THE issue of senior citizens being left alone at home to fend for themselves when younger people in the family are away -- for work or for whatever reasons -- has certainly assumed a serious dimension. With no easy solution in sight, thanks to various factors that affect families in these modern times, many esteemed readers of the column ‘Loud Thinking’ went on to suggest a rather radical solution of granting old people a ‘right to die’. The argument was that armed with this right, older people would have the freedom to choose when to depart from life -- so as to avoid the troubles of living an incapacitated life. In time, who knows, this argument may gain much importance and the larger society may feel persuaded to think positively about granting a ‘right to die’ route to senior citizens who find life at that stage rather too difficult to cope with. There, of course, will be a good support to this idea since a few countries have passed legislations to that effect. This approach, however, is not without its own serious issues that need to be tackled in a great seriousness. For, what such a legislation would involve is ‘life’ of an individual.

 

 

The legal arrangement in other countries would certainly be of much use while deciding the details of any such move in our country, all right. For, the ‘right to die’ involves not just senior citizens but also people of all ages with incurable ailments to handle which the medical sciences have failed. Tired of living the life of a ‘vegetable’, so to say, those people also seek an end to their miseries by seeking end to their lives. Legally, this process is called euthanasia -- which also means ‘mercy killing, killing, painless death, easy death, putting one out of one’s misery, putting an animal to sleep, release from suffering’ (to use the terminology used in dictionaries or thesauruses). The law in this regard does not consider such a death as “suicide”. Provisions of such a law also refuse to accept the killing by euthanasia as a “murder”. Some esteemed readers of ‘Loud Thinking’ have insisted in their response to the last week’s edition that ‘right to die’ honourably and on one’s own volition could be a good way of ending old-age miseries of countless numbers of senior citizens in the society.

 

The loud-thinker does not pick up courage to support this idea easily. For, if ‘right to die’ is to be granted, ‘right to live’ too needs to be given a top priority in human consideration. Yes, traditionally, ‘right to live’ has always been treated sacrosanct. Yet, to think directly of a ‘right to die’ as a solution to old-age miseries appears to be rather too hard an approach. The better way is to seek a solution -- howsoever utopian it may sound -- by improving the overall standards of civil society so that senior citizens having been forced to live lonely lives without younger generations in their families can find a suitable and honourable social support-system. In many societies, such solutions have come up and are working well for years. Those solutions need to be tried even in India.

 

There is something important to be considered about the old-age homes that are coming up everywhere in the Indian society -- mostly in urban areas. That is a good arrangement, so to say, but not good enough to replace an original family. But then, let us not forget that no other arrangement can replace the original family. So, the limitations that afflict old-age homes also can afflict other arrangements outside the family’s own eco-system. The problem, thus, is rather too vexed -- in the light of the earlier discourse on the issue. That makes it imperative for us to think more deeply and comprehensively so as to come up with a fully acceptable solution. ‘right to die’ is certainly one suggestion. But that would need a much deeper consideration than just the issue of avoidance or escape from old-age miseries -- which also include lonesomeness. There also are some criminal angles to the issue -- as some smart operators may even use the legal arrangement to kill somebody (without getting covered under the homicide law). But those angles will have to wait for now -- to be picked up later for a more detailed discussion.