Conduct of Bombay HC judges questioned

NEWDELHI: Appearing for the Bombay Lawyers Association, which is seeking an independent investigation into the death of special CBI court judge BH Loya in late 2014, senior advocate Dushyant Dave questioned the conduct of some sitting judges of the Bombay high court, and also claimed judges who didn’t toe the establishment line in the Sohrabuddin encounter case (which Loya was hearing at the time of his death), were being transferred.

A bench headed by Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra is hearing a bunch of petitions on Judge Loya’s death.

Pointing to “too many coincidences” around his death, Dave recounted the sequence of events and told the bench of CJI Misra, Justice AM Khanwilkar and Justice DY Chandrachud that “there is suspicion around the death of Judge Loya”.

During the course of hearing, Justice Chandrachud took excep- tion to Dave saying whether the top court was trying to “wish away everything” in the case.

“We are not wishing away anything,” said Justice Chandrachud. “We are also not going to pass bad-faith judgment about the HC and district court judges.”

Judge Loya died on December 1, 2014, in Nagpur where he had gone to attend the wedding of a colleague’s daughter. His death hit headlines in November 2017 after media reports quoting his sister raised questions about the circumstances surrounding his death and its alleged link to the Sohrabuddin case. In a related development, the Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL) filed an application seeking a courtmonitored probe by a “high-powered team” into Loya’s death. The bench agreed to hear CPIL counsel Prashant Bhushan on Friday. The Maharashtra government has sought dismissal of the petitions, saying four judges who were with Loya confirmed he died of cardiac arrest.