Plea for palliative care in hospice: HC says will consider all angles

The accused Nirmala Uppuganti has been suffering from stage four cancer

The Bombay High Court has reserved its order in a petition by Maoist leader Nirmala Uppuganti seeking to be transferred to hospice for palliative care due to her terminal illness.

Uppuganti was arrested in 2019 along with her husband for their alleged involvement in the Gadchiroli Naxal attack of 2019 in which 15 police personnel and one civilian were killed. According to the prosecution, they are allegedly senior members of the banned organisation, Communist Party of India (Maoist).

A division bench of justices SS Shinde and NJ Jamadar was hearing a petition filed by Uppuganti seeking transfer to hospice stating that she has stage four cancer and was suffering from multiple skeletal

metastases and lung metastases. She has also sought that she be allowed to meet her husband who is a co-accused in the case.

While reserving the order, the judges asked Uppuganti’s advocate Payoshi Roy to be optimistic and not keep saying “petitioner’s (Uppuganti’s) last few days”.

Justice Shinde said: “You should be optimistic, why are you restricting her life to last few days? She may live longer. First, we are humans, then we are judges.”

The judges also said that Article 21 (protection of life and personal liberty) of the Constitution of India was applicable to everyone, including the prisoners. “There are ‘n’ number of judgments. Certainly, discretion has to be used and we cannot go beyond the law, but we will consider all angles,” added Justice Shinde.

Uppuganti has said in her petition that she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2018. She has claimed that she was illegally detained by the Maharashtra police in June 2019 due to which she was forced to miss her chemotherapy cycle, deteriorating her condition.

Roy argued that her cancer had advanced to stage four and she suffered from multiple skeletal metastases and lung metastases. Roy also argued that Uppuganti was kept in a crowded prison cell where she had to sleep on the floor with no access to basic facilities like toilets, hot water and other medical facilities.

Full report on www.freepressjournal.in