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Informist, Wednesday, Jul. 15, 2026

 

NEW DELHI – The Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau has told the Supreme Court that the final draft report of the Jun. 12, 2025, crash of the London-bound Air India flight in Gujarat is expected to be ready approximately in October. The panel has said that media speculation and narrative putting the blame on the pilots for the accident have made some witnesses restrictive and nonresponsive.

 

The panel said that the probe was currently at the stage of evidence collection, technical examination, and forensic examination which are the core fact-finding stage and that the investigation in all probability is anticipated to be completed within approximately six weeks. The panel's response came on a plea filed by Pushkar Raj Sabharwal, the father of one of the pilots who was flying the aircraft and lost his life in the tragedy. 

 

The panel opposed the prayer sought by the father to furnish cockpit voice recordings. It said that Aircraft (Investigation of Accidents and Incidents) Rules, 2025 specifically and separately provides that the audio content of cockpit voice recordings as well as image and audio content of airborne image recordings shall not be disclosed to the public, adding that it is an absolute statutory prohibition. Further, the rules also bars disclosing statements taken from persons by the investigating authorities in the course of their investigation. The panel said that such protections serve a critical purpose. This preserves the candour of witnesses, the independence of investigators, the integrity of the no-blame investigation process, and India's international obligations under the Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation, it said.

 

If witnesses and persons involved in aircraft operation know that their statements may be disclosed in litigation or public proceedings, they will become guarded or unwilling to cooperate, thereby defeating the very purpose of the safety investigation, said the panel. Furthermore, 2025 Rules provides that the final report shall not disclose the names of the persons involved in the accident or incident, reflecting the legislature's considered intent that the investigation process is not used for purposes of attribution or blame, said the panel. 

 

The panel opposed a parallel probe by a court appointed body, as sought by the petitioner. The Chicago Convention, the Bharatiya Vayuyan Adhiniyam, 2024 and the Aircraft (Investigation of Accidents and Incidents) Rules, 2025 together constitute a complete statutory and treaty framework governing aircraft accident investigations, said the panel. This framework vests investigative authority primarily and exclusively in the bureau, leaving no legal basis for a parallel investigation into the crash, said the panel. 

 

Another petitioner Safety Matters Foundation, an aviation safety non-government organisation, had argued that the preliminary report issued by the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau was "incomplete, selective, and lacking in transparency, thereby undermining the credibility of the investigative process and the trust of the travelling public". The petition stated that the preliminary report contained selective disclosures, such as paraphrased references to cockpit voice recordings without timestamps, full transcripts, or corroborative context. To this, the panel said that it is only the final report, and not the preliminary report, that will establish what happened, how it happened, and why it happened.  

 

The Air India flight from Ahmedabad to Gatwick in London had crashed seconds after takeoff, killing 241 passengers and the crew. According to the preliminary report by the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau, the fuel control switches in the cockpit of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner had been flipped, starving the engines of fuel. However, the report does not say whether the control switches were flipped by a person or in another way. End 

 

Reported by Surya Tripathi

Edited by Akul Nishant Akhoury

 

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