The
Supreme Court (SC) on Friday observed that no blame could be directed to the
pilot of the Air India flight that crashed in Ahmedabad on June 12 this year.
A
two-judge bench of Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi was hearing a
petition filed by Pushkar Raj Sabharwal, the father of Commander Sumeet
Sabharwal, and sent notices to the Centre and the aviation regulator, the
Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).
On
June 12, a London-bound Air India flight from Ahmedabad crashed shortly after
takeoff, killing all but one passenger on board. The total fatalities were 260,
with 240 people on board.
Appearing
for Sabharwal, Senior Advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan contended that the
current investigation being conducted by the Aircraft Accident Investigation
Bureau (AAIB) was not independent, and sought an independent judicial probe.
Along
with Sabharwal, the Federation of Indian Pilots (FIP) also filed a petition,
seeking an independent judicial probe in the case.
Justice Surya Kant, who heard the petition today,
told the 91-year-old grief-stricken father of the late pilot, "It's
extremely unfortunate, this crash, but you should not carry this burden that
your son is being blamed. Nobody can blame him for anything."
Clarifying
further, Justice Bagchi said that there was no insinuation against the deceased
pilot in the preliminary AAIB report. "One pilot asked whether the fuel
was cut off by the other; the other said no. There's no suggestion of fault in
that report."
The
court also termed the foreign reporting as "nasty" after the
petitioner drew the court's attention to a report published in The Wall Street
Journal in July, which claimed that it was the captain who turned off the fuel
switches to the plane's engines. The bench clarified that foreign media
reporting would not influence the judicial process.
"We are not bothered by foreign reports. Your
remedy should then be before a foreign court. That is nasty reporting. No one
in India believes it was the pilot's fault", the court observed.
Earlier
in September, while hearing a public interest litigation seeking a
court-monitored investigation into the Air India crash, the top court flagged
concerns over the selective leak of AAIB's preliminary report. The court noted that
the leak fuelled a media narrative, attributing the crash to pilot error.
The
bench described the selective and piecemeal publication of the preliminary
report as “unfortunate” and emphasised that complete confidentiality must be
maintained until the inquiry is concluded.
The matter will now be heard on November 10.