Venkatesh’s wish fulfilled in death

The former chess player’s eyes were donated soon after he died. However, other organs could not be transplanted as he had been on ventilator for a long period, the sources said. The high court had yesterday ordered the setting up of a new committee to reconsider the euthanasia plea by Venkatesh’s mother Sujatha to enable him to donate organs. The court had on Wednesday rejected the appeal.

While rejecting the plea of the petitioner, the court had said ‘‘though it can understand the anguish of the mother and the noble intentions of her son, the statue has no such provision which provides exemption from the Act as a special case’’.

The bench also rejected another petition questioning the recommendations of a medical panel, that organs of any person not brain dead, cannot be donated by the nearest relative. Sujatha said she would continue her fight urging for a change in the Human Organ Transplant Act.

Vowing to carry on the legal battle for a change in the law to enable persons who are not brain-dead to donate organs, Sujatha told a private news channel: ‘‘This is fighting. May be not this year, but in two years or three years or four years, the act (change in law) is coming’’.

She said she would also fulfil Venkatesh’s last wish that she performs his last rites, even if it means going against Hindu traditions. ‘‘I know only what my son said. He said, ‘Amma, do this’. Hindu dharma, I don’t know’’.