Pinki Virani
| Pinki Virani | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1959 (age 57–58) Bombay, India |
| Occupation | Journalist, writer |
| Nationality | Indian |
| Ethnicity | Gujarati; Ismaili Khoja |
Pinki Virani (born 30 January 1959) is an Indian writer, journalist, human-rights activist and author who has won critical acclaim for her books Once was Bombay, Aruna's Story, Bitter Chocolate: Child Sexual Abuse in India (which won the National Award), and Deaf Heaven. Her fifth book is called Politics of the Womb -- The Perils of Ivf, Surrogacy & Modified Babies.
Virani was born in Mumbai, India, to Gujarati Muslim parents. Her father owned a shop, and her mother was a teacher. She attended school in Mumbai, Pune and Mussoorie. She went to the US to study for a Masters in Journalism on the Aga Khan Foundation scholarship. She did an internship at The Sunday Times, where she reported extensively on the race riots in Britain.
She started working as a typist at the age of 18. When she returned to India after her scholarship, she worked as a reporter and went on to become India's first woman editor of an evening paper. She moved from daily journalism when she published her first book.
Virani is the author of five books, four of which are non-fiction best-sellers.
Virani's writings may have contributed to India's Parliament passing a law against sexual abuse of children (The Protection of Children Against Sexual Offences) in May 2012. The law includes four of her suggestions to the Standing Committee, it also encompasses several suggestions from her book Bitter Chocolate: Child Sexual Abuse in India. The book and a part of its contents has also been quoted in a Madras High Court judgement.
In 2009, Pinki Virani filed a petition in Supreme Court of India on behalf of Aruna Shanbaug, a nurse working at the KEM Hospital in Mumbai on 27 November 1973 when she was sexually assaulted by a sweeper. During the attack she was strangled with a chain, and the deprivation of oxygen left her in a vegetative state. She was treated at KEM following the incident and was kept alive by a feeding tube for 48 years, until her death of pneumonia in 2015. In Virani's 2009 petition, she argued that the "continued existence of Aruna is in violation of her right to live in dignity". The Supreme Court made its decision on 7 March 2011. It rejected the plea to discontinue Aruna's life support but issued a set of broad guidelines legalising passive euthanasia in India. The Supreme Court also refused to recognise Virani as the "next friend" of Shanbaug, a description Virani had used to file the petition. The Court observed in paragraph 14 of the judgment, "[...] we are treating the KEM hospital staff as the next friend of Aruna Shanbaug and we decline to recognize Ms. Pinki Virani as her next friend. No doubt Ms. Pinki Virani has written a book about Aruna Shanbaug and has visited her a few times, and we have great respect for her for the social causes she has espoused, but she cannot claim to have the extent of attachment or bonding with Aruna which the KEM hospital staff, which has been looking after her for years, claims to have."
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