Aruna Shanbaug+ View more photos and videos

The Aruna Shanbaug story: 'Perhaps she's paying for all our sins'

May 18, 2015 14:35 IST

EDITOR'S NOTE: The following extract is from Pinki Virani's book Aruna's Story: The True Account of a Rape and its Aftermath. It's a heartbreaking account of what happened to Aruna Shanbaug, how her body survived a horrific rape and how the medical staff of KEM Hospital resolutely stood by her and cared for her — even when it may not have been in Shanbaug's best interests medically — when she was abandoned by her family and betrayed by the justice system.

Virani decided to write the book when she realised that Shanbaug's rapist served sentences for assault and robbery, but not for rape. The only silver lining in this terrible history is that Virani's passionate plea for euthanasia for Shanbaug would start the debate that would ultimately make passive euthanasia legal in India. It couldn't be applied in Shanbaug's case because the nurses of KEM Hospital, where Shanbaug had worked before she was raped and became brain dead, refused to entertain the idea of allowing the former nurse to die.

One man. Plus a savage twist of one chain. And the thirty seconds for his sperm to release. Equals one broken woman. With brain damage so irreversible that it does not even register images. And perfectly healthy pupils but blind for life.