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Fragging: Unravelling the Skein *Saumitra Mohan Last few years have seen a spurt of cases where soldiers serving across the country, specifically those serving in conflict situations, turning their weapons on themselves or their fellow soldiers or officers. Even though there has been a decline in such cases lately, but they refuse to die down. We keep hearing of such incidents from across the country from time to time. The phenomenon has been a serious cause of concern for the army which has been seriously contemplating measures to curb this disconcerting trend. All such cases of fratricidal killings have been termed ‘fragging’ and is not specific to this country. The phenomenon of fragging is traced to the Vietnam War when US soldiers stationed there would often roll fragmentation grenades into the tents of unpopular officers and ‘run amok’ (‘amok’ is a Malay word meaning ‘out of control’). Such behaviour was traced to psychological disorders resulting from the ‘pressure coo...