Judge Loya case: HC allows petitioner to amend ‘prayer clause’

Judge Loya, who was presiding over the Sohrabuddin Shaikh encounter case, died of a heart attack in 2014 while staying at the government guest house Ravi Bhavan in Nagpur.

A division bench of the Nagpur high court heard a case that seeks all details of CBI special court judge BH Loya’s death in late 2014 and alleges that he was poisoned using a radioactive isotope.

Special CBI court judge BH Loya, who was presiding over the Sohrabuddin Sheikh encounter case, died in Nagpur on December 1, 2014. (File Photo)

The bench allowed the petitioner, lawyer and activist Satish Uke to amend the so-called prayer clause, where a plaintiff lists expectations of the court, and deferred hearing by two weeks. Two earlier benches refused the hear the case.

Judge Loya, who was presiding over the Sohrabuddin Shaikh encounter case, died of a heart attack in 2014 while staying at the government guest house Ravi Bhavan in Nagpur.

Amit Shah, who was Gujarat’s minister of state for home at the time of the alleged fake encounter, was once named in the case but subsequently discharged.

A CBI special court recently acquitted all the accused in the case and the judge also said the investigation by CBI was politically motivated. The Bharatiya Janata Party says the Congress tried to use the CBI to frame Shah.

The SC ruled on April 19, 2018 that it did not have reason to believe there was anything mysterious about Judge Loya’s death. Uke clarified that he was not demanding a reinvestigation into the case, but wants all records pertaining to judge’s death.