Ahmedabad plane crash: 'Pilot not to be blamed, don't carry burden on yourself,' SC tells 91-year-old father

The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to take up on November 10 a petition field by the father of Captain Sumeet Sabharwal - the pilot who died in the Air India flight AI171 crash in Ahmedabad – and the Federation of Indian Pilots (FIP) seeking a court-monitored probe into the accident.

The June 12, 2025 crash of the London-bound Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner aircraft had claimed the lives of 265 people, including those of both pilots and crew members.

A Bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi issued notices to the Centre, the Directorate of Civil Aviation (DGCA) and the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB).

It directed the matter to be listed for further hearing on November 10, when another petition on the issue was scheduled to be taken up.

“It’s extremely unfortunate that this crash took place, but you should not carry this burden that your son is being blamed... Nobody can blame him for anything… No one in India believes it was the pilot's fault… It was an accident. There is no insinuation against him even in the preliminary report," Justice Kant told 91-year-old Pushkar Raj Sabharwal - the father of Captain Sumeet Sabharwal who died in the crash.

“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 Bench noted.

The court’s comments came after senior counsel Gopal Sankaranarayanan submitted on behalf of the petitioners that the current investigation by the AAIB was not independent and that the pilots were unnecessarily being blamed for the crash.

“I am the father of the Commander of the plane... I am 91 years old. This is a non-independent investigation. It should have been independent. It has taken four months,” Sankaranarayanan submitted.

He requested the top court to order a court-monitored probe under Rule 12 of the Aircraft (Investigation of Accidents and Incidents) Rules, which mandated impartiality in accident investigations.

As Sankaranarayanan drew the court's attention to a Wall Street Journal report, which allegedly suggested pilot error, citing an unnamed Indian government source, the Bench said, “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 pilots’ fault.”

The pilot’s father and the FIP have filed a petition filed under seeking a court-monitored committee comprising a retired judge of the Supreme Court and independent aviation and technical experts to conduct a fair, transparent and technically robust probe into the crash.

The petitioners have urged the top court to direct that all investigations carried out so far, including the preliminary report dated July 12, be treated as closed and all records, data, and evidence be transferred to the new inquiry panel to be set up.

Terming the ongoing probe as “incomplete, biased, and technically unsound”, the petitioners said it undermined India’s obligations under International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Annexe 13, which mandated an independent investigation authority.

The current five-member team is dominated by officials from the DGCA and the AAIB, the very entities responsible for regulatory oversight, thereby violating the principle of nemo judex in causa sua (no one should be a judge in their own cause), they alleged.

The AAIB report predominantly focused on the deceased pilots, who were no longer there to defend themselves and that the report failed to examine or eliminate other more plausible technical and procedural causes of the crash, the petitioners submitted.

Accusing the authorities of selectively leaking the contents of the Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR) to the media, they said it violated Rule 17(5) of the Aircraft (Investigation of Accidents and Incidents) Rules, 2017.

These leaks, they claim, fueled a “malicious media campaign” attributing fault to the deceased pilot without corroborative evidence, amounting to state-facilitated defamation and violation of the family’s right to dignity under Article 21.

This is the second petition filed in the top court on the June 12 plane crash. The Supreme Court had on September 22 asked the Centre, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) and the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) to respond to a PIL filed by ‘Safety Matters Foundation’ seeking an independent, fair and expeditious probe into the June 12 Air India plane crash at Ahmedabad.

Expressing concern over the selective leak of the preliminary inquiry report, which led to a media narrative blaming pilot error for the crash of the London-bound Air India Flight AI171, a Bench led by Justice Surya Kant had noted that certain aspects of the July 12 AAIB preliminary report indicating lapses on the part of pilots were "irresponsible".

"Suppose tomorrow, it is said pilot 'A' is responsible… The family of the pilot is bound to suffer… Instead of piecemeal leaking of information, somebody should maintain confidentiality till regular inquiry is taken to logical conclusion," the Bench had said, terming it as “very unfortunate”.

Calling the attribution of pilot error “implausible” and “procedurally unjust,” the petitioners argue that the failure to probe design or software integration failures in Boeing’s Common Core System amounts to non-application of mind and suppression of material facts.

Sabharwal’s father said his son had an “unblemished career spanning over 30 years, with 15,638 hours of incident-free flying, including 8,596 hours on Boeing 787-8 aircraft, without a single reported lapse or incident causing fatalities or otherwise.”

The petition pointed to several technical lapses in the preliminary report, including failure to examine the unexplained deployment of the Ram Air Turbine (RAT) before any pilot input, the simultaneous failure of multiple electrical systems, and damage to the Enhanced Aircraft Flight Recorder (EAFR) consistent with lithium-ion combustion. It also notes that the investigation ignored prior incidents involving the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, which could indicate systemic or design-level faults.

“The investigation has been prejudiced, arbitrary, and structurally compromised, with the regulator effectively investigating itself,” the plea states, adding that this endangers future passengers and violates the state’s constitutional obligation to protect life under Article 21.