The Supreme Court on Friday declared that its 2011 judgment in the case of Aruna Shanbaug is “flawed.”
The Constitution Bench was answering doubts raised on whether passive euthanasia can only be introduced by means of a legislation as concluded in the Shanbaug judgment by a two-judge Bench led by Justice (now retired) Markandey Katju.
The five-judge Bench led by Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra concluded that the Shanbaug judgment was based on a wrong reading of another Constitution Bench verdict in Gian Kaur in 1996.
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Chief Justice Misra clarified that the Gian Kaur verdict, unlike what the Katju Bench erroneously concluded,“neither gave any definite opinion with regard to euthanasia nor has it stated that the same can be conceived of only by a legislation.”
The 1996 verdict gives an “indication” that passive euthanasia would only “accelerate the process of dying” in the case of terminally ill persons or patients in persistent vegetative state.
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The Gian Kaur judgment had dealt with the legality of penalising attempt to commit suicide.
In fact, the Misra Bench reiterated the idea spawned in the Gian Kaur verdict that “a dignified procedure of death may include the right of a dying man to also die with dignity when the life is ebbing out.”