March 7: In an unprecedented verdict, the Supreme Court on Monday opened the window to permitting “mercy killing” of terminally ill patients agonising in hospital for long, with no hope of survival. The court laid down comprehensive guidelines to process “passive euthanasia” through a petition in the High Court concerned till Parliament passes any law on the issue.
However, a bench comprising Justices Markandey Katju and Gyan Sudha Misra dismissed the plea for the mercy killing of a Mumbai nurse who has been lying in a vegetative state in King Edward Memorial Hospital for 37 years as her case did not fully meet the criteria.
While dismissing the petition to allow “passive euthanasia” to be carried out in the case of Ms Aruna Ramchandra Shanbaug, who, according to a team of three doctors, has been reduced to a “vegetative” state, the apex court said the guidelines laid down by it would act as “judicial legislation” in the same manner as its guidelines regarding “sexual harassment” of women at the workplace are already in force since 1999.
While making a clear distinction between “active euthanasia”, which means ending the life of a patient by injecting a drug, and “passive euthanasia”, which means permitting doctors to withdraw life support to a patient, the apex court said there was no ambiguity in the law on “active euthanasia”, which is a crime under Sections 302 (murder), 304 (homicide) and 306 (abetment to suicide) of the IPC.