‘October’ by Shoojit Sircar

‘October,’ directed by Shoojit Sircar, is a Hindi drama film about Dan and Shiuli, two interns who work at a hotel in Delhi, India. Dan is irritable and irresponsible, while Shiuli is gentle and diligent. When Shiuli accidentally slips from the third-floor terrace of the hotel, she sustains severe damage to her brain, neck, and spine, falling into a deep coma. Before slipping, Shiuli innocuously asks, “Where is Dan?” Upon learning this, Dan is consumed by her case, devoting himself to staying at the hospital with her mother, uncle, and siblings at the cost of his personal life and career. ‘October’ is not a film specifically about assisted death. Instead, the subject organically arises  while the characters wait for Shiuli’s condition to improve. In three key scenes, Shiuli’s uncle Jairam, who is pessimistic about her recovery, opposes the other characters’ dogged hope and belief that she wishes to live. He bemoans the mounting hospital bills, but Shiuli’s mother, Vidya, counters his concerns citing their savings and insurance. He later argues that sustaining Shiuli’s life as a ‘vegetable’ is akin to torture, believing that she would not recognize them if she recovered. When Shiuli becomes paralyzed after an epileptic attack and stroke, he implicitly suggests assisted death, arguing that her quality of life has greatly diminished. But Dan constantly opposes Jairam, invoking Shiuli’s young age, her potential, the moral responsibility of their duty to her, and his belief that she intends to live. Eventually, Shiuli does wake from her coma, but with minimal physical and mental function. Despite her incapacity, Shiuli reciprocates Dan’s attachment to her, which she can only communicate with eye gestures. The second half of the film depicts her grueling recovery and eventual death by seizure, through which Dan learns to shed his resentment and grow through his indefinable relationship with Shiuli.

‘October,’ written by Juhi Chaturvedi and directed by Shoojit Sircar, eschews the melodrama of a conventional Bollywood musical and plays instead like a mellow indie drama. Critics and audiences alike praised its performance, narrative, direction, writing, tone, and cinematography. There has been little discussion, however, of ‘October’s’ treatment of euthanasia, likely because of how delicately Sircar and Chaturvedi handle the topic. The dialogue is performed in hushed tones and the characters never use the words euthanasia, assisted death, or their synonyms explicitly. The viewer thus finds herself confronting this provocative topic without realizing the characters have been discussing it. The scenes in which assisted death is discussed are resonant with India’s legal history of assisted death. When Jairam considers euthanasia, he evokes the landmark Aruna Ramchandra Shaunbarg vs Union of India case of 2011, in which the Supreme Court of India legalized passive euthanasia. In 2009, author Pinki Virani petitioned for court-ordered euthanasia on behalf of Shaunbarg, who at the time had been in a vegetative state for thirty-six years. However, Virani was vehemently opposed by the hospital workers, whose reasons included their diligent effort at sustaining her life, Shaunbarg’s inability to communicate her wishes, and their own emotional attachment to her. In ‘October,’ Dan, Shiuli’s mother, and her siblings steadfastly oppose Jairam’s implicit arguments for assisted death.  While debating the best mode of care for Shiuli, the protagonists thus are strictly anti-euthanasia in opposition to whom Jairam functions as a soft antagonist. Though Dan and Shiuli’s mother cannot truly speak to Shiuli’s wishes any better than Jairam, the film ultimately sides with them. Thus, while ‘October’ brushes upon assisted death, its narrative ultimately reaffirms the Indian values that champion the sanctity of life, which assumes that everyone wants to live, and euthanasia would truncate a miraculous recovery. This alignment with convention makes ‘October’ ultimately palatable to the Indian consciousness, which leans anti-assisted death, even though India has legally eased its stance on it.