New Delhi, Jan. 16 -- The Supreme Court on Thursday reserved its judgment on a plea seeking permission for passive euthanasia of a 31-year-old man who has remained in a permanent vegetative state for more than a decade, even as the court openly grappled with the moral limits of judicial decision-making in matters of life and death. "We decide matters every day, but these issues are delicate. We are also mortals. Who are we to decide who lives or dies? Let us see," remarked a bench of justices JB Pardiwala and KV Viswanathan after hearing extensive submissions from the family of Harish Rana and the Union government. The case, if allowed, could result in India's first instance of judicially sanctioned passive euthanasia, implementing the principles laid down by the Supreme Court in its landmark Common Cause judgment (2018), which recognised the right to die with dignity and permitted withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment and support under a structured legal and medical framework. Harish Rana, a former Panjab University student, suffered catastrophic head injuries after falling from the fourth floor of his paying guest accommodation in 2013. Since then, he has remained completely unresponsive, bedridden and dependent on clinically assisted nutrition and hydration through feeding tubes. While he is not on mechanical ventilation, he requires round-the-clock care and has shown no signs of neurological improvement for over ten years. After years of treatment, therapy and home-based care, his parents approached the Supreme Court seeking permission to withdraw life-sustaining treatment, contending that continued medical intervention served no therapeutic purpose and only prolonged suffering. On December 11 last year, the Supreme Court ordered the constitution of a secondary medical board at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) after a primary board comprising doctors from Ghaziabad and Meerut reported that Harish suffered from 100% disability quadriplegia with "negligible" chances of recovery. The AIIMS board, in its report dated December 16, concluded that there was little to no possibility of improvement in his condition. The report detailed Harish's medical history, neurological assessment and prognosis, concluding that his condition was irreversible. "This is a very sad report. We have reached a stage where we will have to take the final call," the bench had observed on December 18, noting that the case warranted moving to the next stage contemplated under Common Cause....