The father of the young woman who died after being refused an emergency abortion in Ireland has appealed directly to the Irish prime minister, Enda Kenny, to change the country's legislation on abortion.Interviewed by the Observer, Andanappa Yalagi issued a personal plea to Kenny: "Sir, please change your law and take consideration of humanity. Please change the law on abortion, which will help to save the lives of so many women in the future."
Mr Yalagi also says he will take legal action against the hospital to try to prevent future acts of "inhumanity". He and his wife, Akkamahadevi, expressed fury at the way in which Savita Halappanavar, 31, had been treated and revealed that no one from the hospital nor the Irish government had been in touch to express any remorse for the death of their only daughter.
"I want to take legal action against them over the inhumane way they treated my daughter," said Mr Yalagi, speaking at his home in the southern Indian town of Belgaum.
Mrs Halappanavar died in agony at University Hospital Galway after doctors refused her pleas to abort her miscarried baby and told her that Ireland was a Catholic country and that she had to abide by its laws on abortion.
Her family say their only solace is that her husband was able to tell her, moments before she was rushed into intensive care, that she had been carrying a baby girl – which had been her greatest desire.
The case has prompted a furious reaction in Ireland and around the world and brought calls for the law to be clarified to allow an abortion to be carried out if the mother's life is in danger.
Even the Catholic church in India has expressed surprise at the hospital's refusal to permit the abortion.
In their first full interview with a British newspaper, her parents described their heartbreak and devastation at the loss of a beautiful and vivacious young woman who had brought only joy to their lives until her death on 28 October.
Of her treatment at the Galway hospital, Mr Yalagi said: "They are doctors but they were not humane. If they had been humane, they would have treated her. I do not want this to happen to other people. I am very angry."
He said that his daughter and her husband, Praveen, had pleaded with the hospital to carry out an abortion after she began to miscarry, but doctors refused because they could still detect a foetal heartbeat.
Only when that stopped did they finally carry out an emergency operation to remove the foetus, but by then it was too late to save the mother.
The couple said they wanted the Indian government to take up the issue with its Irish counterpart at the highest level. "We want the government of India to put pressure on Ireland to change the law so that this cannot happen in the future," said Mr Yalagi.
India summoned Ireland's ambassador on Friday to express its concern over the death and to ask for the inquiry into it to be independent.
Mrs Halappanavar had worked as a dentist in Galway for four years after moving there with her husband, an engineer with the Boston Scientific company. The couple married in 2008.
Her parents had been enjoying a holiday with them in Ireland and the four had travelled around the country seeing the sights. They discovered she was pregnant shortly after arriving.
"She was very excited and she said that she really wanted a daughter," said Mr Yalagi. "She had a great love for the female child." But on 21 October, Mrs Halappanavar went to hospital complaining of severe back pain.
Not realising the seriousness of the situation, her parents returned to India two days later when their 90-day visas expired.
The last they saw of her was in her hospital bed, where they said she appeared happy and relaxed and showing no signs of serious problems.
Her mother said that they were still unable to come to terms with their daughter's death.
"She was so open-hearted and made us laugh. She always kept us happy, she was making jokes. She always took a great interest in everything she did and she was a real leader," she said.
"We are in deep grief and sorrow. We could not bear her departure," her father added. "It was so unexpected. The last time we saw her in the hospital in Galway she was smiling and saying that they were providing good food. She was in a normal room and we thought that it was nothing serious."
Mrs Halappanavar was 17 weeks' pregnant when she was admitted to hospital. Her father said that her condition had deteriorated after their departure and she appeared to be miscarrying.
"But the hospital refused an abortion. They said there was still a foetal heartbeat. They told her that it was a Catholic country and that abortion was banned until the foetus's heartbeat stopped. She requested several times and my son-in-law requested, telling them, 'We are not Catholics, we are Hindus, please do the abortion immediately because her life is in danger', but they continued to refuse. She was terribly worried and was in great pain. You would think that for humanity's sake they would have carried out an abortion."
Mrs Halappanavar died of septicaemia and her husband had to break the news to her father.
"When I found out that she had taken her last breath it was a terrible shock," said Mr Yalagi. "I could not believe the words that he was saying. She was my only daughter."
But he said he was glad that her husband had had the opportunity to tell her she had been carrying a girl before she was taken into the intensive care unit.
"He leaned over and told her that it was a female child. I don't know if she was still conscious but I am glad he could tell her," he said.
The couple spoke fondly of a young woman who had seemed to have everything going for her in life.
"She was very intelligent and very talented and she always had a good relation with the public," said Mr Yalagi. "She was taking very good care of us. She was a kind and thoughtful girl."
She was a talented dancer who had taught herself and had been passing on her skills by teaching children in Galway to dance.
"Even in school she was doing dances," her mother said. "By birth she was a dancer."
Mrs Halappanavar's body was returned to India on 3 November and she was buried the same day.
The Irish prime minister has promised to look into the case.
The insistence that an abortion could not be carried out has prompted anger and bemusement in India, even among Catholics.
The spokesman for the Delhi archdiocese told the Hindustan Times that while the church was against abortion, the priority should have been to save the mother.
"You are not aborting the child. You are only taking steps to save the mother of the child," Fr Dominic Emmanuel told the paper.