The father of late Captain Sumeet Sabharwal, who was piloting the ill-fated Air India flight AI171, has moved the Supreme Court demanding a judicially monitored probe into the fatal crash that killed 260 people, including 241 passengers, shortly after takeoff from Ahmedabad on June 12, 2025. Expressing grave dissatisfaction with the ongoing investigation by the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB), he alleged a lack of transparency, credibility, and objectivity in the agency’s findings. The writ petition, filed jointly by Pushkaraj Sabharwal and the Federation of Indian Pilots (FIP) on October 10, calls for the establishment of a Court Monitored Committee to conduct a fair and technically sound inquiry into the accident.
The petition demands that all earlier investigations by the AAIB, including its preliminary report issued on July 12, be considered closed. It further seeks the transfer of all materials, records, and evidence to a new committee or court of inquiry led by a retired Supreme Court judge, assisted by independent aviation and technical experts. According to the petitioners, the ongoing probe has ignored key design-related issues with the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner and instead focused on attributing blame to the pilots without credible evidence. They contend that this approach violates international standards of investigation under Annex 13 of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and undermines India’s obligations to conduct impartial accident inquiries.
Pushkaraj Sabharwal, 91, in his plea and accompanying letters, accused the AAIB of bias and of shielding the aircraft manufacturer from scrutiny. He argued that the preliminary report was “deficient, diversionary, and discrepant,” alleging it neither presented the technical facts of the accident nor explained the sequence of events leading to the crash. Instead, it contained insinuations about the pilot’s mental state while appearing to exonerate the manufacturer. The petitioner highlighted that selective leaks of cockpit voice recordings and internal investigation details had been circulated in the media, fueling false narratives that his son had been under psychological stress or contemplating suicide.
In his August 29 letter to the Civil Aviation Secretary and the Director General of the AAIB, Pushkaraj strongly objected to these insinuations, calling them damaging to his son’s professional and personal reputation. He said such speculative claims were contrary to fact and had caused him severe emotional distress. He also pointed out that Captain Sabharwal, divorced 15 years ago and bereaved of his mother over three years earlier, had since completed more than 100 flights without incident. He described his son as a seasoned professional with over 25 years of flying experience, logging 15,638.22 total flying hours, including 8,596 on the Boeing 787-8, and serving as a Line Training Captain licensed by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).
The petition invokes Rule 12 of the Aircraft (Investigation of Accidents and Incidents) Rules, 2017, which allows the central government to institute a formal investigation if deemed necessary. Pushkaraj argues that the government’s failure to order such a probe has resulted in a compromised investigation that violates his and his late son’s constitutional rights, including the right to reputation under Article 21 of the Indian Constitution. He emphasized that the absence of a transparent and independent inquiry has eroded public trust and could expose India to international liability under ICAO protocols.
The AAIB’s preliminary report stated that fuel supply to both engines was cut off within one second of each other, leading to confusion in the cockpit moments after takeoff. The cockpit voice recorder reportedly captured one pilot asking the other why the fuel had been cut off, to which the second pilot responded that he had not done so. However, the AAIB cautioned against premature conclusions, noting that the final report would determine the precise technical cause of the accident. Despite this clarification, speculation has persisted in public and media discourse, prompting the family to seek judicial intervention.
Through his petition, Pushkaraj Sabharwal has urged the Supreme Court to direct that the entire investigation be transferred to an independent, court-monitored committee to ensure fairness, accountability, and adherence to international investigative standards. He maintains that only a judicially supervised process led by an impartial panel can restore confidence in the inquiry and deliver justice to the victims and their families.
