Shame drives HIV couple to kill themselves and their three children

The couple, who lived in a middle-class district of Bombay, had hidden their infection from everybody except the father’s brother, who discovered the bodies.

Campaigners say that such situations are not uncommon in India, where HIV/Aids carries a massive social stigma. The UN estimates that 2.5 million people are infected across the country and has said that India is in the grip of a serious epidemic.

Knowledge about the illness is often confused — even among India’s professional medical community — but it is widely connected with sexual activity, which is a taboo topic in what remains a deeply conservative country