New Delhi— The Central government informed the Supreme Court on Thursday that the pilot of the ill-fated Air India flight, which crashed on June 12 and claimed 260 lives, has not been blamed in the Aircraft Accident Investigation Board’s (AAIB) preliminary report.
A Bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi heard the matter, during which Solicitor General Tushar Mehta explained that the AAIB probe team was constituted under international aviation protocols and statutory provisions. He emphasized that the investigation followed global standards to determine the cause of the tragedy.
Justice Bagchi noted that the AAIB inquiry’s purpose is not to assign blame but to identify causes and prevent similar incidents in the future.
Advocate Prashant Bhushan, representing an NGO, called for a parallel judicial inquiry, arguing that a disaster of such magnitude warranted an independent examination. He further cited concerns raised by a pilots’ federation, which claimed that certain aircraft models were unreliable and posed safety risks to passengers.
Justice Kant cautioned against turning the proceedings into a dispute between airlines and asked the Solicitor General to submit the Centre’s detailed response to the petition filed by the father of one of the victims. The court adjourned the hearing for two weeks.
The crash occurred when Air India’s Boeing 787-8, operating flight AI171 from Ahmedabad to London’s Gatwick Airport, plunged into a medical hostel complex shortly after takeoff. The disaster killed 265 people, including 241 passengers and crew. Among them were 169 Indians, 52 Britons, seven Portuguese, one Canadian, and 12 crew members. Only one passenger, identified as British national Vishwashkumar Ramesh, survived the crash.
