Aruna Shanbaug's case can't reopen unless the court orders
Ranjit Patil the Minister of state for home said, "If somebody goes to court asking for reopening of the case, the state government will do as per the court's orders. The government cannot ask the police to take suo motu action. The (court) verdict has already been given. If we order the reopening of files, it will be disrespecting the court's judgment."
Aruna Shanbhag who was former nurse at Mumbai's King Edward Memorial (KEM) hospital and was admitted here after sexual harassment by a ward-boy of hospital. She died on Monday morning at 8:30 am. She was on a ventilator here since last five days.
On November 27, 1973, Shanbaug (67), working at the government-run KEM hospital, was attacked by Sohanlal Bhartia Valmiki a ward-boy of the hospital. who tied her to a dog chain and sodomized her.
The incident left her in a vegetative state owing to serious brain injuries. For the past 42 years, she had been confined to ward No. 4 of the same hospital. In March 2011, Shanbaug became the face of the debate on euthanasia in India after the country’s Supreme Court rejected a petition filed by the writer Pinki Virani that sought permission for a “mercy killing.”
Virani’s move was opposed by the nurses and doctors at the hospital who had looked after Shanbaug since she was attacked. Her rapist served seven years in prison after being convicted of robbery and attempted murder.
