Know Your Rights!!

I first learned about living wills when a newspaper article “Renowned gynaecologist registers living will” caught my attention. Then of course, at one of the OTT platforms I saw the movie “Salam Venky” based on the true story of a 25-year-old chess player Kolavennu Venkatesh from Hyderabad who in 2004 pleaded to be euthanised. Almost after 14 years, in March 2018, the Supreme Court of India issued a landmark judgement recognizing the right to die with dignity and allowing for passive euthanasia in certain circumstances. The judgement, passed by a five-judge Constitution Bench led by Chief Justice Dipak Misra, held that "the right to life includes the right to die with dignity" and that individuals have the right to refuse medical treatment or life support in cases of terminal illness or irreversible coma. The case was brought to the Supreme Court by a non-governmental organization called Common Cause, which argued that the right to die with dignity was a fundamental ri...