‘I lost even after winning’: Harish Rana’s lawyer on dignity in death

Supreme Court’s landmark judgment allowing withdrawal of life support to Harish Rana will help families in a similar situation because of the guidelines laid down by it even as it asked the Centre to legislate, Manish Jain, counsel for Rana’s family, says.

Injured after a fall when he was a civil engineering student in Chandigarh in 2013, Rana was in vegetative state for 13 years and his family fought a long legal battle. After 10 days of withdrawal of life support at AIIMS, under the watch of specialists, Rana died. Jain spoke to TOI about the dilemma before the court, application of ‘right to die with dignity’, the widened definition of life support it accepted, and more. Excerpts:
After Supreme Court’s landmark verdict, you said ‘I lost even after winning the case’. Does that also sum up the judicial dilemma on euthanasia pleas?