Harish Rana, the first person in India to be granted permission for passive euthanasia by the Supreme Court, died at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in Delhi on Tuesday, The Indian Express reported.

Rana died at 4.10 pm on Tuesday, the hospital stated. He had been in a permanent vegetative state since 2013.

The court had, on March 11, allowed life support to be withdrawn for the 31-year-old. The order had been passed on a plea filed by the family of Rana, who suffered a severe traumatic brain injury in August 2013 after falling from the fourth floor of a building in Chandigarh.

This was the first instance in which the court’s directions on passive euthanasia, laid down in a 2018 judgement, had been applied.

Three days after the court’s ruling, Rana had been moved from his home in Ghaziabad to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences.

Also read: From Aruna Shanbaug to Harish Rana, India’s long reckoning with the right to die with dignity

In 2018, a five-judge Constitution bench of the Supreme Court had recognised and given sanction for passive euthanasia, and allowed living wills or advance directives.

In that judgement, the court had ruled that the right to life under Article 21 of the Constitution includes the right to live with dignity....

Read more