Deceased diplomat's family moves Delhi HC for new post-mortem examination

New Delhi, March 10 The family of India's representative to Palestine Mukul Arya on Thursday approached the Delhi High Court seeking a judicial probe into the IFS Officer's death and also a second post-mortem examination of the body.

The 2008-batch Indian Foreign Service officer, posted in Ramallah, was found dead in his office premises on March 6.

The plea which was mentioned before a division bench of Justices Vipin Sanghi and Dinesh Kumar Sharma was later listed for hearing before Justice Rajnish Bhatnagar.

In the plea, Arya's family sought a panel of doctors from the AIIMS be constituted on an urgent basis for conducting a post mortem and autopsy. The plea also sought to constitute a commission for inquiring into the suspicious circumstances under which the envoy died and submit a report before the court within a stipulated period of time.

Allowing the request for autopsy, the court stated the post-mortem examination to be video-graphed and same made part of the record.

During the course of the hearing, senior advocate Siddharth Luthra appeared on behalf of the petitioner family.

Centre's counsel Anurag Ahuluwalia apprised the bench that the Ministry of External Affairs will facilitate the autopsy to be conducted at AIIMS as per the family's plea.

On March 8, the MEA had said that Arya died of natural causes, denying speculative reports about the nature of his death.

"We have seen some irresponsible comments on the passing away of Mukul Arya, Representative of India in Ramallah. He died of natural causes. We urge that the tragic demise of a young diplomat be treated with decency and respect," read the statement of MEA.