Whose Life Is It Anyway?

The heading of this article is the title of a 1972 television play scripted by British dramatist Brian Clark, which was subsequently made into a Hollywood film.

The story, which unfolds within the claustrophobic confines of a hospital room, deals with a sculptor who, permanently paralysed from the neck down following a car accident, seeks legal sanction to end what he deems to be an unendurable state of existence in which he is incapable of attending to his basic bodily functions, leave alone pursue his creative career.

Clark's play is a dramatisation of the ongoing debate about euthanasia - a word derived from the Greek, meaning 'good death' - whereby terminally ill or disabled people may be assisted by doctors or caregivers to end their condition of unbearable physical or mental agony.

Euthanasia, or assisted dying , is once again in the news following the recent passing of a bill in the UK parliament , 'Terminally Ill Adult (End of Life) Bill'. If, after further scrutiny and debate, the bill becomes a law, UK will be one of several countries, including Belgium, Canada, and Netherlands, where assisted termination of life is legal.

The legislation is opposed by religious leaders of various communities who believe that life is a God-given gift and its denial constitutes blasphemy. Its critics fear its misuse by attendants or heirs who might pressure patients to take the fatal step.

In India, the law makes a distinction between passive and active euthanasia. Passive euthanasia is when a patient, in a coma or similarly incapacitated physically or mentally, is taken off life support systems after due consultation between doctors and relatives.

Active euthanasia, also termed physician-assisted suicide (PAS), whereby cessation of existence is induced by the administration of a lethal pathogen, is not permissible.

There is an SC ruling that while Article 21 of the Constitution confers the right to life, it does not extend to its converse, the right not to live. However, there is a rider in that the right to life encompasses the right to live with dignity . The implication being that life bereft of mental and physical dignity is untenable.

In Jainism, the spiritual practice of sallekhana involves the voluntary, non-violent termination of existence achieved through the progressive abstinence from nutrition. The practice is distinguished from suicide in that it is dispassionate and does not involve the use of toxins or instruments of harm, its objective being liberation from the karmic cycle of birth and rebirth.

Similarly, euthanasia differs from suicide, which by its very nature, is an act of violent passion, borne out of darkest despair.

Contrary to such life-negation, both sallekhana and euthanasia are affirmations of agency, of the individual's freedom of choice, untrammelled by constraints other than the dictates of one's own conscience.

The assertion of the supremacy of religion, or the state, over free choice renders an individual into an object, reducing a person to a possession owned by some over-ruling authority.

To deny the self-sufficiency of the individual in this regard is to deny the right to live in dignity. Whose life is it, anyway? The corollary to that question is, or ought to be: Whose death, in dignity, is it, anyway?

Authored by: Jug Suraiya