them needed tiers two or three support," says Farjana Sharmin, head of programme, Mental Health, Sajida Foundation.

Using the insight from Shojon's tele-counselling support, it was found that many protesters and family members of the deceased had symptoms of trauma and grief, which signify the necessity for more structured and accessible mental health services. This realisation led SAJIDA Foundation to establish an in-person Trauma Counselling Centre, with the help of the Government of Bangladesh, to provide trauma-focused counselling support, particularly for those injured during the movement, bereaved families, and affected bystanders. The trauma counselling centre is planned to start in four locations across Bangladesh. However, it is presently operational at the Narayanganj 300 Bed Hospital and NITOR.

Many students who joined to bring in the change are now in hopeless situations -- bullet-ridden, with eye wounds, or amputated due to late treatment which led to infection. They are in a vulnerable mental state, financially doing poorly as well, and some are not able to avail the government's financial help.

"These are ordinary students and regular people like tea sellers and rickshaw pullers, who are not under any political banner. They hold a grudge against the late treatment, and delayed recovery. It's a complex and traumatic scenario that these ordinary students and people are in after August 5," says Farjana, who is the first one to receive or make calls to people from the list provided.

Affordability and availability are key to Shojon's reputation, and they are investing in bringing mental health services to people's doorstep, so that they realise and develop service-seeking behaviour. Shojon also addresses all kinds of trauma, regarding regular relationship issues plaguing one's mind like love, marriage, family, parents, financial stress.

If one cannot make the call due to monetary constraints, then they call them back to provide mental health treatment, ranging from primary care to long-term intervention, such as counselling/psychotherapy and psychiatric support from psychologists and psychiatrists. The helpline number is 09612-119900, and its service remains open every day from 8:00am to 10:00pm.