from The New York Times
India and the Right to Suicide
MUMBAI,
INDIA — L. is 21 years old, a Mumbai media professional who wears his
hair gelled and his shirts buttoned down. We met at a book reading a few
weeks ago, and soon he was telling me about the night two years ago
when a friend of his tried to kill herself.
Four
friends were at a bar, drunk, L. recalled, when S. said she would never
get over the man she was in love with. She went to the toilet and came
back wrists bleeding. “The owner freaked and called the police,” L.
said. “We cut out quickly and got away before they showed up.”
L.
took S. to a hospital, but “the doctors refused to treat her because
she was a suicide case.” The police arrived before S. could be brought
home and shown to her family doctor. “The policemen said that she was a
criminal now and she should be taken to the police station.” And “they
said that we were abetting the crime so we should also go to the police
station.”
At
that point L. did what the young and privileged all over the world do
in such situations: He called his father, a well-to-do travel agent.
“Dad came to the hospital and slapped me across the face two or three
times in front of the police. I think that was to show the cops that he
was serious. I think he slapped me so he wouldn’t have to pay too much.
We got off with Rs 12,000 (about $190), but there was solid bargaining.”
L.
had come up against Section 309 of the Indian Penal Code of 1860, a
piece of legislation designed by the very Victorian Lord Macaulay, which
punished attempts to commit suicide with a fine or up to a year in jail
or both. Aiding or instigating suicide — an offense created later — was
punishable by up to ten years in jail, including possibly hard labor.
The
rationale for criminalizing attempted suicide is the standard
theological argument: Since only God could give you life, only God could
take it away. The harsher penalty for abetment arose from something
more distinctly Indian.
India
has strict laws against demanding a dowry of brides and their families.
But even after marriage, women can be harassed by in-laws asking for
money, gold or gifts, and some, driven to despair, kill themselves.
Criminal abetment to suicide was often used to take such cases to court.
But
now, at the instigation of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, the law
stands to be repealed. This follows a 2008 recommendation by the Law
Commission, which suggested that attempted suicide should be “regarded
more as a manifestation of a diseased condition of mind deserving
treatment and care rather than an offense to be visited with
punishment.”
The
news comes none too soon, given that India has the world’s highest
suicide rate for 15-to-29-year-olds and desperately needs to rethink its
approach to mental health. (In many cities, electro-convulsive therapy
remains a common treatment for depression and suicidal tendencies; in
small villages, the standard cure might be exorcism.) Although the
anti-suicide law has rarely been applied, its very existence — and the
threat of prison — discouraged people who attempted or considered
suicide from seeking help. The authorities would sometimes leverage it
for political advantage or to extract money by blackmailing already
traumatized families.
When
I heard earlier this month that the law was up for repeal, I wept for a
while. It was never used against my mother, but I remember the day a
police officer came to our home on one of the many occasions when she
tried to take her own life. I was about 12 years old. He sat on our
dark-red Rexine sofa and talked quietly with my father. He smelled
acrid, of sweat in polyester, and refused an offer of tea, the standard
gesture of hospitality in middle-class India. He did not ask for money,
but my father produced some anyway, thanking him for his time and
patience. After the police officer left — having accepted that offer — I
asked my father whether my mother would have been arrested otherwise.
He said, “I don’t know that I can take the chance.”
