Justice Loya death case Live: SC bench headed by CJI Dipak Misra begins hearing plea, says report

A Supreme Court bench headed by Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra began hearing on Monday pleas seeking an investigation into the 2014 death of special CBI court judge justice BH Loya.

The Loya case is seen as the trigger for the four senior Supreme Court judges — Justices J Chelameswar, Ranjan Gogoi, MB Lokur and Kurian Joseph — to go public with their criticism of CJI Misra for allocating sensitive cases to junior judges. Judge Loya, then presiding over the Sohrabuddin Sheikh encounter case, died in Nagpur on December 1, 2014. Current BJP president Amit Shah was named in the case but in December the same year, he was discharged by the court.

Read: Have no suspicion, stop harassing us: Justice Loya’s son on his death

Besides the CJI, Justices AM Khanwilkar and DY Chandrachud will be on the bench, according to the list of business released by the Supreme Court registry on Saturday.

Here are the live updates:

1:30pm: Reports say senior advocate Harish Salve, who is appearing from Maharashtra government, has told the court Justice Loya died of cardiac arrest.

1:15pm: SC bench headed by CJI begins hearing the plea, say TV reports.

What we know so far

The two public interest litigations (PILs) demand an independent probe into the death of Judge Loya. The petitions were originally listed before a bench headed by Justice Arun Misra.

On January 16, the bench headed by Justice Arun Misra heard the matter directing the Maharashtra government to share details of the police investigation into Judge Loya’s death with the petitioners and also passed an order for listing of the case before an appropriate bench.

In the SC a roster system is followed to mark cases to benches that sit in the combination of two judges. Roster is notified by the SC registry after the CJI approves it. However, the roster is not made public and even lawyers are unaware of the same.

When a “sensitive matter” or PIL is filed the SC registry brings it to the notice of the CJI who then takes a call on who will hear it.

Read: Nagpur police say CBI judge Loya died of heart attack

Justice Arun Misra’s January 16 order, fuelling apprehensions over him hearing the case again came a day after he broke down at a morning tea meet of SC judges where he expressed his anguish at being collateral damage in the fight between the four senior judges and the CJI because their allegations cast aspersions on his abilities.