Aruna Shanbaug's niece claims body, last rites to be performed today

The last rites of Aruna Shanbaug, who passed away after being in coma for 42 years, will be performed at 3 pm on Monday.

Her body will be kept at the KEM hospital to pay the last respects. 

Shanbaug's niece Smita Nayak arrived at KEM Hospital to claim her body and her son will perform her last rites.​

Speaking to dna, Nayak said, "We had come to meet her 15 years back, but hospital didn't allow us to do so." 

For42 yrs, Kem hospital nurses wr #ArunaShanbag 's family. Her niece smita @hospital to claim her body! @dna pic.twitter.com/Nbz1GLsvsV

— Somita Pal (@somitapal) May 18, 2015

Aruna Shanbaug's last rites happening at Kem Hospital (Mumbai). pic.twitter.com/WLks4GIUcC

— ANI (@ANI_news) May 18, 2015

Shanbaug, a former nurse who lived in a vegetative state for the past 42 years after being brutally sexually assaulted and became the face of the debate on euthanasia.​

66-year-old Aruna, was put on ventilator support in the ICU of the hospital at Parel on Tuesday, after she suffered from a serious bout of pneumonia last week.

Aruna was working as a staff nurse at the KEM hospital when she was raped by ward boy Sohanlal Bhartha Walmiki on November 27, 1973​. He had also strangled her with a dog chain. The asphyxiation cut off oxygen supply to her brain, leaving her in a vegetative state.

Sohanlal was caught and convicted, and served two concurrent seven-year sentences for assault and robbery, but neither for rape or sexual molestation, nor for the alleged "unnatural sexual offence."