Aruna Shanbaug (67), a former nurse with Mumbai’s KEM hospital and the face of a debate on euthanasia, died on Monday, after being in a vegetative coma state for more than four decades, following her brutal rape in 1973. She was put on ventilator in the previous week and passed away at 8:30 on Monday morning after a deadly bout of pneumonia.
Confirming the death, King Edward Memorial Hospital’s medical superintendent, Dr Pravin Bangar stated that, “She passed away at 8.30am. She had been diagnosed with pneumonia and had been on the ventilator for the past few days.” She had been in a critical condition in the intensive care unit (ICU) of the hospital in Parel for almost a week, under strict supervision. Doctors and other staff of the hospital had attended to her, all these years, and took care of every single need. Though she had bounced back from several bouts of other illnesses, this proved to be a fatal one.
Shanbaug had been a staff nurse at the same hospital when she was attacked by sweeper Sohanlal Bharta Valmiki as a revenge on the evening of November 27,1973. Valmiki, in a fury, had attempted to rape her, but later sodomized her when he found her to be menstruating. He had even yanked a dog chain around her neck to immobilize and ‘punish’ her. Sohanlal, however, served seven years imprisonment and walked free later. He, reportedly, joined another hospital after serving his jail sentence.
When Shanbaug was found unconscious the next day, doctors realized that some part of her brain had been ‘damaged’, as the chain had cut off the supply of oxygen. The cortex and some other parts of her brain were severely damaged. Though suffering a lot, she did not have many visitors. Her sister Shanta Nayak, the only relative in Mumbai who visited her occasionally (according to Shanta’s statement) passed away in September 2013. She used to live in Wadala, Mumbai.
The KEM Hospital’s nurses had been taking care of her since. Nurses and doctors visited her on her birthday on June 1. The nurses state that Aruna had become their family and it gave them satisfaction to serve and take care of her every need. They further stated that though she wasn’t aware of her surroundings, she could recognize the people around her to some extent.
In March 2011, the Supreme Court had rejected a petition filed by author Pinki Virani seeking mercy killing for Shanbaug. The case had triggered a wild round of debates on euthanasia and Virani made ‘passionate pleas for an end’ to what she described in her own statement as Shanbaug’s ‘unbearable agony’.
Her rapist Valmiki served a seven-year sentence in prison after being convicted of the twin crimes of robbery and attempted murder, but not rape as an official deleted part of her medical report that showed Shanbaug was ‘sodomized.’ Also at the time of the assault, Shanbaug, a resident of Haldipur, Karnataka, had been engaged to Sundeep Sardesai, a fellow resident doctor in the KEM Hospital. Sardesai waited for her to revive for four years, however, later he married and settled abroad.
On Monday, the hospital sent a message asking her family members to get in touch with the hospital authorities. Aruna would turn 68 this year on June 1st. Shanbaug’s corpse was kept in the KEM premises for last rites and funeral was to be conducted at Bhoiwada on Monday noon.
With inputs from Suyash Karangutkar.
Tags: Aruna Shanbaug
