Prejudiced inquiry: Father of AI-171 pilot moves SC

On September 22, the top court said certain aspects of the AAIB preliminary report on the crash indicated lapses on the part of pilots, and had issued notices to the Centre and the Director General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) on another plea seeking an independent, fair and expeditious probe. 

Pushkaraj Sabharwal, 91, has sought a fair, transparent and technically robust investigation into the tragic incident. An incomplete and prejudiced inquiry, without identification of the exact cause of the accident, endangers the lives of future passengers and undermines aviation safety at large, causing a violation of Article 21 of the Constitution, the plea said. 

The petition, filed through AP&J Chambers on October 10, made the Union Ministry of Civil Aviation, the DGCA , and the Director General of the Aircraft Accident Investigation Board (AAIB) as respondents, and is likely to come up for hearing after Diwali vacation. 

The plea seeks directions for the constitution of an independent committee, comprising aviation and technical experts also, to probe the crash that killed 229 passengers, 12 crew members, and 19 people on the ground. The ill-fated aircraft had taken off from Ahmedabad for London Gatwick but crashed within minutes, impacting the BJ Medical College hostel located less than a nautical mile from the end of runway. 

The debris was strewn over an area of nearly 1,000 by 400 feet, indicating a high-energy impact. The Emergency Locator Transmitter (ELT) failed to activate, and both the pilot-in-command Captain Sumeet Sabharwal and co-pilot Captain Clive Kunder lost their lives in the crash, the plea said. The petition said that the official investigation conducted by the AAIB and the DGCA is defective, biased, and technically unsound. 

The preliminary report, issued on July 12, 2025, is alleged to have wrongly attributed the cause of the crash to pilot error, while ignoring multiple systemic and technical failures that could have played a decisive role. According to the petition, the inquiry team, rather than undertaking a comprehensive technical investigation, appears to have disproportionately focused on the deceased pilots, who can no longer defend themselves and overlooked plausible evidence of electrical, software, or design-level failures. -- PTI