SC reserves verdict on pleas for probe into judge Loya's death

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court reserved its order on a slew of petitions seeking a probe into the death of judge BH Loya more than three years ago, after arguments came to a close on Friday.

The Maharashtra government, which opposed the plea, told the court on Friday that the issue was being raked up now only to target “an individual using the unfortunate death as a façade”.

Loya was the judge of the CBI court that heard the politically sensitive Sohrabuddin Sheikh encounter case.


The petitioners include Bombay Lawyers’ Association, which sought the court’s intervention citing media reports on the possibility of foul play in Loya’s death, which the doctors who attended to him and post-mortem report said was due to cardiac arrest. “Their (petitioners’) so-called aim, to protect the judiciary, is completely false,” senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi, appearing for Maharashtra, told a three-judge bench led by Chief Justice Dipak Misra. “In the process they are causing immense damage to the judiciary, attacking it at its roots.”

He pointed out that senior advocate Dushyant Dave, who represented the Bombay Lawyers Association, wanted to cross-examine the four district judges who were with Loya when he died.