Sallekhana

A book review by Claire Maes Tübingen De Gruyter Orientalistische Literaturzeitung 2024; 119(2): 65-70

Introduction
The Jain Approach to Dignified Death, edited by Shugan Chand Jain and Christopher Key Chapple, focusses on the end-of-life practice known as sallekhanā (Sanskrit salle­khanā-) in Jainism. What is sallekhanā? A common etymol­ogy explicates the term as consisting of the components sat- (“good, right”) and lekhanā-, a noun derived from the verbal root √likh, meaning “(the act of) scratching” (pp. 92, 196); sallekhanā-, then, is thought to refer to the “proper scratch­ing out” or “thinning out” of both the physical body by the gradual renunciation of food and water and the karmic body by controlling and eliminating passions.1 It is the vow of fasting to death, also commonly referred to as santhārā (Middle Indo-Aryan santhārā-2). To understand why many Jains consider the practice of fasting to death to be a good way of dying, one needs to contextualise sallekhanā within the Jain classical theory of the soul and karma, and the phi­losophy of non-violence (ahiṃsā-). The Jain fast to death demonstrates, as Chapple writes in the chapter “Eternal Life, Death and Dying in Jainism” (p. 225),
a willingness to devote oneself in an ultimate sense to the obser­vance of non-violence. By not eating, no harm is done to any living being. Second, it functions to burn off residues of karma that otherwise would impede the soul and cause further bondage. It purifies the soul by releasing (nirjarā) the fetters of past attach­ment The practice of sallekhanā has a long history in Jainism. It is already discussed in the Ācārāṅgasūtra, the earliest Jain canonical text, and inscriptions at Śravaṇabeḷagōḷa dating from the sixth century AD to 1820 record the sallekhanā of various Jain monks, nuns, as well as male and female lay followers.3
Legal Debates
The practice of sallekhanā remained mostly uncontested throughout Jain history, whereas in modern times it became the focus of legal contention. In 2006, Nikhil Soni, a human rights advocate, along with Madhav Mitra, a criminal law attorney, filed a public interest litigation (PIL) case in the Rajasthan High Court (RHC) to outlaw this practice. Soni raised several arguments to criminalise both sallekhanā and its abetment. He contended that the practice is not free from potential coercion, and further argued that sallekhanā violates Article 21 of the Constitution, which protects the right to life. The Jain fast, he pleaded, is no different from suicide, and the community’s support of a sallekhanā aspirant is no different from the abetment of suicide, both of which were criminal offences under the Indian Penal Code4 at that time. Soni drew parallels between satī- (widow burning) and sallekhanā, pressing the court to play a pro­gressive role by outlawing sallekhanā, as when it favoured the promulgation of the Sati (Prevention) Act in 1987.5 To the great dismay of the Jain community, the RHC ruled in favour of Nikhil Soni’s PIL and on August 10, 2015 outlawed both the practice of sallekhanā and its abetment. In protest, Jains filed multiple special leave petitions in the Supreme Court. In response to these petitions, the Supreme Court on August 31, 2015, stayed the order of the RHC, and thus restored the right to the Jain community to practice sallekhanā until the case is heard.
The Jain Approach to Dignified Death needs to be contex­tualised in the wake of this legal controversy surrounding sallekhanā. As the introduction chapter mentions (pp. 4 f.):
This decision of the Rajasthan High Court caused a major unifi­cation of all Jains because this judgment hurt the very roots of their religion.
Jains from all sectarian traditions expressed their disagree­ment with the RHC’s ruling in various ways, from organ­ising protest marches to participating in public tonsuring events.6 In addition, some also mobilised the academic community. The International School of Jain Studies, an educational institution in India that has been training inter­national students, researchers, and teachers in Jain studies since 2005, collaborated with Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles to arrange a series of workshops and semi­nars on the topic of sallekhanā.
A first one-day preparatory workshop at the Bhagwan Mahavira Memorial Trust in New Delhi (December 19, 2015) was followed by three major conferences held at the University of Madras in Chennai (February 18–19, 2016), the National Law University in New Delhi (Feb­ruary 26–27, 2016), and the Teerthanker Mahaveer University Medical College in Moradabad (March 5, 2016). Together, they attracted over 500 participants, bringing together advocates, judges, physicians, bioethi­cists, sociologists, scholars of Jain and religious studies and philoso­phers, as well as social and legal activists (pp. 6 f.).
Content Overview
The reviewed work comprises twelve papers that were presented during one of these three conferences. It is divided into three main sections. The first focusses on the legal aspect of sallekhanā and contains five contributions, by Whitny Braun, Ananth Acharya, Purushottama Bilimo­ria, D.R. Mehta and Kusum Jain, and Panachand Jain. The second section discusses sallekhanā from a medical per­spective; it has three papers written by Sean Hillman, Nitin Shah, and Reshma Bhansali. The third section discusses the Jain philosophy behind the practice of sallekhanā and has four chapters by Christopher Key Chapple, D.S. Baya, Priya­darshana Jain and Rajal Borundia Jain, and Shugan C. Jain. This is followed by four appendices, the contributors’ biog­raphies, a bibliography, and an index. Appendix 1 provides a schedule of the three confer­ences, as well as summaries of some of the papers pre­sented. Appendix II lists twenty-four distinctions between sallekhanā and suicide, compiled by Sumat Prakash. Appen­dix III includes the Samādhibhāvanā hymn in Hindi, as well as an English translation. Practicing Jains, especially in North India, frequently recite this hymn, which instructs a person what to feel and think when the time of death is approaching. Appendix IV contrasts one sallekhanā account with a case of “Voluntarily Stopping (of) Eating and Drink­ing” (VSED), an end-of-life option available in many coun­tries (see op.cit. in note 6). The sallekhanā account is by the hand of Kalyan Gangwal, who briefly recounts the twelve-year sallekhanā vow undertaken by his father at the age of 84. The VSED account retells the case of Rosemary Bowen, a 94-year-old US-American who decided to hasten her death by VSED when experiencing a loss of independence after a spinal compression fracture. Rosemary Bowen’s VSED is relatively well-known since she had requested her daughter to document and film her fasting.7
The Jain Approach to Dignified Death merits the atten­tion of all those interested in the Jain practice of fasting to death. It offers a unique collection of chapters, combining scholarly accounts and contemporary perspectives from Jains. In addition, it provides an exploration of sallekhanā from three significant angles: legal, medical, and philo­sophical. If the volume were to go into a second edition, it is recommended to conduct a comprehensive editing process to ensure consistent spelling of Indic words and texts throughout the chapters, and to address the multiple typos. Additionally, including verse or page numbers alongside references to Jain canonical and paracanonical texts would greatly benefit textual scholars, allowing them to consult the original sources more easily.
In what follows, I shall discuss a few chapters in detail, before ending with some critical reflections on the pres­ent-day debates surrounding the Jain practice of fasting to death.
Selective Chapter Discussion
In “Sallekhanā on Trial,” Whitny Braun examines the Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed by Nikhil Soni and Madhav Mitra in the Rajasthan High Court, which, as she notes “represented the first formal legal complaint against sallekhanā … in Indian history” (p. 15). Braun demonstrates how their PIL consists of social, bioethical, and human rights arguments. She shows how Soni and Mitra argue to see sallekhanā as suicide, a criminal offence under section 309 of the Indian Penal Code, and to penalise not only the person undertaking sallekhanā but also the Jain community at large for glorifying the rite (p. 18), portraying it as a social evil comparable to (the glorification of) satī- (pp. 20–22). Braun also discusses their reference to the 1996 Supreme Court case of Smt. Gian Kaur vs The State Of Punjab on 21 March, 1996,8
8 See <https://indiankanoon.org/doc/217501>, last accessed on Apil 17, 2024. where it was determined that (in the words of Braun) “Article 21 of the Constitution of India, which guarantees the ‘Right to Life’ does not also guarantee the ‘Right to Die’” (p. 19). Given that both Indian and interna­tional media extensively covered the PIL against sallekhanā (p. 16), the case is relatively well-known.
But even readers familiar with Soni and Mitra’s PIL will find Braun’s chapter worth exploring. She offers an insightful discussion of the legacy of British Common Law in India’s legal system and its position towards suicide, and also questions the impact of the 2013 Mental Health Care Bill on limiting “the parameters of the prosecution of attempted suicide” (pp. 16 f.). In addition, she includes an interesting discussion of Nikhil Soni’s personal experiences of salle­khanā during his childhood, based on her conversations with the lawyer in August 2010 (pp. 23–27). Braun further offers an insightful account of how the Indian legal system is backlogged (pp. 27–29), making one wonder whether we will hear the Supreme Court’s ruling on sallekhanā during our lifetime.
Although Braun’s chapter thus provides an original contribution, it occasionally overlooks crucial information relevant to her discussion. For instance, when discussing the RHC’s verdict, she neglects to mention that the ruling not only criminalised the practice of sallekhanā, but also the abetment of sallekhanā, under Indian Penal Code (IPC) 306. The RHC also deemed sallekhanā a non-essential Jain religious practice.9
9 Additionally, it is worth noting that since the 2013 Mental Health Care Bill, India has passed The Mental Health Care Act in 2017.
In “To Be or Not to Be?”, Ananth Acharya considers the questions of suicide and sallekhanā from both a phil­osophical and a constitutional point of view. Drawing mainly from “Death,” an open Yale course given by Shelly Kagan,10
10 Cf. <https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEA18FAF1AD9047B0> (last accessed on April 17, 2024), or, in book form, Shelly Kagan: Death. (Open Yale Courses.) New Haven/London: Yale University Press 2012. Acharya discusses the moral theories of deontol­ogy (pp. 33 f.), consequentialism (p. 35), and (hedonistic) utilitarianism (pp. 35 f.) and their position on the ethical­ity of intentionally taking one’s life. In the second part of his contribution, he revisits six different Indian court cases that, prior to Nikhil Soni’s PIL against santhārā, discussed (the attempt to commit) suicide. He shows how the courts ruled differently about the validity of IPC 309 in relation to article 14 (right to equality) and article 21 (right to life) of the Indian Constitution (pp. 36–40). Considering this fact, Acharya advocates for a “stronger moral understanding of life and death” (p. 42). He pointedly concludes by stating (pp. 41 f.):
The current lack of moral backing to any of the judgments on suicide, euthanasia and santhārā is problematic because it allows too easily for decisions to be overturned and reversed with a com­plete lack of reasoning or understanding.
“Bioethics and Medico-Legal Approaches to Ritualized End-of-Life Fasting” by Sean Hillman, upon the request of the Jain community, consists of two parts. In the first part (pp. 123–154), Hillman analyses sallekhanā through the lens of modern bioethics (p. 126). In the second part (pp. 154– 183), he contrasts the Tibetan Buddhist practice of thugs dam (Tukdam) with sallekhanā. Although one can raise critical question marks surrounding Hillman’s claim that sallekhanā and thugs dam are “strikingly and impressively similar” (p. 123), the chapter deserves to be read carefully. Hillman’s contribution is an original piece of scholarship that argues to develop and incorporate safeguards and oversight into the process of sallekhanā to both protect vulnerable Jains from potential coercion and to legitimate sallekhanā in the eyes of its detractors. He suggests that Jains who seek to undertake the vow should be tested on “informed consent” (p. 128), and recommends a procedure modelled on the safeguards and oversight in place for Medical Aid in Dying (MAiD) as found in Canada, where he works as bioethicist. Jains who seek to undertake the vow should be examined on informed consent, he suggests, by testing for (1) voluntariness, and (2) capacity, as well as ensuring that they have (3) sufficient information on all their end-of-life options, and introducing (4) case reviews (pp. 130–142).
Against the backdrop of the problematic reality that in the USA too many dying persons receive aggressive, ineffec­tive, and expensive medical treatment, Nitin Shah in “Prac­tice of Modified Sallekhanā: Acceptance of Death” discusses the practice of sallekhanā as a possible solution (pp. 195 f.), an alternative way of dying that, in his words, is peaceful and ensures a quality of life (pp. 196, 201). Sharing his expe­riences as an intensivist treating dying patients, he makes the important observation that the lack of death acceptance in contemporary society comes at a high financial cost. Ter­minally ill patients, he notes, often drain large amounts of resources that do not add to their quality of life, and which could have been employed differently (pp. 200 f.). He there­fore advocates for a better education about end-of-life options and palliative care (pp. 198–201). In the final part of his chapter, Nitin Shah shares his personal experiences of the death of his first wife and both his parents, who all decided “in [a] very conscious state of mind to not accept available treatment or to stop treatment altogether” (p. 201).
Though short, Reshma Bhansali’s chapter “The Role of Dharma Jāgaraṇa for Sallekhanā” is exceptionally inform­ative for all those who seek to learn how the vow of salle­khanā is administered on the ground. Bhensali describes the work of the Dharma Jāgaraṇa Maṇḍala, previously known as the Santhārā Club (p. 206), which is a voluntary organisation run by Sthānakavāsī Jains in Chennai that aims “to help the terminally ill lay householders (śrāvakas and śrāvikās) to remain calm and undisturbed and to face death without fear” (pp. 205 f.). The volunteers working for the organisation provide counselling and administer the vow of sallekhanā to terminally ill patients upon request, irrespective of their caste, creed, and gender (pp. 206, 209). The organisation provides guidelines for both the salle­khanā aspirant and her or his family members, such as the importance for the aspirant to “not wish for happiness in this loka … [and] paraloka” (p. 208), or for family members to not discuss worldly issues in front of the sallekhanā aspirant, but to instead engage in religious activities like svādhyāya- (p. 208). “The Maṇḍala has visited more than 100 patients and has successfully helped fifty-two aspirants take the vow of sallekhanā” since its inception (p. 206).
“Relevance of Sallekhanā/Samādhi-maraṇa in Today’s Society” is written by D.S. Baya, a colonel who after his retirement from the Indian army went on to earn a doc­torate in Jain Studies from Mohanlal Sikhadia University in Udaipur. Baya gives a statistical analysis of the number of Jains who take the vow of sallekhanā each year. For the period between January 1, 1994 and December 31, 2003, he searched in a wide variety of Indian local newspapers, periodicals, magazines, and journals, documenting the announcements of Jains taking the vow of sallekhanā. He recorded a total of 350 cases. Based on this number and on the fact that there were other issues he did not consult, Baya extrapolates that there must have been about 2400 cases of sallekhanā during the ten-year period he researched, which translates to about 20 cases per month (pp. 241 f.).
As far as I am aware, Baya’s study is to date the only research that focusses on recording the number of Jains who take the vow of sallekhanā in India today. While his data is limited (he points out that he sampled “only” 750 out of 1500 possible issues) it is an essential step towards the development of a demographic understanding of the contemporary prevalence of the practice of sallekhanā. Without such data, several key questions regarding salle­khanā must remain guesswork. For example, how common is sallekhanā today? Is the practice gendered? Are there sig­nificantly more women or more men taking the vow? Does the place where one lives play a role: is there a correlation between the likelihood of a Jain taking the vow of salle­khanā and the fact that she or he lives in a rural versus an urban area? Is the practice more common among ascetics than among householders? What is the average age of a Jain taking the vow, and what is the average length of the fast? To be able to answer such questions we need reliable data. Baya’s study helps us answer these questions for a sample of 350 cases.
It shows that in absolute numbers, Śvetāmbaras out­number Digambaras in taking the vow of sallekhanā. Śvetāmbaras account for 260 of the 350 documented cases, which is 74 % (p. 243). This is not surprising, given that there are far more Śvetāmbara than Digambara Jains. Among the Digambaras, ascetics outnumber householders, whereas the opposite is true among the Śvetāmbaras. Baya reports that among Digambaras, the highest number of sallekhanā cases is by monks, followed by nuns, laymen, and then finally laywomen. For Śvetambāras, the most cases of salle­khanā are among laywomen, followed by laymen, nuns, and monks. In terms of gender, Baya’s study shows that women slightly outnumber men; they account for about 54 % of the 350 sallekhanā cases. He further discovered that sallekhanā is carried out more frequently in urban settings than in rural areas; nearly 70 % of the cases he investigated are of Jains living in urban areas. Regarding the median age, Baya established that “the average age at the time of death of the practitioners in the sample group was 77 years and four months” (p. 245). He further observes that more than 96 % of the documented sallekhanā cases are by Jains who were of advanced age and/or suffering from an incurable disease. Regarding the duration of the sallekhanā fast, he discovered that about 80 % fasted for one day, showing that most Jains take the vow symbolically at the end of life.
Tradition versus Modernity and the Issue of Coercion
To a certain extent, it is ironic to notice that while in recent years the Jain practice of fasting to death has become heavily contested, the end-of-life practice of VSED has been gaining legitimacy in countries worldwide, with each year more and more individuals opting for it.11 Yet, as I argue elsewhere (op. cit. in note 6, p. 326):
From a medical and legal point of view sallekhanā can be consid­ered a form of VSED. Although differing in terms of intent and historical context, the two practices are similar insofar that they relate to capable and sound individuals who voluntarily forego food and water until death.
How, then, ought we to make sense of these differing trends in how the wider Indian society and Western countries respectively perceive and respond to the Jain vow of sall­ekhanā and VSED?
For let there be no misunderstanding: Indian society is polarised regarding the ethicality of sallekhanā. Nikhil Soni’s PIL to criminalise sallekhanā is not a singular or isolated stance; rather, it resonates with others in Indian society who share similar views. As Braun justly observes (p. 27):12
Soni is representative of a growing number of young urban Indian professionals who see the practice of ancient rituals, particularly one religious in nature, that push the boundaries of gender equality and human rights as an obstacle in the path of India becoming the world’s largest developed nation democracy.
The mixed reception of sallekhanā in contemporary India must, in part, be understood as the impact of globalisation and secularisation. The traditional socio-religious context that once upheld and strengthened the Jain fast to death has been facing increasing challenges since India entered the global marketplace in the 1990s. With the rapid modern­isation of Indian society, new sets of values have been intro­duced that exert pressure on communities to either adapt, reassess, or abandon traditional practices and rituals. The rite of sallekhanā is no exception to this process.
Regardless of the position one holds vis-à-vis Soni’s PIL, it did start a much-needed discussion regarding the danger of potential coercion; it may be remembered that one of the reasons why Soni filed a PIL case against salle­khanā rests on a widely held belief that elderly Jain women, who are perceived as no longer contributing to society or their families, may face pressure to undertake sallekhanā. Moreover, he contended that the Jain community’s public celebration of sallekhanā undermines the possibility of its being pursued on an authentic voluntary basis. Partly in response to this, Hillman proposes that “Jain families and communities could consider toning down the publicity of such occurrences, which happens through various types of advertising, adulation and celebration” (p. 184). He sug­gests to “tone down the publicity” in the hope that it would reduce “undue internal or external pressures on candidates that might stem from the social capital that is thought to be gained by families of people who undertake sallekhanā” (p. 184).
Considering the issue of coercion, it is useful to intro­duce the ethical concept of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ voluntariness. ‘Hard’ voluntariness refers to a situation where an individ­ual’s decision or action is entirely free from any external influence or coercion. In this context, the person’s choice is autonomous and self-determined without any external pressures, threats, or manipulations; the decision is made with a clear understanding of the options and their conse­quences, and the individual exercises full control over the choice. ‘Soft’ voluntariness, on the other hand, describes a situation where an individual’s decision or action is influ­enced or shaped by external factors or pressures to some extent. While the person may still have some degree of choice, there are external elements that might sway the decision-making process. Hillman argues that the increased reputation of the family of someone who engages in sall­ekhanā and the normative push towards this idealised mode of dying in Jainism “are examples of interferences to soft voluntariness, where processes internal to the person hinder their ability to make a free choice” (p. 134). Considering the fact that the rite of sallekhanā is embed­ded within a normative worldview, one wonders if it will not always to some degree be based on “soft voluntariness”, and if striving for “hard voluntariness” is realistic or even desirable.
Be that as it may, for sallekhanā to be ethically accept­able, the vow must be voluntary and not administered against one’s will. In this context, it is worth noting that Baya in his study also foregrounds a little discussed but potentially problematic aspect regarding the practice. As he observes, the majority of the sallekhanā cases are of Jains who are about to pass away (p. 246). This, of course, is not problematic per se. In fact, it may serve to emphasise the soteriological importance many Jains attach to the prac­tice. What is debatable, however, is the fact that “in some cases”, as Baya remarks, “it is the attendants who admin­ister the vow when the person concerned is not even fully conscious of what he or she is doing” (p. 246). He casts doubt on the spiritual benefit of such sallekhanā cases (pp. 246 f.). Leaving aside this issue, what I consider most problem­atic here is the fact that the vow can be administered to someone who is not fully conscious without there being a clear, transparent procedure in place that establishes that this would be in harmony with the individual’s personal wishes, values, and worldview. Without this, the ethicality of such sallekhanā cases is questionable, at the very least. To withhold the right of capable, sound Jains to take the vow of sallekhanā can for various good reasons be considered unjust, but to allow the rite to take place involuntarily is likewise a powerful injustice.

1 Briane Donaldson, Ana Bajželj: Insistent Life. Principles for Bioethics in the Jain Tradition. Berkeley CA: University of California Press 2021, p. 194.

2 This goes back to the Old Indo-Aryan noun saṃstāra(ka)-, derived from the verb sam√stṛ “to spread out”; in early Jain texts, to spread out one’s grass mat on a suitable piece of ground was an essential step in the ritualised process of fasting to death.

3 S. Settar: Inviting Death. Historical Experiments on Sepulchral Hill. Revised edition. Delhi: Primus Books/Ratna Sagar 2016, pp. 5–10.

4 On July 1, 2024, the Indian Penal Code was replaced by the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), which decriminalized attempted suicide by omit­ting the former Section 309. The BNS retains the provisions of the IPC on abetment of suicide.

5 Cf. Rajasthan High Court: Nikhil Soni vs Union of India & Ors. on 10 August, 2015 (<https://indiankanoon.org/doc/173301527>, last accessed on April 13, 2024).

6 Cf. Claire Maes: “Sallekhanā and the End-of-Life Option of Voluntar­ily Stopping of Eating and Drinking. An Ethical Argument to Consider the Jain Practice of Fasting to Death as Different from Suicide”, Reli­gions of South Asia 17 (2023): 323–350; see p. 325.

7 Cf. Tara Bahrampour: “At 94, She Was Ready to Die by Fasting. Her Daughter Filmed It”, Washington Post of November 3, 2019 (<https:// www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/at-94-she-was-ready-to-die-by-fasting-her-daughter-filmed-it/2019/11/03/41688230-fcd9-11e9- 8190-6be4deb56e01_story.html>, last accessed on April 15, 2024).

8 See <https://indiankanoon.org/doc/217501>, last accessed on Apil 17, 2024.

9 Additionally, it is worth noting that since the 2013 Mental Health Care Bill, India has passed The Mental Health Care Act in 2017.

10 Cf. <https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEA18FAF1AD9047B0> (last accessed on April 17, 2024), or, in book form, Shelly Kagan: Death. (Open Yale Courses.) New Haven/London: Yale University Press 2012

11 Philipp Starke: “Freiwilliger Verzicht auf Essen und Trinken – zur ethischen Lagebestimmung eines ambivalenten Begriffs”, Ethik in der Medizin 32 (2020): 171–187 (see p. 172); Michael Coors, Alfred Simon, Bernd Alt-Epping: “Freiwilliger Verzicht auf Nahrung und Flüssigkeit (FVNF): Ein einleitender Überblick”, in: id. (eds.): Freiwilliger Verzicht auf Nahrung und Flüssigkeit. Medizinische und pflegerische Grundla­gen – ethische und rechtliche Bewertungen. (Münchner Reihe Palliative Care.) Stuttgart: Verlag W. Kohlhammer 2019, pp. 7–12.

12 See also Manisha Sethi: “Ritual Death in a Secular State: The Jain Practice of Sallekhana”, South Asian History and Culture 10 (2019): 136–151.